Before I bought my first serious bike (a yellow-jacket BMW), getting around Los Angeles was irksome, tiring, frustrating. I never angrily gestured at anyone and I certainly never road-raged, but once or twice guys tried to road-rage me. (Here’s an incident that happened in March 2013.)

But it wasn’t the psychotics who made driving around so trying. It was the slowboats — those fine folks who don’t signal, don’t nudge their way forward into a left-turn lane at a traffic-light intersection, and who will sometimes block a narrow neighborhood street as they look for street-meter parking.

Those daily feelings of entrapment are a thing of the past now. I drive the car only when forced to (weather, too far to travel, big load). Otherwise I’m a free man in Paris, and it’s glorious. No parking problems ever. Around six or seven dollars to fill the tank. The pokies are no longer an issue. And I always make excellent time.

I don’t have my own private parking spot in the outdoor Farmer’s Market lot, but you might as well call it that because nobody ever parks there. Ditto the Hollywood Arclight lot — a small area that’s too small for cars but more than enough for the Rumble Hog is always unoccupied, and even if a two-wheeled guy were to take it I could find an alternate spot immediately.

In short, as far as Los Angeles traffic is concerned I lead a stress-free life, and I doubt that I could feel more thankful and soothed about this than I already am.