My new regime has been so effective that from certain angles, and for certain motorists, I have become invisible. Clearly, it’s an optical illusion or maybe they think I won’t now leave a crater on their bonnet if they hit me. Rest assured, I will.
Yes, for the past two weeks or so, motorists have been sidling up to junctions on my right, looking up and down the road and then blithely pulling out into the path of the oncoming cyclist – me. Ah, but what about the French rule of giving way to the right, I hear you cry. Roads where you have to yield to oncoming traffic from the right are few and far between, and well sign-posted. No, these are roads with thick white lines denoting “wait until the road is clear”!
And it’s not just motorists. I have been plagued with dogs, specifically Jack Russells, very much the dog du jour over here. I have to confess that one poor Jack Russell puppy has been so traumatised by our encounter that he’s never, ever going to like cyclists. Only a puppy, he emerged from under his master’s parked, white van right into my path, emitted a high pitched bark and wet himself. I managed to adroitly steer around him only to encounter another dog, of the same breed, further up the road. He had escaped from its elderly owner and darted into my path, teeth bared, making straight for my tyres. I managed to outsprint it. Yes, that interval training is coming in handy.
