B'oh!

I had my third bike accident today. It's close to where I had my last one, shortly after turning onto Alberto from Highway Nine, though this time it was from the other direction. When going directly to work, I typically ride along the sidewalk until I get to Alberto, then continue on Alberto's sidewalk until I see the road is clear (it usually is right away), then cross over at the next driveway and get on the road. This time oncoming traffic on Nine had a red light, so I moved immediately onto Alberto and started moving to the right lane. However, the left turn arrow turned green soon after I started, and once I saw a car was turning onto the street I moved back to the left. (I'm not sure why - I would easily have established myself before he got on the road.) I thought, "Huh, I shouldn't be riding down the left side of the road," so I rode onto the next sidewalk. Or I tried to. There was about an inch gap between the road and the driveway, and I was coming at it from about a thirty degree angle, so the bike slid to the pavement and I hit the ground.

As injuries go, I think this is the lightest yet. I have two nasty-looking cuts on my upper left arm near (but not on) my elbow, and some lighter lacerations on my knee, thigh and hand. The nice thing about always getting into accidents so close to work is that I'm only a few minutes away from antiseptic pads, gauze and bandages. I won't claim to enjoy it, but it definitely gets less scary every time I do this to myself.

I've started a counter on the right side of my blog to keep track of the number of injury accidents I've had. If this continues to be a common occurrence (I'm currently averaging a bit more than one accident every two months), I'll stop blogging about each one, so just keep an eye on the counter if you're curious.