Earlier this year, I asked Kentucky cyclists what their greatest fears were. In a totally unscientific tallying of the responses, here's my impression: The two most commonly cited fears were, unsurprisingly, getting hit by a moving car and getting doored. I can sympathize. I'm looking in the rear window of every single parked car I ride past to see if there is a driver getting ready to exit the vehicle and throw me into traffic.
I also asked what Kentucky cyclists fear that I had not considered. Boy, you all are creative bunch. Among the things you fear (and that I now have to consider) are:
- Handle bars torque while at top speed going downhill.
- Vision impaired in both eyes due to cloud of gnats.
- Having your butt crack peek out of your pants as you bend forward to reduce wind resistance.
- Having a can thrown at you from a passing car window, looking down and then being smashed by a semi only to then have a bee sting you!
- Being lasso'd in the middle of fricken nowhere and thrown in the back of a truck of a psycho woman and carted off to some hole in the ground.
- When in Kentucky... being bitten by dogs.
- Unexpected rain.
- River Road and people from the East end.
- I can't say that every single thing on this list is actionable in a court of law, but if you or a bicyclist you know are injured by a driver's carelessness, please, get a lawyer. If it's me, great. If not, that's fine, too. But, you need to get a lawyer so that the driver compensates you for all of your injuries. This includes your medical bills, lost time at work, property damage, and your physical pain and emotional suffering.