Tuesday, August 17, 2010

Blind to giveway rules


-- Looking, but not seeing

Life is a potpourri of chance and opportunity.

Sometimes you come up smelling like roses and other times like steaming turd. Whichever the case, the winners are those who suck it up and enthusiastically saturate their olfactory organs with life’s sweet scents and steamy miasma.

Recently, I was presented with a stark illumination of this hackneyed wisdom, when a car operated by a driver who had failed to giveway suddenly appeared in front of my handlebars.

Before I could even conjure the words, steamy miasma, my bicycle, immediately followed by my face and shoulder, impacted the driver’s car door and window, and I was bounced backwards to the ground, where I writhed to the twisted rhythm of involuntary yowling.

There are better ways to stop. The head-stem of my carbon frame snapped in a style similar to the AC joint in my shoulder. My extremes pulsated with pain.

As kind passers-by tended my twisted form and hazy disbelief became aching reality, I found comfort in the generous care administered by strangers (and, later, ambulance staff) but also irritated overhearing an observer explaining: “He hit the car.” I really hated that and the possibility that those words could be construed to mean I was at fault. Sure, I hit the car, but only because Mr Blind Man was behind the wheel.

The other thought occurring to me as I wrestled the asphalt was, how did the driver not see me? How does anyone not see a pulsating 900-lumen nitelight (which on this occasion was working just fine)?

Turns out you can look, but not see. And not seeing is an excuse popular with errant motorists.

Anyway, now I am under the tender care of ACC and my insurer AA has stumped up for a new bicycle (not that I’m able to ride it just now).

The sad irony is that I was on a ‘recovery’ ride following the first day of a training programme.

Not wanting to fall too far behind schedule while my shoulder heals I’ve had to dust off the wind trainer. And what fun it is dry humping the steel mule, unable to hold the handlebars and shaking my fist at God for the pain in my taint.

No hands is fine when you’re rummaging through a musette, but try it for an hour-or-so on a stationary trainer. Torture.

But, like I said, you’ve got to suck it up and find any traces of sweetness.

So, in this spirit, I’m pleased to share with you the rising excitement dispersing my miasmic mist.

Pictured below, the must-have for the recovering one-armed wind-training cyclist prone to taint pain. Called The Leaner™ it relieves taint pressure by allowing the operator to rest their good arm (your bad arm will likely be in a sling) on the ‘cross-bar’. You sort of ride in the same way you lean on the bar after work on a Friday.

So simple, yet so effective. You will be amazed.

1 comment:

Glendowie Bicycle Club said...

You need to have some nails poking out. Looks far to comfortable.