Brilliant
To outsiders and beginners,
people who ride motorcycles might appear to be one big happy family.
Like a giant borscht of head-nodding mutual admiration; all brothers
(and sisters) of the handlebars, riding as one on the highways of their
dreams.
But it's not like that at all, and the following motorcycle riders are to blame…
L-platers on Kawasaki Ninjas
For reasons no-one can explain, L-platers on Ninjas are an order of magnitude more annoying than L-platers on any other bike.
It may have a lot to do with the poor Ninja sounding like a tin of
gravel being kicked down the road when a can is fitted to it and it is
being bounced off the rev-limiter through the first three gears.
Their riding gear is cheap and mostly second-hand, they smell of fear
and bravado in equal measure, their chains are unlubricated and their
tyres are flat in the middle. Counter-steering is not a concept that can
be explained to them without it ending in tears of confusion.
Many of them belong to Facebook sites, which are echo chambers of
their own massive ignorance and contain many pictures of people who have
parked their vehicles in ways they don't approve of.
They can be found…
On the Internet, mainly. These are mostly inner-city rattlers, so they
spend a lot of time riding around the metropolitan areas of capital
cities, visiting ice cream parlours and low-rent pizzerias.
On weekends, the braver ones can be found crashing on winding roads
close to the city, or being processed like hams by the Highway Patrol
who feeds on them like whales eat plankton.
Outlaw club members
They don't socialise with other motorcyclists very much. Not because
they don't like them, but because they have nothing in common with them.
So they're largely indifferent to other riders.
The bikes they ride are not like other Harleys. The colours they wear
cannot be bought in any shop. They are currently being crushed under
the government jackboot for being too scary-looking, but they can still
be relied upon to always drink from the skulls of their enemies.
They can be found…
Sometimes in their clubhouses but, more often than not, at their homes,
since the police have been avidly stripping their clubhouses of
everything from light-fittings and taps, to wall-hangings and pictures
of their dead members. It's rare to see them on the roads these days.
People with topboxes
While no-one can deny the sheer practicality of a topbox, one must also
admit a topbox is the nil-plus-ultra example of men who have given up on
ever seeing a naked woman again.
Buying one of the most impractical transportation devices, then
spending large sums of money fitting heinous-looking steamer trunks a
metre higher than the rear-axle of the bike, and declaring it suddenly
'practical', is the act of a train-spotter. Or someone who paints in
water-colours.
They can be found…
Outside shops. Or looking smugly at you and your ocky straps from across the service station.
Adventure tourers
Very few people who buy adventure bikes actually go adventuring on them.
Just like the people who buy massive four-wheel drive rescue vehicles
to drive to work every day, adventure bikes are bought for two reasons:
1. "I may, one day, ride to Tajikistan and this is the bike to do it
on." And 2. "I will never ride to Tajikistan, but I want people to think
I will."
Like BMW riders who only speak with other BMW riders and God,
Adventure Tourers only speak to other Adventure tourers. And it's
usually about places they plan to go, but never will, wearing gear made
by German scientists.
They can be found…
In peak-hour traffic, which they can't lane-split because they've fitted
2000-litre aluminium panniers to their bike just in case the wilderness
ever calls to them and they simply must answer.
People who ride Chinese motorcycles
These are a strange and feral breed of human. Like crazed lepers craving
social acceptance, they bought a Chinese bike because they imagined it
to be great value, and secretly hoped no-one would ever know it was made
in China because it had an Italian-sounding name.
They live a life of disillusionment and despair, especially when they
find out how much a $4000 Chinese bike depreciates 12 hours after it is
purchased.
They can be found…
On train station platforms, or in front of computers sending angry emails to Xiangang Heavy Industries.
Scooter riders
Not motorcyclists. If they were motorcyclists, they would ride motorcycles.
They can be found…
Everywhere. Like rats. And fleas. And cockroaches.
Bearded women who smell like expensive coffee
It is the Golden Age of the Hipster. And if there is a God, that age
will be short and end in a welter of ethically sourced tears, fuelled by
the smoke from early '80s Japanese motorcycles which have spontaneously
combusted in shame at having stupid knobby tyres fitted to them while
being menaced with angle-grinders.
More fond of looking like sexually questionable lumberjacks, their
skill-free riding is usually done en masse and informed by relentless
good cheer. It's almost as if they imagine that no-one's ever belted a
grinning buffoon before.
They can be found…
Raising awareness of the bearded in inner-city suburbs successful
immigrants have all moved away from, by drinking garbage coffee,
slurping smashed avocados, and pounding quinoa into their delicate
blurters.
The ATGATT crowd
People who ruthlessly dress for the slide rather than the ride and who
cluck like condemnatory chickens at everyone who isn't wearing full race
leathers everywhere all the time, are not so much motorcyclists as they
are angst-filled nannies self-prophesying themselves into the front of a
truck.
The sheer danger of motorcycling makes them uncomfortable, so rather
than upskilling themselves, the ATGATT crowd (All The Gear, All The
Time) wrap themselves in Dainese-brand cotton-wool against the
inevitable disaster that awaits them.
They can be found…
In front of their computers demanding people tell them of the state of
their favourite piece of heavily frequented road, so they may briefly
ride upon it, before parking their motorcycles to sip bad coffee and eat
sad hamburgers for the balance of the day. In winter, they are the
shivering frozen ones, and in summer they are the ones glistening in
fool-sweat.
Riders who've returned after years off the bike
Certainly not the sharpest blades in the kitchen, these worthies will
either buy 500kg Harleys, presumably because they like to hear the sound
their exploding knees and hips make when they try and move them, or an
Adventure bike they need a ladder to climb onto.
Few of them make it past their first 'big trip', and most will
usually give it up after falling over at a service station, or being
rear-ended by a bus on the first day they decide to ride their new bike
to work.
They can be found…
Usually, they are seen being loaded into the back of ambulances, but
sometimes you can find them on gurneys being triaged by a sad-faced
nurse at the nearest hospital.