My poor broken Marin, I’ve managed to break the handlebars. And it was pretty embarrassing! I was on my to Chichester, or rather I’d just arrived in Chichester when it happened.
It was right in the middle of Chichester town centre. I’d just cycled the nine miles from home and was just about to get off when the bar snapped, sending me sprawling over the road, right in front of a load of old dears and an oncoming bus. The bus was only going about ten mph, so there wasn’t any problem. Although it made me jump back up pretty fast, what with seeing a bus bearing down on me and the scores of people all around also looking at me! No sooner had I hit the ground than I’d picked myself, and I tried to pretend that nothing had happened! But of course, that wasn’t going to happen, was it? A group of old dears that were standing close by came over and started fussing over me and asking if I was okay,
“Are you okay, sonny?” one of the old ladies asked
“I’m fine, thank you, my handlebars have just snapped as I was getting off”, I replied,
“You could have hurt yourself. What happened? Did you just fall off?” another old lady asked,
“No! My handlebars have just snapped. Look! But I’m fine, thank you.”
“Well, as long as you’re okay and nothing is broken, we’ll be on our way. You had a narrow escape there. Perhaps you should be a bit more careful next time you get off your bike!” a third old lady in the group replied!
I don’t think anybody noticed that my handlebar had broken; they just thought I couldn’t ride a bike!
The driver of the bus who’d also stopped, was next to start fussing over me, asking me the exact same question, “Was I okay?” to which I obviously replied, “yes, I’m fine, thank you, my handlebars have just snapped”, but at least she could see my broken handlebars and didn’t keep repeating the same question. All the people on the bus just sat there looking at me, and of course, with all these people fussing over me and a bus stopped in the middle of the road, it just drew more attention. I just wanted to go away and pretend that nothing had happened. I was grateful that people bothered to take the time to see how I was.
After I’d eventually convinced everybody that I was okay and that nothing apart from the bike was broken, they all left, leaving me to quickly park the bike up in the bicycle racks and make a hasty escape, to the nearest pub!
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