Sunday 3 July 2011

Tip 8: Fall off on wet metal

You have drips in your eyes and a big stripe up your back.  A slippery feeling between your toes as your croc loafers prove less waterproof than the animal they're made of.  It's dim, and there's a mirage effect as headlights gleam up from the road.
You're on the brakes the whole time.  You are super careful, slow and steady, alert to cars stopping distances, studiously avoiding puddles of unknowable fathom. 
Until you get within a street of home and you lean into a corner.
Oh! That manhole cover must be new.
When the asphalt rushes up to caress your cheekbone it feels like a rusty razor found way down the back of the bathroom cabinet. Your trousers tear like tissue paper as you slide. It ends when you are lying still, feeling like you are taking a cold gritty bath with your bike.
 
BONUS TIP: If you are spread-eagled on a tram track, ignore the holes in your Lee denim and put a finger to the track.  If the steel is thrumming, you are about to be turned into strawberry jam.  Move!

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