Biker Chick

I went for a bicycle ride with my baby today. We launched in the AM and rode over to the MRH high school. The Kiwanis Club was sponsoring a pancake breakfast. The breakfast was a benefit to raise money for a new program called visiting teachers, sort of an educational home invasion program. I was finishing breakfast, when Anne spied a couple of our friends. They had just arrived and she went over to speak with them. She intercepted them before they got into line. While they were gabbing the entire high school football team got in line ahead of them. The friends were not pleased with this turn of events.

After our charity carbo-load, we swung by the house for a wee little stop and then launched again, this time for the park. Today had such gorgeous weather for a November afternoon. We had to take another wee break, too much coffee I guess. This time we pulled over at the Science Center. The World Bird Sanctuary was there. They were releasing raptors back into the wild. We had arrived just in time to see the release of a Cooper’s hawk. A volunteer had been picked to perform the release, but first she had to practice with a plush toy eagle. I was able to catch this shot, but when it came to the real deal, I flubbed it badly. We wandered around the park some more, before we decided to head for home. There were a lot of other things that we needed to get done on this Saturday.

I got out ahead of Anne and caught the light on Big Bend, but she didn’t. I decided to go on and headed for the barn. I was stabling my mount, when I got the call. I knew instantly, from the timbre of her voice that things were not right. Anne had crashed. She was only three houses from home, but she was pretty banged up. I ran outside and saw her immediately. She was standing, leaning on a parked car. As near as we can tell, she had run over something in the middle of the street, lost control and tumbled over and over, striking the parked car. Subsequent investigations found a piece of concrete rubble in the leaves.

I helped her inside to the bathroom, to clean up some. Her pinky looked broken. So, we spent the rest of this beautiful late fall afternoon in the ER. It turns out that maybe nothing was broken. She got enough x-rays to fill up her radiation dance card for quite a while. Her knee is wrapped in an ace bandage and the pinky is in a splint. She also has a bunch of cuts and scrapes or contusions and abrasions if you like. Plus, strained tendons, don’t forget the tender tendons. I have to go back to the pharmacy now, to pick up her prescriptions. The ER doc didn’t put her DEA number on the scripts. Hmm, Anne on drugs, this should be interesting.