HardyWeinberg

Excellent

Mr. Underbridge

What a moron. If, when seeing a line of stopped traffic your default reaction is to *blindly swerve around it*, you need to lose your license for a decent amount of time.

Failure to yield is crap, but it's better than nothing. Good job sticking with the case, now teach his insurance company a lesson that they'll certainly pass along to him.

ItoDoeblin

Congratulations! Best of luck with your continued recovery. I hope the settlement isn't fought and is sufficient to "make you whole", as they say.

kokomo61

The museum / parking excuse was an attempt to weasel out of it. This guy was on his way to work, and either tried to leapfrog the stopped traffic, or was cell/texting and swerving to avoid the stopped cars.

Now that this is over with, I'll be focusing on finishing up PT (currently scheduled to run 2X a week through end of September) and all my doc visits. I have a scrip for an MRI, and will likely see my regular and ortho doc at the end of PT to see if I'm 'released'. At that point, I'll finish giving the bills to my car ins. company, then total them up and send copies to his insurance company. They'll then likely offer a settlement of some multiple of the med bills. I'll then talk to 2-3 PI attorneys with all the data (including the conviction) to see what they say about the case. Then, I need to decide whether filing a suit is worth it....

I noticed that his car still has the out of state plates on it. In this state, you have to register your car within X days, or you can get busted for property tax evasion. He's way over that time limit already. The web site just might get an anonymous tip.....

(not that I'm vindictive or anything like that).

kokomo61

Oh, and BTW....my new Fuji Cross Pro has arrived at the shop, and I've got all the new parts either at the store, or ready to drop off this afternoon. I'm going to drop the parts off on the way home from work, and ask them to build the bike and get it ready to go. If I get fitted this week, I may be back to biking in as early as next week!

poopisnotfood

I think you will like the Fuji, I got the Cross Comp last week and have loved every minute of it so far.

huhenio

Thanks for the update.

He lawyered up instead of manning up ... what a child.

beowulf7

Congrats, that's great news (both about court and your new bike). I'm sure it's a big sigh of relief. Now that you're approaching 2 months since the accident, it looks like you're finally doing well from a physical standpoint. Still taking OTC meds at night? Have fun riding.

kokomo61

Actually, he pled guilty (after seeing that both the officer and I showed up, and that the judge wasn't taking any lame excuses)....and showed up without a lawyer.

He would have been better off by pleading not guilty, and getting the conviction. Why? Here's what I was told by a local PI attorney.

In this state, if you plead not guilty in a traffic case, but are convicted, the traffic case conviction is inadmissible in a civil case. HOWEVER....if you plead guilty, it is. Why? Because you've legally admitted fault. So, that will be leverage when it comes time to settle the PI part of this.

To Beowulf7's question....Sleeping better, still taking meds, but less often. Ribs hurt less, but still hurt if I stand for long periods of time. Still have crappy flexibility in my lower back and hips, but PT is helping. I've been swimming 2X a week for 30 minutes (4th time was yesterday). First time I only did 20 lengths, with a lot of rest between the 2 sets of 10. 2nd time, I did 30. 3rd time, I did 34, 4th time I did 36, and yesterday, I did 40 in half an hour. I'm no Michael Phelps, but at least I'm not drowning.....

beowulf7

Too bad you're still taking meds, but at least the meds and exercise are going in the right direction. It looks like cager owned himself and will wind up regretting it.

EmersonHart13

That is GREAT NEWS. Now on to a full recovery, back on 2 wheels soon enough!

kokomo61

Latest update - At PT today, they've scaled me back to 1 session per week, and said that they should be done by the end of September. I get an MRI this weekend to check my progress, and I expect that by 10/1 I'll be "done" with treatment. I'll be back to commuting the 1st week of Sept, though.

