Almost...

Had my first near miss today on the way to work. Ack.

I was going up the divided highway, riding in the right lane, doing the speed limit (45mph), and here comes some guy from the other side of the highway. He was crossing through the median, turning left across the road to go in the direction I was going, and instead of turning and staying in the left lane and then moving over to the right, he turned directly into the right lane. Guess where I was? Yep. Right lane. I was trying like hell to stay out of his blind spot, but apparently either I was already there, or he just plain didn’t see me. Either way, next thing I know I am in the sand and crud on the shoulder, trying to steer, stay upright and honk the horn at him. He was close enough to me that I could have reached out and kicked his rear quarter panel at one point, before he finally saw me and moved over. Then, of course, he took off.

I was strangely (for me) not even shaken up, or upset, except that I was PISSED. It was all I could do not to chase him down and ask him exactly what the hell he was doing. There’s a four-way stop a little farther up the road, and I was hoping I could catch up to him. I didn’t. He was pretty good at staying well ahead of me, which was fine. I certainly didn’t need to be getting into anything with any drivers, but I sure thought about it.

The good news is that now I know my bike does 60, and I can ride it when it does.