I went for a ride today with my SO, who is superman on a bike. I always know that I am in for a workout when riding with him. Our goal today was to ride from Arlington to Ft. Worth, cruise around downtown, and ride back...about 75 miles. It did look a bit, uh, dark, out as we started. So we are ripping along, I am keeping up well, we are averaging about 19 mph (good for me, considering we had plenty of hills) and I was enjoying, for once, not much wind. It began to drizzle, but neither of us are into quitting (even when we should) so we pressed on. So we were riding along a poor patch of road on the shoulder. The shoulder came to an end ahead, so he hopped up the lip to the road proper. Being the sheep I am, I followed without noticing how much higher the road was from the shoulder...and wiped out. I banged my head on the concrete, and hit my hip and elbow. Keep in mind, I did EXACTLY THE SAME THING on Tuesday night while on bike patrol (I didn't SEE the lip then)...the only two times I have ever done that in zillions of miles and still have scabs, bruises, and a swollen thumb from that debacle.
My SO returned to help me pick up the stuff that had flown out of my bag and assess the damage to the bike and me. When I asked him twice if I had fallen, he walked me back to a little driveway (the only thing in sight...I think it led to an oil rig) and left me there while he double timed it to get the truck (although I vaguely remember insisting that I was fine and could ride). So as I sat there, I noticed the sprinkles had grown heavier. The only shelter was a little cluster of shrubbery on the side of the road. I initially sat in the middle of the cluster (now I was cold) until the sky opened up and BUCKETS of water and wind and thunder (and yes, I know about trees and lightning) erupted from the heavens. I walked around to the lee of the largest bush, parted the branches, and stepped in. I am a small person, and it was a good thing, because anyone any larger would not have been able to sit amongst the branches as I did. I was very , very wet, but protected from the worst of the wind. When my SO pulled up I simply emerged from the bush. Since he couldn't see two feet in front of him, he thought I simply materialized. He grabbed my poor bike (with soaking wet brooks saddle) and handed me his ridiculously small towel and cranked the heat for me. It took the butt warmers on full heat to make my teeth stop chattering.
My butt already looks like someone kicked me a few times, my elbow is sore, both knees scraped up, one calf bruised from knee to ankle, my thumb is at an odd angle to my hand. I had twigs and leaves in my hair, and I ruined my ipod, my glasses, my credit card wallet thingie and the credit cards inside, and the hood on one shifter is jacked up.
But it was funny, me stepping out of that bush into what was really a wall of water.
