You may notice in my picture above that I am sporting a new accessory. No, it’s not the hat–that has been around for a while! It is a splint on my right arm. Yesterday while riding home on my bike along the LA River bike trail between Anaheim and PCH something happened. Details are bit fuzzy. There was a young couple on the left side against the wall and I was watching them when I hit something. There was an impact and my right arm went dead. That caused me to lose control of the bike. Luckily I was able to bleed enough speed so that when I did go down I only suffered an abrasion on my knee. My hypothesis about what happened is that the young man had a skateboard that had found its way onto the path (he was pretty preoccupied with the young lady) and I hit the end of it which catapulted it into the air where it whacked my elbow and caused me to lose the use of that arm. That’s my story and I am sticking to it!

My elbow–ouch!

Many thanks to Edna Pestano, who was kind enough to come and pick up myself and my bike and ferry me to the urgent care facility. They took an x-Ray which seems to show a small fracture to my radius, patched me up and splinted my arm. Haven’t yet seen an orthopedist for the final verdict, but looks like I am going to have yet another opportunity absorb yet another injury. Next steps: deal with it and move on! The good news is that on my walk to Steelhead Coffee this morning my right leg and right foot, the site of much angst over the past several months as I reworked my gait, were performing quite well, which is a great development since I am likely going to be doing mostly walking as my exercise for a while!

Yesterday otherwise was a great day. In the morning at Steelhead I was sitting next to two men who seemed to be conversing about some kind of athletic training, and then they were joined by a lovely young lady who had a bag of goodies (mostly Bluetooth devices like headphones, etc.) that she was giving to the younger of the two men. It turns out that the younger fellow is a slope-style skier named Noah Wallace (@noah_wallace on IG), the other fellow was his agent, and the young lady a representative of a corporation that is providing him with sponsorship.

After that it was off to LA Fitness with another great yoga class with JR Johnson, followed by some light weight work and my treadmill and elliptical work for my gait. Then it was down to the beach at Belmont Shore on my bike. I have been hanging out there at 2nd and Bay Shore watching the swimmers come and go, and trying to summon the gumption to add swimming to my training regimen. I was getting pretty close, but it looks like that may need to be put off for a few weeks at least.

On the way back I saw that play for the Asics World Series of Beach Volleyball event had begun, so I stopped off there and saw a couple of matches in the qualifying rounds. Early in the tournament is a great time to go there. Not many spectators there, a chance to rub elbows with the top beach volleyball players in the world, and an opportunity to see the sport from very close up. On the women’s side, Kerri Walsh Jennings and April Ross will be playing, along with Larissa and Talita, the Brazilian pair who lost to Jennings/Ross in the Bronze medal match. Also present are the top-seeded Dahlhouser and Lucena men’s team, who will be challenged by the top-ranked men’s team from Latvia. I plan to take in some of the action today, and will be heading down there shortly.

Update from the future: August 23, 2018

It turned out not to be a fracture, but a rupture of two of the three heads of my triceps. The young man’s skateboard had rolled across the bike path, and I rode right over it without any knowledge it was there. The resulting jolt was sufficient to cause my triceps to pull a bit of bone from my elbow. I had surgery 11 days later to reattach them, was in a rigid splint for 3 months, and am still, two years later, not quite up to speed on that arm.