Another Hooky Ride, Finally

The weather has been bad, although it's been good for winter sports. This, winter sports, caused a problem two weeks ago, when I took a hard fall on the Amsterdam speedskating oval and separated my shoulder a little ("piano key injury"). The ice was bad that morning when we got on, and two showers consisting of a wintry mix of snow, rain, and sleet turned it into a very rough sandpaper. The stuff just seemed to freeze to the surface. Instead of getting off, I decided to do a few more laps, started to get very sloppy in a turn, and took myself down. I might as well have fallen off my bike, because there was absolutely no sliding of any kind. First I hit my right shoulder, then I did a kind of salto (someone who watched it told me later) to land on my knees (which were bloody and bruised). After that, I just lay there--no smooth sliding to the outer lane, hoping not to take anyone else down with you. It hurt, and after putting some ice on it (and taking a shower during which I sighed and swore a lot) we went to the emergency room where the x-ray showed a mild case of separated shoulder. (When I signed in, they still had my name, address, and phone number on file from when I had knee surgery there in 1985). That started almost two weeks of doing nothing, except keeping my arm in a sling part of the time and going for walks. But in week 2 things started to feel better, and when I saw the doctor, he spoke the now famous words: "if it doesn't hurt, do it." A little ride last Saturday to see how it felt, and today the roads were clean enough for a first 21 miler. It really didn't feel that unusal, considering that it was also only just above freezing with a decent breeze. I did my usual hooky loop (Vreeland, where the skating course looked just fine, Loenersloot, Abcoude, Weesp) and it took a little longer than normal, but a 17 m/h average isn't horrible. It felt very nice to be back outside, moving.