Heads up: There’s a bloody leg at the bottom of this post, and I’m not talking about the British expletive attributive. I’m saying there’s a photo of a leg with a bit of blood on it. It’s in black and white, but there’s no mistaking what is going on there. Just so you know.
Saturday was slow. Luxuriously slow. We sat around and watched football, shaking off shot side effects. I checked my email two times too many. My lovely bride took a nap. (She dislikes naps on a fundamental level, so this is indicative of the speed of the day.)
Late on Sunday afternoon, as a break from housework and school work, I proposed a casual little bike ride. We stood over our bikes in the driveway and I said Where would you like to go?
She said, “No, no. You’re idea. Your route.”
So I thought we’d do the square route. But I realized that there isn’t a lot of opportunity to ride and talk on those particular roads. So I selected another series of quieter roads. The point being to just be outside and enjoying the opportunity to have a little ride without bigger goals. To pedal and not pant.
We went, then, through corn fields and across three intersections. After that the road ends. We turned right and went down a nice little hill, around a curve and to another intersection, where we turned left.
(Incidentally, I updated the art on the front page of the site with 10 new photos. The above photo is a clue.)
At that left-turn is a quite little intersection. The National Guard has a facility there. There’s a farm. And another building a small fertilizer concern, that has pearls of wisdom painted up near the roof. This was the second time I’ve been by there, and so we went by slowly, trying to read them all. There are, I think, a few I missed. One day I’ll have to stop and take photos of them all, because I’m sure there’s something important for me to learn in those old faded sayings.
A bit before that I had decided that I would ride us by a few houses that have had an explosion of Halloween decorations. There are at least two of them on this little soft-pedal I planned out, and here’s one now, just there to the left.
A little boy runs into the road. Probably five.
“There’s a party going on and you’re invited!”
He’d come from the direction of the Halloween yard. I looked to him, watching where he’s moving, maybe I said something to him, I don’t recall. I looked back up and there’s my wife’s bike, a half-second away from me riding into it.
When you touch wheels on bikes, you’re going to crash, and that’s what I did. Fell to my right, foolishly putting my hand down to try to catch myself before I rolled into it.
The kid ran off to get his folks, yelling about this guy that’s crashed. My lovely bride stayed up right and she wheeled around. Probably apologizing before she’s even seen me. I was flat on my back. Bike still between my legs.
She said “Are you OK? What can I do?” I’ve been listening to the little boy running off to get his folks. And before I’d even opened my eyes, as I waited for all of the parts of my body to report in with pain, I said Stop that.
When I opened my eyes I was laying opposite the direction of my travel. Still not sure how that happened. But I’d pointed in the right direction that the boy had run. His family must now be outside because she’s saying to them, in her really reassuring tone, “He’s fine. It’s OK.” I wasn’t sure, yet, if I was, but that was nice and encouraging.
This is a residential neighborhood, but there is still the occasional car, so the first thing I noticed when I stood up was this guy standing around me with his arms out wide, blocking off an oncoming car. Someone moved my bike out of the road and there’s a truck where a guy has stopped to offer help. But all I need are a few bandages. First thing I noticed was that my left index finger hurt, and it was bleeding, right on the tip. Second thing was a bit of road rash on the outside of my right calf, which is the direction I’d fallen.
How did I cut my finger, anyway? We’ll never know. We’ll also never know how I scraped my right forearm, a little, but it never hurt. Not like my left finger, or my right wrist, which I put out to catch myself. I tentatively peeled back my right glove to see what I’d done there, but the glove did it’s job. It looked like I’d have a wicked bruise in my hand, but no abrasions. (Today, my palm was just fine.)
My left finger and right leg, then. And also my right wrist, which I immediately diagnosed as the mildest sprain ever.
These nice people quickly retrieved their tub of first aid stuff — like they keep it by the front door or something; this mom was so well prepared, you could tell her boy is the rambunctious sort, even if he was being shy. He’s sprinted back out with an antiseptic spray and I doused my index finger. I took two Batman Band-Aids to cover the thing. Someone else drove by offering to take my bike wherever. My lovely bride had already volunteered to go back to the house for the car. We were only about three miles away at that point. But I said none of that is necessary. This is the silliest slow-speed crash in the world and none of it is as bad as it looks. My leg looks pretty awesome though, right?
We rode back to the house. She stayed behind me, keeping a careful eye, I’m sure, making certain that I didn’t run into anyone. I wound up riding part of the way back with puppy paws so I didn’t have to hold the handlebars with my aching wrist. This is funny because my bike is a little short on me and that’s hilariously obvious when I try to ride in that position.
The shower was fun. Clean and grimace and dab. Clean and grimace and dab. Keep your spirits up and dab. We have some special first aid bandage stuff for road rash that works incredibly well, so I’m wearing that now. The best news is that I wasn’t even sore this morning, except for how I managed to sleep on both that leg and wrist.
Today, while doing class prep, I found myself rubbing my eye. My right wrist popped and it felt immediately better. Not perfect, but a lot better. So I took off the wrist brace and I haven’t worn it since. (Fortunately, we have three varieties of wrist braces in our personal health care stores … )
The biggest problem is that the Band-Aids are limiting the use of my left index finger. If you see any typos in this post, that’s probably because I am typing with six or seven fingers instead of the usual seven or eight.
I should have thought up that excuse years ago.
Tomorrow, I’ll go put a thank you card in those nice people’s mailbox. I’m going to go buy some super hero Band-Aids to put in there, too, to make up for the two they gave me.
I think I’ll ride my bike over to do it.
Back to last Wednesday’s Queen + Adam Lambert show. This was a fun concert. Had a great time. All of the YouTube commenters are jealous that they weren’t there to see the North American debut of the tour. And the more I think back on it the more little bits of it I enjoyed.
Except this part. The crowd let me down. I wanted to be a part of a moment like the end of the utterly classic George Michael performance at the Freddie Mercury tribute show, but this crowd, while good, was not up for that.
“Somebody to Love” peaked at 13 on the US Billboard Hot 100 and made it to the nine spot on the Cash Box Top 100 in its original 1970s run. The version with Michael reached No. 1 on the UK Singles Chart, and stayed there for three weeks. It’s criminal that it didn’t have that reception in the United States, where it stopped at 30.
All told, this song was Triple platinum in the US, the 2011 version was platinum in the UK, also platinum in Denmark and Italy, and gold in Germany
Since I mentioned it, here’s the version with George Michael fronting the song. It’s a fundamentally perfect live performance. No arguments will be entertained.
The look from Brian May at the end of the song says it all. Speaking of May, this beautiful sequence happened at the show. “Love of My Life” has always been a singalong, but this … Watch the whole thing.
That’s just special. I am so so glad we got to be a part of that.
