Falling off my bike whilst moving at high speed

The first time I fell when moving fast, I was cycling along the side of the road through Brompton, on my way into London. I was in the cycle lane and there was a bit of a traffic jam. The cars were stationary but the cycle lane was clear so I was cycling quite fast. I was approaching a section of the road that had a Keep Clear sign, for cars to turn into a car park on my left. As I approached that section, I looked but nothing was turning so I kept cycling. All of a sudden, a big jeep thing swung quickly into the Keep Clear section and across my path into the car park. A millisecond before it would have hit me, I pulled on my brakes and skidded around so I was side on to the car. By the time it had disappeared into the car park, I had fallen sideways off the bike and skidded along the tarmac road, leaving the majority of my leg skin there. As this fall was post-cleats, the sudden pull of my body off the bike had been too fast for the shoes. I stood up, in my socks, and noticed that my cleats were still attached to the pedals on my bike! People rushed over, offering support and cursing the jeep driver. I stalked after him into the car park, in my socks, pushing my bike. I caught up with him and poked my head in the driver’s side.

“Are you going to say sorry?” I demanded.

“What’s wrong? Are you ok?” The man seemed worried.

“You just pulled in front of me and I had to brake really hard and I came off my bike.”

“O god, sorry! I didn’t see you.”

“EXACTLY!” I said, self righteously.

“But I, I didn’t see you.”

“Thats not ok. That doesn’t excuse you,” I ranted. “Why weren’t you bloody looking!?”

After a long rant, I mounted my bicycle, awkwardly because of the shoes on pedals and because I now realised that the seat had been shunted out of place, and flounced off, as best I could given the situation at hand.

The next time I fell off my bike whilst moving at speed was a similar situation. The cars were still at a set of traffic lights but the cycle lane was clear so I was cycling quite fast. A lazy mother was dropping her child off at school and instead of driving her into the school car park, she had obviously told her to jump out at the lights. The little girl, not looking of course, opened her car door just as I passed and almost knocked me out. I was thrown clean off my bike and onto the pavement. The edge of the door had ripped the skin between my little finger and ring finger apart and was bleeding all over. My arm felt broken and my leg had taken a bit of a pull in the wrong direction.

“What the fuck are you doing?!” I yelled at the little girl. In hindsight, this may not have been the best thing to say to a little girl.

Shell shocked, I struggled to my feet as the Mum came around from the drivers side and asked me if there was anything she could do.

“I think you’ve done enough!” I snapped, as I got on my bike and gingerly cycled away.

I had a bruise on my arm from shoulder to elbow which was deep purple and yellow and lasted for weeks. It wasn’t broken but I couldn’t really use it for the next two days.

Bloody kids.

Two year anniversary

Today is two years since I got the biggest shock of my life.

Two years since being driven by a worried Danda at 2am to hospital with stomach pains.

Two years since having an unreasonable number of doctors look in places I would never have dreamed they needed to look!

Two years since I was stuck all over with needles which would live inside me for next six days, leaving me tiny scars that are still visible today.

Two years since a lovely kind doctor approached me with the terrifying news that he’d have to stick a tube down my nose and to my stomach to empty it.

Two years since being told I was next in the operating theatre and waking up hours later, literally stapled back together.

Two years since the every day functions of life were torn from me and I needed nurses to wash me, a tube to feed me and a catheter to wee.

Two years since being put on a geriatric ward and becoming a delirious TV addict with access to self medicating pain killer.

Two years since developing a fear of food and living off a spoonful of mash a day.

Two years since I became unable to stand for more than a few seconds without being exhausted.

Two years since telling Danda, “I don’t wanna go a walkies.”

And two years since I thought things were falling apart.

But they didn’t. Wonderful things happened. Friends and family were all mixed together and stuffed into a cubicle during visiting hours and it was brilliant. I would never have invited that combination of people to be together anywhere but I had no control over this and it turned out really really well.

Danda visited every day. Every single day. Every available visit. Twice a day. Him and my brother paid for vouchers so I could watch the TV or make phone calls, which I did. I made long rambling morphine-induced phone calls where I babbled and sniffled and sobbed and raged.

