hazards

My commute through rural roads had lots of wildlife along the route. In the first couple of trips, I met the Sandhill Crane trio who were always present in the same spot, mostly at the side of the road, but once directly in my lane arranged as neatly as three 5 foot tall traffic cones. I used my new braking skills to come smoothly to a stop before hitting anything. The tailgating truck behind me also managed to miss hitting anything, but I bet his pants were dry as he passed us.

A flock of turkeys were also nearly always present at a curve on Beaver Lake Road. The speed limit at that spot was 25 mph and I had enough warning to stop on the several occasions that they chose to stand in the middle of the road, pecking at the asphalt. There were about twenty of them, milling about without fear of my passage. I would slalom through them if they insisted. Rabbits were everywhere and I’m sure there is rabbit DNA on my front tire from a near miss. I can see the benefit of a louder machine as the bunnies and chipmunks were pretty oblivious until it was nearly too late. They seemed as startled as I was to find themselves dodging my tires.

Bees are a hazard I hadn’t contemplated until one got stuck down my jacket collar. I wonder if they might be a greater hazard than deer that kill so many cyclists. Does anyone check for bee stings on dead bikers? It’s easy to find evidence of a deer strike at an accident scene, but not so easy to find a bee sting. I’ll have to research that. Fortunately I was just coming to a stop when I got stung, using my clutch hand to grab that kamikaze out of my collar. I stalled the bike, but didn’t drop it.

The morning weather report became my best friend. I gauged the speed of the green and yellow patches on the radar, timing my chances of rain in the next eight hours. One thing the class had taught me was that rain was my enemy, able to kill at a moment’s notice. Only once did I get rained on, and I was surprised to learn how painful rain can be. I had only one exposed patch of skin on my neck, the rest of me covered with gear, and as I sped through a sprinkle at 55 mph, that patch was shot with needles of rain no matter what position I held my head. I expected to see a bloody neck in the mirror, but even with all that pain, I was unscathed.

My new work nickname was “Weather Hag”. If my bike was in the parking lot, no rain was forecast. If I brought my car, foul weather was acoming.

Fog was another hazard I wasn’t prepared for. My faceshield became opaque with mist and I had no windshield wiper to clean it off. I couldn’t see a darn thing. How long did it take to figure out I could just use my hand to wipe off the drops? Quite a while. And I also had to take a hand off the handgrip to do it.

Another faceshield hazard I hadn’t anticipated was the sneeze. I couldn’t clean that off with my hand that’s for sure. I’d brought glass cleaner to work to clean off mosquitoes, but that morning I cleaned both sides.