Sunday, April 08, 2007

wham bam thank you cam...

I like to fancy myself smart. Not walking down the street looking at people and saying “I’m smarter than that guy” smart, just smart. Smart enough not to do something incredibly stupid and injure myself in the process anyway.

What I’ve learned from this weekend is that isn’t necessarily the case.

I’m still breathing. That’s such great news (for me). Friday we had such a fun sunny festive day. Fantastic. I loved every minute of it. Fun in the sun with K, the babysitter came over, I had a lovely bike ride with my best guy, great wine, good friends, a lovely bike ride home around 8:30 and I was feeling just right, just fine, just good enough to be completely and totally idiotic and attempt to ride my bike up our driveway.

I should add here that I ride a big old style cruiser. It’s great for comfort and style (or getting laughed at depending on your perspective) but not known for going up steep inclines, and a steep incline, or a very steep one is exactly what you’d find my driveway is, especially if you tried to ride a big pink cruiser up it.

Curiously you might also find yourself laying flat on your back with the wind completely knocked out of you unsure if you should move or not because you suddenly can’t recall the first aid protocols for potential back and neck injuries (for reference, I am pretty sure you aren’t supposed to move someone with a possible spinal injury, makes it much worse but I don’t know that from experience).

Luckily we have a very strict helmet law in our family. Not only does K wear one any time she is on anything with wheels Mr. Kaos and I do too. Always. No exceptions. Helmet On.

This means that when I fell flat on my back (with my neck hitting a concrete drop-off near our retaining wall) my head did not split open as it was soundly encased in pink shiny protection. The helmet probably saved Mr. Kaos the trouble of hosing down the driveway and an ambulance driver the trip out here to see the dumb ass 30 year old with the cracked skull. What it didn’t do however was prevent my bike from landing right on top of me a fraction of a second after I landed on the driveway.

I have to say I think the driveway did more damage than the bike but it’s a pretty tough call. I'm one lucky idiot though, I didn’t break anything, I didn’t even feel like I needed to make a trip to the emergency room, just slept it off. The next day I couldn’t move a muscle. I spent most of the day in bed trying not to think about how completely this was my own stupid fault before hauling my sad sack self out of bed around 4:30 in the afternoon to head over to a friend’s gorgeous new condo for dinner. Dinner was great, but I left hastily wanting nothing more than to crawl into bed.


This morning it was pretty clear what I had actually injured and what was just sore from the tumble. I have 2 large bruises on my knee, a very sore hip and jaw. I attribute those to the bike falling on me. The sore ribs (which are much better today) and the inability to move my neck without shrieking and gasping in pain I attribute to the concrete.

Ouch is pretty much what I have to say on the matter. A whole lot of ouch and that I wouldn’t recommend the experience to others.

So if any of you were wondering why I was so terribly absent from the internet this weekend, now you know… I’m really stupid.

6 comments:

T. Forkner said...

I have one of those cruiser style bikes. Love it!

Bubblewench said...

I used to have a cruiser they rock. But I'm still laughing at you. I can't help myself!

mielikki said...

Good grief. You never have done anything half way, have you? What a site that must have been. I hope your soreness goes away soon, and should you be that silly again, no, you don't move if you hurt your back and neck!

sybil law said...

OUCH. Yeesh.
Hope you had some pain pills available!
Damn.

Bubblewench said...

I am STILL LAUGHING about this. So much so, that I actually tell people the story and laugh the whole time I tell it.

dream said...

lol ur right now that i've caught up on ur blogs i am laughing at ur expense but in a i'm-you-friend-and-that-gives-me-the-right-to-laugh-at-you-in -a-loving-way way ;)