I suppose it had to happen sooner or later. No sooner had I been musing about the possibility of ending up in Casualty as a result of my prospective Lomo project, than I did actually end up in Casualty — without the involvement of my camera.

I was cycling in to work as usual, and coming around a slightly tricky roundabout, when I saw a car in the road to the left pause on the stop line. I'm very cautious on this roundabout, and don't go if I think someone might not have seen me (it's amazing how many drivers look without seeing), but I assumed that as she'd stopped, she'd seen me. So, I carried on and saw — with a certain amount of horror — that she was driving on to the roundabout, straight at me. Naturally, I slammed the brakes on, but — as the car's bumper loomed on my port side — I realized that this was only going to end one way. I remember thinking "Bugger.", swiftly followed by "Ow".

I ended up lying on the tarmac on my back, with my bike on top of me, having hit the back of my head on the ground rather hard. Thankfully, I was wearing my helmet, so it took most of the force of the impact. I swore at the driver once, and that seemed to take the anger out of me. From then on, I was just a bit dazed and shocked. She was really upset by the whole thing, and to be honest, her mistake was one of those little lapses of attention which we all make every now and again, but can come frighteningly close to resulting in someone's death. Two very kind and extremely efficient women stopped, picked me and my bike up, and organised the exchanging of details. The driver took me to Causualty. I didn't think I was badly hurt, but you can't be too careful with concussion. It seems that if you have to go to Accident & Emergency (I still think of it by the old term), first thing on Monday morning is a good time. It was lucky that I didn't have to wait too long; making polite conversation in an empty waiting room with someone who has just knocked you off your bike isn't easy.

The verdict was that I was more or less OK. I bruised my coccyx (which would have been worse, but for the fact that I have a reasonably well-upholstered rear), got a few minor grazes and bruises, and a bump on the head. The doctor sent me home with orders to rest for at least 24 hours, and a little card for Mr. Bsag listing all the dangerous complications of head injury that he should look out for. Luckily, it was his day off, so he spent the day checking that I was just napping and hadn't lapsed into a coma or anything. I've just found a really odd, perfectly square bruise on my thigh — how the heck did I get that?