Deceleration (or Why it's a bad idea to fly over the handlebar of a bicycle)

Another lesson learned: When going downhill over rough terrain (i.e. the pavement of the average Vancouver street), DO hold on to your handlebars FIRMLY.  This would have prevented the grips being torn from my hands, the front wheel turning perpendicular to the direction of travel, the bicycle instantaneously decelerating from 30 km/h to 0 km/h and me having to impersonate a cannonball by continuing my travel at 30 km/h from an elevated position.

If you find yourself in flight, try to distribute the force of impact over various body parts (in my case left big toe, right knee, left thumb, right brow). 

Since I still have two functioning eyes and all the teeth I had before the take-off, it's not really tragic, i.e. I won't have to wear one of these, as well-meaningly suggested by Alan ;-)






























Things already look much brighter the next morning after sleeping for 12 hours.











And as confirmation of my good luck, Sophia, the hotel's receptionist, tells me a story of how something very similar happened to a friend of hers, only that friend did his stunt driving going downhill on the bicycle path of Lions Gate Bridge. He was catapulted over the barrier onto the car lanes and needed knee surgery afterwards!

But deceleration was not limited to the launch off my bicycle seat. Daily routines are being executed in what seems like slow motion. Going down stairs becomes hobbling.  Taking a shower changes to taking a batch to keep water from various body parts.

And once one only has one thumb to work with, one realizes how many of these:

are present on every-day clothing items and how one in the past relied heavily on BOTH thumbs to button them.

I won't even progress into the subject of shoe laces, because fortunately today is the first warm (17 Celsius) day of the year in Vancouver and I was able to perform the spring switch to sandals.