Accident Prone

It's probably about time I thought about not cycling. Whenever I take the bike for a spin these days some part of my body ends up tangled in a mesh of metal and concrete (and blood) on the road-side. This time, A+E came a'calling.

Just yesterday I managed to tangle a shirt up in my front wheel and force the bike into a front flip. The shirt had also become tangled up on my arm, meaning when I reached out to the ground mid-fall for protection my hands couldn't follow. Cue to the crash, and my chin taking the brunt of the fall, body weight et al pushed upon it as it nestled nicely into a slab of concrete, forcing multiple drivers to stop and several pedestrians to come running.

That familiar feeling of embarrassement post-crash flooded in, and before I knew what was what I was waving the cars on and hoping the bike was okay. A few minutes later, and a lucky encounter with a coursemate who helped tame the wounds, and I was back on the bike heading home.

Only thing is, after trying to clean up the mess in the sink I realised that the pool of blood stuck around my chin wasn't just a massive drip, but a pretty deep gash. After ending up going to A+E, getting glued up (thankfully avoiding stitches) and getting home again in one piece, only to find I can't eat much since my jaw won't allow much movement and resorting to protein shakes and mocha, I've decided I might just hang up the cycling shoes now. At least the hospital was clean - something that comes as a huge relief after visiting a Parisian hospital a few months ago, where there seemed to be about as much dried blood and dirt as there was disinfectant. Minor win.

Just last week I got a puncture, and snapped the valve cap in the process meaning the tyre couldn't be pumped up. An 11-mile barefoot run soon occured, and left me unable to walk for a good few days.

Before this, I crashed again (thought can't remember how - this is a bad sign) and ended up leaving another nice bruise on my knee that's only just healing now.

To add insult to injury, I can't even do much after my latest accident. I also fell on my shoulder, meaning there isn't much movement coming from my left upper body right now. No gym work then, so that throws out that suggestion to get fitter pre-freshers.

All I'm hoping for now is for my gruesome ol' chin to cure itself pronto. The last thing I want is to look like the elephant man during freshers week come this time next week. Heal chin, heal!