Sometimes leaving later will actually cause you to arrive earlier than you otherwise would have. Today we have an anecdote of why that can be the case.

I was driving to campus as I do every day. Driving the same car, on the same streets, in the same freezing cold. But today, something would be different about my drive. Had I left 1 minute earlier or 1 minute later my drive would have been exactly like it always is. It is for this reason that leaving later can cause you to arrive earlier. Even just 1 minute later and I would have arrived on campus 20 minutes earlier than I did.

(How do you like my build up? it's almost like I'm a writer or something.)

I was driving East on 500 N approaching the intersection with University Avenue. The long line of cars in the center lane told me the light would soon be changing to green. Luckily there were no vehicles waiting to turn left yet, and the car in front of me and I pulled into the left turn lane. I'm a good 30 feet behind that car and we're slowing down for the light. In the center lane amidst the line of cars is a large delivery type truck. Big, boxy, no windows to see through it. So it was a surprise to me (and even more so for the car in front of me, I imagine) when from in front of this truck a bicyclist appeared. The car in front of me was just rolling past the front of said truck as this occurred.

The cyclist was moving too quickly for his surroundings and was just as unaware of the car coming up alongside the truck as the car was unaware of the cyclist coming around the front. No surprise here that there elapsed a very brief amount of time before the bicycle was busted up and the cyclist lying on the ground. Like a fool the cyclist was not wearing a helmet, though today mercy would shine upon him and prevent his head from contacting anything hard.

I, however, was no fool. The moment my brain finished processing what had happened I was on my phone with a 911 operator. Not knowing how bad the cyclist was I figured this was probably the best course of action from my position. The driver was actually fairly intelligent about the situation and flicked on his hazard lights and got out to help the cyclist. Another car stopped to check on his condition. So while this was being attended to I just popped my car in park and turned on my hazard lights as well.

The cyclist was back on his feet rather quickly. And was very lucky to not have a head injury or a shattered ankle; the pedal on his bike was destroyed, so there wasn't much left to protect his ankle and foot from being smashed. Since the cyclist was up and about the emergency vehicles came in without sirens blaring. Before they arrived the driver was loading the bike into his car and apparently planning to drive the cyclist home. So I got out and told them to stick around and instead we pulled off the road into the parking lot of Cherry Lane Keepsakes.

An officer arrived (with only 4.5 fingers on his right hand!) and started the process. Soon after, a firetruck and ambulance arrived to check on the cyclist; who appears to be fine except for a bloody knee. Now it's time for all of us to write up our statements about what happened. So I got my paper and sat in my car to fill it out. Of course the only pen I have is frozen solid and it's still about 28 degrees outside (and my car didn't have time to warm up yet). So it's a bit chilly trying to write under those conditions, breathing on my pen every 3 words to keep the ink flowing. My training as a theoretician and scientific writer served me well in describing the events as accurately as I could without injecting purely subjective statements as facts. I turned in my statement and was on my way, arriving on campus 20 minutes later than I had planned, and now 20 minutes late for class, but whatever.

So, now I can add to my list of unusual things I've done in my life:
Provided a Witness Statement

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