Sorry, I can't let it go.
There's been the minor irritating stuff - such as the recent trend for motorists to skim by inches from my elbow as they jump the lights that I'm stopped at. It's happening a couple of times every ride - that's just unpleasant.
Yesterday though, there was the figure in the road. Lying as he had fallen, a considerable distance from the crossing. No passers-by gawping, no other vehicles stopped, just the response car in the middle of the carriageway and the paramedic establishing an airway. Normally the area is thronged, it had obviously just happened and the victim looked suddenly, horribly alone.
Late at night on the way home: madness. Three successive vehicles.
I can remember looking at the nearside wheel as I bailed left - it was chattering with the ABS. The driver had beaten me to the pinch point but couldn't do anything other than brake to a stop to avoid the parked car on the left. I was wedged between him and the kerb. I got a foot down but had to steady myself with a hand against the passenger window. Within a split second that was revealed as 'The Wrong Thing To Do'. The next couple of minutes were a mixture of unpleasant threats, getting out of his grasp, staying upright despite kicks to the rear wheel, bailing to the pavement in populated, lit areas, slack jawed indifference to a cyclist being dragged off their bike, getting away again and eventually making it to Newington Green. At last I was off the road and I had my bike and a good Samaritan between me and him. The Police arrived just as he started to get kicky again. I was sent on my way and told to get some distance between us while they had a chat.
I managed to get to the far side of Newington Green. I pulled up behind a bus that was waiting for on-coming traffic to clear before making it's way along the narrow channel between the parked cars. Then I was gently hit from behind. A woman in a small dark car had driven up against my rear wheel. I didn't react other than to move forward and to the left. She pulled up again a hair's breadth from my wheel. There was nowhere for me to go. Bus in front, tightly parked cars on the left, the car on my rear wheel. The only gap I could physically fit through was blind into on-coming traffic. I turned to the woman and simply said 'Please!' and clasped my hands together. As the bus moved off I was again looking for the first gap into which I could bail as the car revved and lurched behind me. It was the bus stop. I pulled in behind the bus and as the car passed one of the four passengers took the opportunity to call me a cunt and throw something.
Seeking a relatively safe place to be I sheltered behind the bus as it rolled along the Essex Road. A taxi that was passing in the outside lane though, took the opportunity to brake, move in to the bus lane behind the bus, push me into the gutter, move back into the outside lane and then continue to overtake the bus. No drama, but by this point depressing that someone would go out of their way, and slow themselves down just to be unpleasant.
I stopped for ten minutes to pull myself together and to investigate the problem that was developing with my left pedal. I was close to throwing the bike in a nearby skip, but the fact that twelve miles with a snapped cleat is preferable to the last train on the overground on a Friday night saved it.
I'm a bit paralysed today.
Edit: A weird detail that sticks is that the first driver wanted me pay for his shoes that he had damaged by kicking me.