I want to get my new bike home so I can start making sure that it's set up properly and get back into the routine of prepping for the morning ride.

dscheidt

Good to hear!

brooklyncyclist

Glad to hear everything's coming together for you finally, kokomo. It's certainly been a summer to forget, but your preparation and perseverance have paid off. Congratulations. Enjoy your new ride.

beowulf7

Great to hear that, kokomo. I can only imagine how painful and frustrating the past 2 months have been for you. But things are coming together, you got a new bike, and it appears you'll be compensated for PI and P&S. :cool:

bobbyortizjr

get well...

i didn't wear a helmet for a little while because it looked so dorky, but someone cut me off forcing me onto the sidewalk and tumbling off my bike.

that quickly cured my of my stupid desire to look cool...i don't even ride the quarter mile to the supermarket with a helmet now.

ItsJustMe

Here's a hint: If you're an adult on a bike, you don't look cool. Might as well be safe.

beowulf7

I didn't used to wear a helmet either until I started doing charity rides, which required helmet use. Ever since then, I always strap on the helmet, even if just riding around my neighborhood development.

beowulf7

Have your injuries continued healing nicely over the past 3 weeks? Hope you're enjoying your new ride.

kokomo61

Haven't updated for a while, so I thought I would post the latest....

New bike is working out well, but I'm going to strip off the Specialized Armadillo CX tires and go back to Gatorskins - the CX tires are just too fat.

I'm kind of up and down physically. I can ride further, but I'm still having weird back and hip issues. I pop like a bowl of Rice Krispies every morning, and still have to sleep with a body pillow to keep my hips from shifting. I've had two incidents with major muscle spasms after doing what should be routing household chores that involved lifting stuff. I also went camping this weekend, and even using a big air mattress, I cramped badly just trying to get dressed in the tent....

So... I'm not sure what's happening. My doc has scheduled me for a series of 3 cortisone injections, which are supposed to help. I'm not really in pain, but I'm cramping more than I think I should be, and for some reason, the BACK of my ribs are hurting.

I'm up to $7900 in medical costs, and it's projected to be about 10K by the end of the year. Insurance is paying, but man, this is tedious.

markhr

Have you tried sleeping on the floor(or any other flat, hard surface) without all the extra padding? Generally the softer surface the more your back is affected, i.e., spasms, cramps and pain.

Anyway, sleeping on a flat, hard surface works for my bad back but usually takes 2-3 nights for the full effect and relief to kick in.

kokomo61

We have a Select Comfort mattress, and I was able to crank it up to the highest setting. That helps quite a bit - but I also need a body pillow between my knees to keep my hips and spine in line. So, I've got an adaptation that helps....it's the lack of flexibility that is most annoying.

markhr

Fair enough. That sucks, good luck with the healing and try a few yoga classes. They're great for finally loosening muscles that are in spasm (really wierd feeling when they un-spasm) and flexibility too.

beowulf7

Have you tried doing a lot of swimming to help the flexibility of the joints and stretch out the muscles in a comfortable manner?

kokomo61

Another update....

I've been having some significant stiffness problems lately - whenever I've done anything significant lifting wise, (taking seats out of minivan, moving bags of lawn stuff) I'm VERY stiff for the next few days. I'm not talking significant yard work. It's not 20 bags of sand....it's 6. From the car to the driveway. (about 6 feet).

As far as doctor stuff, I'm down to 1 day of PT a week, and they plan to end it at the end of this month....but mainly because I seem to have stabilized at a particular level of flexibility, not because I'm completely back to normal. I also got my first of 3 epidural cortisone shots....these are NOT fun.

At the end of this series (around 11/15), I'll get another eval from my ortho doc. He'll either release me from treatment (because I'm all better), or set a checkpoint for 6 months from now (because I'm not where I was before the accident).

From a riding standpoint, I'm only getting in 1 commute a week at this point, which really sucks. I'll try to do 2 this week, but ideally, I'd be riding 3 times (2 commutes of 42 miles RT), and 1 recreational ride on the weekends. Some of this is a time management issue, but a lot of it is because I'm too stiff / sore to ride a lot.

Sorry for the rant - I'm just ticked right now that this isn't over with.