When I tried to understand the logic in what had happened to me and needed someone to blame or hate, everywhere there were people ready to support me and let me rage at them and at everything.

When I hobbled down the road for a cup of tea at the deli, fellow customers came to sit with me, bought me lunch, kept my spirits up when I felt low.

The doctors who repackaged my wide open scar every day were supportive and kept up constant chatter while I looked in horror at my insides on show!

And while it would be an exaggeration to say the process was a good one or that I’m glad it happened, if it had to happen, I had the best possible experience of it.

And now, right now, where I am in my life at this minute, I can’t remember ever feeling this great. Things are just lovely. I don’t have the anxiety of the teenage and early 20’s years. I don’t have the indecision of university years. I don’t have to always ask myself ‘what I’m going to do with My Life.’

And things are nice now. Very nice. I cook. I bake. I eat. I write. I read.

Two years ago, I thought I’d be angry forever over what happened to me. But I’m not. I’m just very happy and chilled out.

Just another day in the life of Detective Laura

I’ve just got a minor annoyance to share before I start today’s post. I would like to know when the government started dipping into my pay cheque to get student loan repayments? Surely they’ve got to wait till you’re not a student any more? It was only £3 from this month’s pay cheque so it’s not a big deal but I hadn’t realised they were doing it and I’m still technically a student.

Anyway, moving on. I’d like to talk about the time I single handedly fought crime and saved the world… kinda.

I worked in a coffee shop in a station for a few years, while studying my undergraduate degree. This one customer would come in a few times then we wouldn’t see her for months, then she’d come in again, out of the blue. She was Scottish and rude. Not many teeth. Short, orangey badly dyed hair. And she was very confrontational. Any words that came out of her mouth felt like an invitation for a fight. She refused to be served by anyone but the white people who were on shift so sometimes she’d stand for ages, refusing to give her order to the Burmese guy who was on the till that day.

One day, she came and asked for porridge and a chai latte. I made both and she sat down. A few minutes later, she came back to the till and declared that I’d made the porridge wrong. Her main argument seemed to centre around the fact that she was Scottish and, therefore, porridge making was inate in her being, so it was impossible that she could be wrong on this point.

She kept saying that to make porridge, you need pour the hot milk onto the oats, stir it, then let it sit for a few minutes, for the oats to absorb the milk. I, in turn, kept saying that that was EXACTLY what I had done. She got silly with her ‘explaining’ thing so I just said, “Ok, well what would you like me to do about the porridge you’ve got? Would you like a refund or should I make you a new one?”

It was like she couldn’t hear me. She kept ranting and raving about being an expert on porridge and got really rude about it.

“Ok, well I’m sorry about your porridge. There’s a customer behind you so could I just ask you to move along so we can serve her.”

She flipped.

She said she was going to beat me up. She was so angry.

“No, you’re not,” I said calmly. “I’m sorry about your porridge but this conversation is finished now. I need to serve the lady behind you.”

Still spouting threats to kick my head in, she came around the side of the kiosk and shook the side door. I knew she couldn’t get in, there was a code lock.

“I’m going to come in there and kick your head in,” she was saying, or words to that effect.

I sighed, picked up the milk jug and started steaming, for the next customer’s order.

“I’ll get in there!” she was still rabbiting on.

I just turned and looked at her.

“No. You won’t.”

“I will!”

“Well, come on then,” I said. She shook the door, menacingly. I was finding the whole thing highly amusing. Calm as anything, I gave her a withering look (or my best impression of one).

She circled the kiosk back around to the front again, trying to work out a way of beating me to a pulp. She was getting infuriated by my calmness. I could see this so was acting even more calm. She came around to the till again and said she was going to jump over the counter and kick my head in. I stepped aside to make a space to jump into and told her to go for it.

She knew she wouldn’t be able to. It was too high. Clearly wanting to kill me. She remembered the chai latte on the counter, picked it up and threw it inside the kiosk, aiming for me. It had cooled down loads so the bit that went on my arm wasn’t so hot. It went on all the equipment inside the kiosk though.

