A Rash Decision

Road rash, that is

Yesterday, I made what might kindly be called a less-than-wise decision when out on my bike, resulting in the beautiful photos you see here.

It was a decision that will go down in the annals of history as one of the worst ever, ranking right up there with Bob going electric, the architect that designed that slanty Italian building and the Apple Newton (whatever happened to Apple, anyway?).

I had spent most of Saturday sporadically working on the Black Cross Check, replacing the brake cables, rear brake pads and handlebar tape.

Sunday morning I put the finishing touches on everything, trimming the cables, putting the crimps on the end to prevent unraveling, etc., then planned on taking it for a test ride later.

Being Father's Day, I gave my Dad a call to wish him a good one, then the S.O. and I set off to eat lunch, do some chores and get in a five-mile walk in the process.

We got home around 4:00 PM, and I decided to rest a bit before the test-ride.

I guess it was five-ish when I donned the helmet (I always wear a helmet, lest I get scolded by the S.O.) and set out on a short ride.

I rode about ten blocks, then turned around to head back home. So far, so good. Then, when I was approximately four blocks from home I got the bright idea that I should try to get a few action shots while riding. I do have a camera mount that attaches to the handlebars, where I can set the camera to automatically shoot pictures at pre-determined intervals, therefore not having to touch the camera at all. In this case, I did not have the mount on my bike, but I had a camera in my pocket, as I always carry one just in case.

Since it was a beautiful, sunny day, I had the false impression that the world was my oyster and nothing could go wrong. As I was soon to discover, that oyster was tainted.

I reached into my pocket with my right hand, pulling out the camera while steering with the left (at this point you can probably see that this is headed quickly south). I figured I could snap a few shots with the right hand while controlling the bike with the left. Easy-peasy as the youngsters say. It turned out to be neither easy nor peasy. As I was fiddling with the controls on the camera, trying to power it up while at the same time paying attention to the road, I was approaching a stop sign where a car was just about to cross the street. I applied the brake with my left hand (which is the front brake), and I still don't know whether the brake wasn't adjusted properly or I just grabbed too hard because of my multi-tasking, but the bike came to an abrupt halt, causing me to do a half-endo, heading over the handlebars and causing the rear wheel to lift off the pavement, in turn causing the rear of the bike to swing forward, tipping the bike to the side. Already half over the bars, I dismounted the bike involuntarily with a sort of horizontal triple Lutz. Needless to say, I blew the landing.

My sunglasses flew to the right, my camera tumbled to the left as I lay somewhere in between.

Lucky for me I had my Casio rugged camera, though I don't know that it was actually designed for anything like this. I heard it smack the ground. When I retrieved it from the middle of the road, I saw that some of the powder coating had been scraped from the case, but the lens and LCD screen seemed none the worse for wear.

Embarrassingly, there was a group of people standing on the corner as I executed my impromptu routine. Oddly enough, one of them was a woman who had fallen on her bike shortly before I had arrived.

I assured them that I was OK (except for the scarlet skin-tone from the aforementioned embarrassment), and noticed my bike was not rolling. Taking a quick look at the bike, I saw only minor scratches on various levers and attachments, but not on the bike itself. It looks like once again, I was able to prevent frame damage by shielding it with my body.

Trying to determine what was preventing the wheel from turning, I finally noticed that one of the cables had been dislodged from its stop, effectively applying the brakes. I reseated it, squeezed the levers, and it appeared I was ready to go.

As for myself, I knew I had sizable scrapes on my right elbow and left knee, but decided to wait until I got home to further inventory the injuries.

The one on my elbow was the most obvious and the largest. The one on my knee wasn't so bad, but minutes later I was aware of a burning sensation on my right hip. I lifted my shirt, and there was another large scrape, almost as large as the one on my elbow. There was also a small one on my forehead, where the visor of my helmet (go ahead and call me a dork, it keeps the sun out of my eyes) had come loose and poked me.

After cleaning the multiple areas, we went to do our weekly shopping, which we always do on Sunday evening. While I was walking there, I noticed more pain on my left thigh. Checking it out later, I had another small scrape where the seam of my shorts had chafed my skin.

Add to this a pinched nerve feeling in my right arm, and what I believe are bruised ribs (though not as bad as the last time I took a sideways spin down the street.

This morning when I awoke, I was stiff and sore and came very close to calling in sick. I am not sure what I found so humorous first thing in the AM, but I noticed that my ribs hurt when I laughed.

As I started to reach for the phone, I thought about it, then decided that work might be the ideal place to be, because fortunately, nobody at work is that funny. I did, however, take the bus to work and might do so for one or two days. I recall from last time that I thought I was healed, and got back on the bike after a few days only to find that the weight on my arms made my ribs worse.

Since this time wasn't as severe as then, I am hoping a couple days will do the trick.

I will need to survey the bike more closely to make sure that everything is in good shape, but so far, fortunately it looks like it didn't undo any of the work that I had done on it.

I suppose it could have been worse, and served as a reminder not to do anything stupid (yeah, like that's gonna happen). And once again the point is driven home that no, I am not a genius.