Walking into work today on the hellish triple-damned sloping path from my house to the university, which is always coated with a layer of ice, I slipped cartoonishly. Both feet shot out from under me and I fell straight backwards, thumping hard onto the ground, uniformly distributing the pain to my elbows, back, and head. I was wearing my backpack with my laptop and iPad inside, and honestly, my first concern was that I’d just destroyed all of my primary computing power. Fortunately, I was using my Brenthaven™ laptop bag, which was robust and well padded, and everything inside survived just fine. (Contact me, Brenthaven, if you want a testimonial).
The important stuff survived, but my brain is a bit rattled, my left forearm is numb, and my neck and shoulders are badly wrecked to the point where it hurts to turn my head. That’s a bad sign. I’m going to have to make a doctor’s appointment somewhere in this really busy teaching Tuesday.
Man, that stretch of sidewalk is my bane every winter. It’s a slight slope that gets meltwater running over it at the slightest thaw, but not steep enough that the water runs off — it just sits there and freezes treacherously. There’s no way to avoid it, either, because the university is in a shallow depression lower than my house. It would probably be safer to drive the 200 feet than to walk it.
I can tell this is just the beginning, it’s going to hurt much worse later.