Encouraging words? You got it!

I only aspire to having stories like yours, in which actual things (unfamiliar clips, your daughter, etc) have been the cause of your accidents.

Every time I have had a crash, it has only been because my ridiculous impatience or my desire to be "fancy" met up with an ill-placed curb. I kid you not.

It's happened 3 times now: Once I was angry at the dude in the slow-moving golf cart on the bike path in front of me. So I thought I would "show him" and go off-road in order to pass. My front wheel caught the turf wrong and I went straight down, almost into a tree. Boy, I guess I showed him.

Then, I was riding on a busy street and had been trailing a bus, sucking in all that awful exhaust, for a couple miles. I finally decided enough was enough, attempted to jump a curb so I could zoom by the bus on the sidewalk, and instead got stuck half way up the curb and skidded to halt on my right knee. Ah, the joys of road burn from a super lame move like that!

Finally, I was riding to the grocery store in a very un-bike-friendly little town. There was a line of cars waiting to pull into the parking lot, along with a car coming the opposite direction, and a car waiting to pull out of the lot. A traffic jam, to be sure. Rather than be patient (what's that??) and wait until the cars went through, I had the brilliant idea to just hop the curb and pass the whole lot. The curb turned out to be twice as high as I estimated, and I flipped over my handlebars. I wrist-planted, gathered grit and pebbles into both palms, and jammed my right ribs into the handlebars.

That was the last straw: I now stay put behind slow-moving transportation, pass busses on the road and only when it is safe, and never, ever try to hop any curb at any time, in hopes that I can end my string of ridiculous crashes. Maybe third time's the charm for you, too?

One more little bit of inspiration: Remember how many times your daughter fell down when she was learning how to walk? Let that be a lesson in how persistence pays off.

Have a great time out there!