My ex-wife was asthmatic.  She generally managed very well, but occasionally some smells or fumes would trigger a particularly bad attack.

     We were riding my motorbike and sidecar up a steep and very twisty Cornish hill, on a narrow two lane road,  carved between two rock walls with nowhere to pull off.  We slowed to a crawl behind a very smoky lorry.  Suddenly the poor lass was bouncing around on the  seat behind me, desperately trying to get her puffer from the top front pocket of her jacket.

    I slowed down even more to give her a fighting chance, praying she wouldn't drop the thing.  She had the presence of mind to rip off one glove for a better grip and wedged it down the back of my belt for safety.

    Seeing a gap appear between us and the lorry the utter prick in the car behind started beeping his horn and kept trying to pass us.  There was enough traffic coming the other way to make this a very unwise move.

    I head the sound of the puffer, followed by two more quick spurts, and a gasped "I'm okay now, as she leaned back in against me.

    The lorry meanwhile was still belching out black smoke so I dropped even further back.

    Matey behind was going ape with the horn.  So I pulled a trick you can do with really old bikes,  I manually retarded the ignition which let me ride even slower.  With a sidecar you can ride at less than walking pace without worrying about falling over.  We chugged majestically up to the top of the hill, the stinking lorry several yards ahead by now, and an impressive tail of frustrated car drivers behind us ;-)

    When we found a pull-in I stopped and let them all by.  For a few optimistic seconds I thought Matey was going to stop as well and remonstrate with us.  But he thought better of it.

    Gyppo

Hurry up ya daft bastard😜

Seriously,I don't know of anyone who'd want to drive motorcycles behind an obnoxiously smoky lorry 🤢🤮

We sure as hell didn't want to, but once we were trapped in that funnel between the rock sides there was no way out until the top of the hill.

There's quite a few bits like that along the coastal roads, where they've 'eased' a steep hill by making a cutting though the rock.  great fun to hurtle through when there's very little traffic, but a nightmare when it all slows down ;-(

She was very good at not panicking when caught out by a surprise attack.  There would be about a thirty second window, usually plenty long enough, when  she had ample time to dig out the puffer before the lack of oxygen began to bite.  Occasionally she'd be upstairs and her bag was downstairs, but usually she was okay.

When you live with someone like that you get pretty good at recognising facial expressions and reading their eyes when they can't speak.

She was horrified the first time I just upended her bag, tipped everything out, and found the blue puffer straight away with no problems.  If I'd had to root through all the stuff she had in there it would have taken far too long.

Plus I have a deeply rooted social reluctance to dig around in a woman's handbag.  Like my pockets, that's private territory.  Emergencies have to be dealt with, but otherwise, ladies, your handbags are a no-go area.  Even if you invite to me get something out for you, like a house key or purse, I'm reluctant to delve.

I offered to make her a little pouch to wear on her belt, like the one I made for her younger brother who also shared the problem.  But she didn't want to be 'labelled' like that.  Her brother wore his with a kind of masculine pride ;-)

Gyppo

Time is of the essence 😬

Besides,there's nothing in a purse that should shock male partners