The Magic of Ears

This is for my detractors. And this is me now laughing.


The ears, folks, they work! The ears have the magical ability to make me less of a stuck up b!tch, and much more approachable. They also increase my visibility on the road tremendously. I can't really prove that last statement, but because I said it, it's now a scientific fact.



You see, one of the greatest dangers to a motorcyclist is the inattentive driver. I read somewhere that about 75% of motorcycle accidents are caused by cagers, or car drivers. If you follow any motorcycle online message boards, you always read about some accident or another each week. The consensus is anything that makes us more visible on the road is good. Ears are good.

For some reason the ears are a hit with kids. No matter where they are, in a car, on the street, in a field, they will stop and look at me. They get a huge kick out of seeing the tiger eared biker.



Prior to the ears, it was rare that anyone would approach me at the lookout. Many people would pass the bike and nod or say, "nice bike." That was about it. Now that I have the ears, people aren't so afraid to approach and start a conversation, or at least try to get a better look.

The first week I had the ears, a tour guide got a look at them and yelled across the parking lot that the ears were cute. A cute, and really tall, Japanese girl stopped to watch me put on my gear. She kept saying, "kawaii." That means "cute." (I mentioned this before.) Now all I need is another bus load of Okinawan college girls. Lornette likes to tease me about it, but she just doesn't understand. A bus load of Japanese college girls. Right Guys? (Girls, think of a bus load of Ross's.)


(The second girl is Thai, but I wanted to show the impact of seeing more than one beautiful girl at a time.)

The other day I hinted in another blog that some tourist came and spoke with us. One of them said the ears were cute and that she recognized me from the town. They were at a shop on the side of the street eating shaved ice (snow cones). See how visible I am?

Today I got up to the lookout and just as I started to take off my helmet, a lady ran up to me.

"Those ears are great! I just have to take a picture of them. Can you put your helmet back on?"



And as I was leaving, another tourist started calling out to me. I had a hard time hearing him since I had my helmet on and was facing away, but he persisted.

"Sir, I just gotta tell you. The bike itself is awesome. But the helmet, the helmet makes it fukking phenomenal! My wife saw them and said, 'what the hell?' She thinks they're the coolest."



So there you have it. Irrefutable anecdotal evidence that my ears have been increasing my visibility and have been attracting people to me. Mission accomplished. Even the Fonz likes them. Ayyyyyyyyyyyyy.