Thursday, April 20, 2006

It's not the women anymore...

Drivers beware... of other drivers.

It's all right here.

The most ironic day I think I've ever lived.



Today, was indeed one of the most ironic days I have ever lived (hence the title).


I was riding my bike to shoot pictures of mud wrestling, which means I was going down the road here, in the sidewalk.

This is University right beside of the Cooling Plant for anyone who knows UK's campus very well.

In my business, you tend to stick to what's interesting. Well, car accidents are interesting, which is exactly what I spotted, just as you can see in the next diagram, at the red X.


OK, so you see the red X, that's where a small car was crushed. I find this to be interesting, and start snapping a few pics (blue X is me, snapping a few pics). I'm shooting from the other side, when this lady walks up to me (brown X) and asks me who I'm working for. I say the school paper, well, here we go.

She says I should write a story about how nobody stops at these cross walks for pedestrians. I laugh at her and say well, you're right (thinking silly woman, that's a dumb idea). She says no really, and I merely suggest a stop sign. She continues, I say well maybe you should speak with the police...

So we both cross the road to talk to the police, and she begins her discussion as I get as much info as I could at that time. I have a relatively hard time getting back accross, but not too bad.

I go on to shoot pictures of mud wrestling, which was a fundraiser for habitat for humanity. It was fun. I shot it for an hour and half probably. I tried the entire time to stay clean, and managed to, but on the last quote, a girl who I had shot pics of before slapped my arm and sprayed mud all over myself, my bag, and my shirt. I smiled, not wanting to reflect poorly on my paper. But really, it was just mud so I thought to myself, "worse things can happen". I'm very smart you know?

I leave and the mud is all ready begining to dry on my arm before I cross the main road, Cooper. After Cooper from Goodbarn (where the mud wrestling was) it's a downhill cruise.

I was coming fairly fast down the hill, and looked to see that the accident was cleaned up. I was thinking to myself about a joke I was going to ask the Editor-in-Chief about cleaning my shirt as part of my paycheck. Cute eh?


Okay, so right as I come to the place where the lady had warned me about cars not stopping for pedestrians, I was at my top speed. I slowed slightly to cross the cross walk going UP now, and (I'm blue remember) looked to my left to see nothing and right to check for incoming traffic for the second lane. Next thing I know, in the first lane, there is a red blazer coming right at me, and I'm not slowing down at all. My brakes are bad, did I mention that before? Imagine that, I paid 58 dollars for a bicycle and the brakes are wearing out.

Okay, so red arrow is the blazer, and yellow cloud is our collision. We hit. I kind of clipped into her bumper, and some how my tire slid into the tire well (and managed to not get warped). I kind of rolled up onto the hood and honestly believe holding onto the bike which was lodged into the tire well was the only thing that held me from going over.

I pull myself down, and look into the open passenger window, and say, "Yeah, how about slowing down a little next time?"

Here is where I expect tears, apologies, compensations, offers of a ride, anything but what I actually her the (insert curse words here)...actually say.

She says, "I'm late for class."

Wow.

I (embarrassingly enough) cursed back at her and she drives away. That's right, she left me standing there. So I just drive on. At this point, I'm not even sure what has happened. I just know my bike works, and I wanted to get to the Kernel to empty my card.

I tell the first person I see, and they're surprised. I begin to think, OK, this was a big deal. It was just setting in that I had been hit by a car, and they ran...

How ironic is it, that the exact (and I mean within a few feet) location that a lady told me I should write a story about how dangerous the cross walk is, and I laughed at her, is the same place I was hit by a car at.

There were several more ironic situations, but this is by far the greatest.

Moral of the story: Listen to the public.