Realising that she might have done something arrest-able, she scuttled off and I reported it to the transport police, who took a statement.

A week later, I was walking along the high street after work and who should I see wrapped up in a sleeping bag with a paper cup held out, but the angry porridge lady!

I stopped a little further down the road and called the police, as I knew they hadn’t tracked her down yet. They told me to stay put and they’d come down and to inform them if she moved. I was like Inspector Morse or something. I lingered in a nearby phone shop peeping through the window display and trying discreetly to get photos on my phone as evidence in case she moved on. A few minutes later the police arrived. I burst out from my hiding spot and indicated it was her with a discreet, detective-like sideways nod of my head.

They arrested her. She said things like “I haven’t been in that coffee place for months!” And “I’ve never seen her in my life!” But she was carted off and given a fine under the Public Order Offence Act, or something and kept in the cells overnight.

Just another day in the life of Laura “Supremo Crime Fighter” Maisey. Watch out, here I come!

Considering anger management

I went swimming again this morning. I just got back and am feeling relatively calm again. Today’s swimming session wasn’t calm. It made me irate. It shouldn’t have. But it did.

As I approached the pool I saw that it was mostly empty, just the lap lane was full. The front crawl lane and nice and easy lanes were both empty. Also, the massive end lane which can take about four people only had one person in it. So I got in the nice and easy lane and thought I’d just have a relaxing swim today because my shoulder was aching a bit. I was about ten lengths in when it started. It all fell apart.

A lady approached the nice and easy lane so I moved from the middle of the lane to the side of it, to make space for her. She also moved to the side, the side I was on! She stood there fixing her goggles then just started swimming!

This picture shows the situation. I’m in the end lane (the top one). The next lane, for front crawl, is empty. The next lane is full and the end one is almost empty. The lady has approached the nice and easy lane, lined herself up with me exactly, leaving the other half of the lane empty and set off swimming straight at me! Doing front crawl!

DOING FRONT CRAWL! She’s come to share the nice and easy lane and is doing front crawl, when the front crawl lane is free! I quite literally went in to shock. I know it’s irrational but I was livid.

I just kept swimming straight, even though I know she must’ve expected me to move. Don’t people get it? When you’re new to the lane, you fit in with the people there, you don’t come in and shove people out of their space when they were there before you! Is it me? I’m worried about my anger, maybe I’m making up rules that are silly?

Anyway, I kept going, thinking she’d surely move. Surely. But she kept coming, doing a really clumsy version of front crawl, her hands kept splatting on the water like the noise you make when you belly flop. We eventually got so close that I had to stop and just tread water until she saw me. She did, obviously. She must’ve known I was there the whole time. She just looked at me like there was no problem.

“I guess I’ll move then,” I said, when it became clear that she hadn’t noticed anything wrong. I waited for the penny to drop and for her to go ‘O, it’s ok, I’ll move over here.’ But no. It was unbelievable. We were near the stairs so I just got out and moved to the large end section and started swimming but I was all out of sync and couldn’t concentrate.

I noticed the indoor pool was emptier so I went inside and started swimming. After about two lengths, four people came in together and squashed themselves into the lane I was in. One man was just standing at the end, holding on to the side, not moving. He was at the end of my section and didn’t move away when I approached. So I had to swim around him to get to the end then swim back around him to start my next length. He just stood there.

By this point, it was getting silly, I hated everyone in that pool and wished they’d all just bugger off and leave me to swim. It was time to take myself out of the situation…

After I got out, I tried to work out what was wrong with me. I’ve had a bit of a toothache and have a dentist appointment fast approaching. Has that made me angry? When it was quite hot yesterday, I struggled to not get grumpy with everyone, so maybe it’s the leftovers from that? I can’t work it out. People do silly things at the swimming pool all the time and are constantly stealing your space, so why was I so angry today? Maybe the Swim Gods are punishing me for missing Wednesday by stealing the Fun Factor from today’s swim? Or maybe I just shouldn’t be around people…?

I’m going to drink some herbal tea and do some yoga, I think.