Chazari posted a photo:

Always, always wear your helmet. Take a look at the Husband’s helmet to see why (there’s blood so if you have issues with blood, don’t look). Now imagine what would have happened had he not been wearing it. Maybe  there would be a little piece of the Husband’s brains waving and smiling on the road as you drove by. Maybe instead of being at work I would be home cleaning up his drool. Maybe he would be calling next year’s ironMan to get his money back because he’ll only be able to walk by then, let alone swim, bike and run. Maybe he’d be fine. I’m very glad he didn’t take that chance to find out.

I cannot tell you how many people I have seen biking without helmets in the last week. I saw 2 by 10:30 yesterday.  Heck, I saw a kid biking down the wrong side of a busy street without a helmet. I almost hit him because he was biking past the street exit and I didn’t see him until I turned the corner.

Of course you won’t be going 35mph so it wouldn’t be as bad or you only bike in your neighborhood. A few weeks ago one of the Husband’s friends got hit by a car on his bike. The car cut across two lanes of traffic to make a right and didn’t see him. Guess what? He was wearing his helmet and other than cuts and bruises was fine. Cars are driven by idiots. You can’t guarantee that they will always see you even if you are only going 5mph.

“Okay,” you say, “well I’m going to bike on a bike path.” Surely that will be safe without a helmet. There are pedestrians, bikers, skaters, and animals who are not always paying attention. Are you sure they won’t cut in front of you? It happened to a friend of mine this weekend. She was wearing a helmet just in case.

If you bike without a helmet then you are an idiot and I hope you do fall, because then you would decrease the surplus population.

I don’t answer the phone if I don’t recognize the number. Occasionally, I think the call could be important and decide to break that rule. I always regret that decision. Carrying a happy little girl on my hip, I picked up the phone.

“Is this Mrs. the Husband MyLastname? This is Sergent Something or other”

Oh crap. It’s the cops asking for money. Okay. Do I say no now, or wait until they ask for the money. I don’t want to be overzealous.

“This is.”

“Your husband had an accident on his bike. He’s fine.”

That’s never a good start to your night.

Every Tuesday, the Husband has his triathlon group. They all get together and do a sprint tri for practice. (Yeah, I don’t get it either.) On that night, as the Husband was going down a hill at about 35 mph, an orange cat darted into his path. The Husband swerved. The next thing he remembers, he was on the ground with people standing over him. The ambulance came shortly after.

The phrase is Road Pizza or Road Rash. It depends on who you ask and when. The Husband’s left knee, part of his side, elbows, and back from shoulder to shoulder is covered in it. Those look worse than they are. They hurt like hell, but they aren’t horrible. The gash in his head looks nasty and required 12 stitches. I can’t imagine how many stitches would have made it onto his head were he not wearing a helmet.

The walking is the issue. After a few hours of bloody sheets and gravel, the resident who looked nothing like JD came in to clean the road rash. He sat him up only for the Husband to have a lot of pain in his left hip. So much that he couldn’t sit up. X-rays showed no break. We all said, it was probably how he fell, maybe on his keys or a rock or something. Nothing to worry about.  After a couple hours, the pain was worse. He couldn’t sit or stand and they took him back for a Cat Scan. They said he had a subdural hematoma in the area the pain. They said subdural hematoma but after looking it up, that relates to the brain so who knows what it really is. I think by that point it was 12 am? Or was it 10? No, maybe it was 2. Who knows. Anyway, he had a lot of nasty internal bruising which probably explained his issues with walking. There was also some minor bruising on his liver and he had to stay for observation.

Today, he wasn’t much better. The walker was exhausting, pain-filled, and not at all successful. At around 4pm they decided to give him a stronger medication and see what happened. He walked, with a walker and extremely slowly and laboriously, but it was a huge improvement. He’s staying one more night and will be having physical therapy tomorrow. If all goes well, he will be home tomorrow night–bruised, battered and sore, but home.

I guess in the battle of Man v. Cat, cat won.

Made by Hand has collected almost 50 hats! As soon as I finish the Husband’s sweater, I hope to make a few for the pile. This will most likely be Made by Hand’s last charity drive and we are going out with a bang. Or at least trying to. The goal is to bring in 400 hats for 4 hospitals in our area by November 5. That’s a lot of hats, so please take a moment and make a hat for someone going through chemo. You can knit, crochet, or sew your hat just so long as you make it with your own two hands. We even have an address this year!

As soon as I finish the Husband’s sweater I will be raiding the stash for really soft yarn to make a handful of hats. Will you be doing the same?