I visited the swamp yesterday, had to stop and ask Ol' Yoda about a perplexing little issue that had come up.

I had picked me up a $700 motorcycle that had a hundred dollars worth of National Cycle "Street Shield" --a smallish flyshield sized thing-- mounted on it.  Previous owner apparently thought it is a real long distance cruiser (of the smaller 535cc persuasion) so it just had to have a bug catcher on it.  

Some people, you know the sort.

I was planning to take it off, but I procrastinated as I was going to dump the bike for a quick sale/small profit ....  the bug catcher actually looked good on it and added some "perception style" value to the package.

Bike fixed up better than expected and I found myself intending to keep it as for $700 it would do everything my Savage really didn't want to do and it left my Savage fancy free for some potential vague plans for hop-it-up-bobberdom on down the road a bit.

But warm weather had arrived and I found a perplexity that I couldn't solve that drove me into the swamp to ask the Jedi Master of Cheapness for another lesson in the Force.

Problem:

The deflection blast from the flyshield didn't bother me in the winter as I wear a full face shield helmet (when it's cold the full face shield keeps my nose warm).  

My summer helmet is a black shorty shell and the deflection wind blast is smacking me right in the face and trying to tear my shorty right off my headbone.  Can't have this !!!  This sucks worse than thick swarming June bugs in May time!   My face is getting a plus crop of wind and skeeters and doodle bugs as the wind blast delivers them with precision & accuracy right about brow height.

I checked with all them internet sellers, an appropriate size National Cycle to stop this wind blast issue is about $150 tall.  Selling the old one and getting the new one would put me out at least $90.  Yikes, that's almost a week's worth of gas -- more'n I want to spend right now, anyway.

So I went to see the Jedi Master of Cheapness himself, looking for a solution.

Yoda was outside hoeing his mud garden getting ready to plant him a row or two of some sort of warpy little squash looking things that he likes to munch on when I rode up.  He looked at me strangely and leaned forward on his little hoe while he shut his eyes and rocked back and forth a bit while he held up one hand, sampling the flows of the Force.

"Why is helmet on back of neck sitting?  Why bugging out are eyes and bisected your adams apple is?"

Honest, I tried to explain it to him, but he just grunted and kept shaking his head.  

"Bone-headness as always ... air-flow ignorance" was all he would say.

Finally, I got irritated and told him he didn't know how to fix the problem and that it looked like I was going to have to go pay $150 for a bigger windsheld.  

That pissed him off good and he took two big wind up swings around his head with his little bitty hoe and then did me an nasty hard upper-cut blow -- right on the bottom edge of my too-small but still potentially saleable National Cycle Street Sheild.  

    BWAM !!

I backed her up quick-like and popped her into gear and got away from the crazy old coot before he could wind up again, goodness knows that that sort of lick would hurt if he landed one on me or he could dent something if he hit the gas tank or fender or something.  

Demented old fool, that's what he is ....  windshield didn't break but he knocked up all catiwampus and he warped the heII out of it a beatin' on it like that.

Funny thing though ....  as I got her up to full speed I noticed it was sorta still and quiet like around my ears -- the air wasn't hitting me in the face any more.  You don't suppose ?????  

I studied the air flow by reaching up until my hand felt the slip stream -- it just went over the top of my shorty helment and it missed my head by six inches on a side.

It wasn't any bigger and it didn't sit very much higher, but before it didn't work and now it does.

Yoda, Jedi Master of Cheapness had done struck again.  $90 dollars saved with a single stroke of his muddy garden hoe.

Now that's some real cheapness in motion !!


Oldpaduanfeller

90 clams a week in gas?  That's at least 10 tanks in the savage.  That's 1000 miles.

What the heck is your commute like?

My honey bunny drives a cage that has to get filled up twice a week as she is driving 80 miles one way twice a week to take care of aging parents.  $90 bucks is only two fill ups of her cage.  I spend less than $10 for both bikes every Saturday, regular as clockwork.  

Fill them up on Saturday and run all week with no worries.  'Cept them durn June bugs that is ....  bug the size of an aircraft carrier -- feels like you just got shot, it does.  I try to dodge them if I see them coming.

Oldfeller