I was in a motorcycle accident

A couple of weeks ago, I was merrily riding along a beautiful, curvy road through the woods between Redmond and Carnation, and suddenly found myself sliding along the asphalt with my bike in a position normally associated with crashes. This condition obtained, it soon became evident, because I was, in fact, in the process of crashing.

This came as rather a surprise to me, as I had been proceeding around the corner in which I found myself crashing at a somewhat more sedate speed than is my fashion on that particular stretch of road. I must therefore attribute my abrupt transition from riding my motorcycle to sliding on my buttocks at 60 miles per hour to having slid on an enchilada, which, if you know that road, is not an uncommon hazard due to the enormous portions served at the Mexican restaurant frequented by motorcyclists traveling to and from Redmond.

(For those of you who don't know, enchiladas do not provide the same level of traction as asphalt (this is particularly true of used enchiladas). One would not, for instance, pave a race track with enchiladas, because not only would it offer poor grip, but it would be quickly eaten by hungry racing fans (not so much in the case of used enchiladas). This is a little-known fact, but it is quite true.)

I managed to emerge from the bushes at the side of the road with nothing more than a broken ankle, bruised ribs, and leaves in my helmet, the latter actually being of the most concern to me at the time because the leaves happened to be of the variety that grow on nettle bushes, and my initial efforts to remove them were hindered by the fact that they were inside my helmet, which I could not take off before removing my gloves, which I could not remove until I disentangled them from the nettle bush in which I was laying, which presented a whole separate set of difficulties.

I did eventually manage to remove my helmet, and the nettle leaves, during which process I discovered that I had broken my ankle. If you are going to discover that you have broken your ankle, I strongly suggest doing so while lying in bed or sitting in an easy chair, preferably at a hospital where attractive nurses with well-honed pillow-fluffing skills are on hand with injections of morphine, and not in a nettle bush at the bottom of a steep hill which is covered with still more nettle bushes.

I am fine, and my bike is, miraculously, only superficially damaged. I'll be on crutches for a while, which is doing my armpits no good at all, but is doing a wonderful job of toning up the muscles in my upper body and arms. So it's not all bad.