On Sunday December 18 broke right collar bone and right shoulder blade at Boulder Park. Sore hip and neck, too.

Wondered how the X-Ray technician could get decent images of all this when my body wouldn't stop quivering. He said he could time it? Those machines have gotten better!

Experienced anger at the ER nurse when she expressed an interest in saving my jersey rather than cutting it off. I guess broken shoulder blades and collar bones out at the shoulder end aren't that readily visible...

The ER doctor had a very clear job definition: make sure you lived to see the next day. Anything past that and he was not interested.

I am fine with that.

I had visited a shoulder specialist about one year prior to "put him on retainer." The next day when asking this specialist about possible soft tissue damage, he said, "When one thing breaks, it relieves the pressure on everything else."

"Bone heals. We'll look at that other stuff later if we have to."

I have real problems framing obstacles when there is another rider in view on the trail in front of me. I was slow to recognize the down and then up ravine crossing - 10 ft deep and 18 ft across. Rather than slow down to drop in, I hit it at about 12 mph. I pushed the bike down. Couldn't get it close enough to roll on anything - 3 ft of air. I landed head and shoulder first on the opposite wall - about 4 ft down from the rim.

The helmet saved my life. The full face aspect saved my cheek, jaw, face.

For me since all my behavioral cues come from image and pattern recognition where I need a clean image of the terrain, when riding at pace, I should only lead... or follow at a generous distance.