Hands open

‘Look, Mum! No hands!’

It seems that these words of childish exuberance are rearing their head on our streets, albeit in their slightly more dangerous adult form:

‘Look, England! No brain!’

Harsh words? Well, yes. But surely ‘no brain’ is exactly what some people are not only demonstrating but are also anticipating as a future accident waits around the corner to rid them of their grey matter once and for all. As a child, lifting your hands off the handlebars for an ambitious half a second (which, let’s be honest, felt like at least a full minute when you did it) was the signal that you were truly brave, a fully initiated member of society who could hold their head high in the park, perhaps even strut while striding past those pathetic six year olds (you are seven in this story, by the way) who could only dream of lifting a finger, let alone a hand, off their handlebars. They probably still used stabilisers too. You – that’s right, you – were destined for glory because your very own mum had seen you dice with death. And all while being decked out in a fluorescent orange helmet and knee pads…

And then we become adults. Well, some of us do. Some of us walk, drive cars and ride bikes with both hands on the bars, well aware that we are surrounded by machines that are more than capable of crushing us if we make just the slightest slip. (Anyone been put off cycling yet?)

Some of us, on the other hand, think the game is still on. Mum is around every corner, cheering us on as we go for our new personal best, perhaps even occupying our fingers with something else entirely – phones being the most popular option currently – just to prove that, not only can we do without those handlebars, but we can turn our attention to something far more interesting (like the handlebar app on our phone). And you can forget the orange helmet – that’s gone completely, and I don’t just mean the colour…

My favourite ‘stupid cycling incident’ (or SCI, as they’ll forever be called) took the whole ‘I can do whatever I like with my hands’ claim to a whole new level, tore through all previous levels, mocked them for being so unimaginative and made any future efforts at handlebar-free cycling pale into insignificance. This was more than a phone. (No, it wasn’t two phones.) This was a bowl. A bowl containing noodles. A bowl held in the left hand. And the right hand? Well, let’s just say that his fingers were expertly grasping chop-sticks that were extracting the noodles and effortlessly raising them to the mouth above. While cycling. Quickly. In a straight line.

‘Look, Mum! Noodles!’

Is it wrong to have wanted to have kicked the bike?

Or perhaps we should embrace this as the perfect demonstration of multi-tasking. Maybe we should all be trying out such things? Perhaps someone who reads this might like to go for a ride on their skateboard (you probably don’t own a skateboard if you’re a follower of my blog but I saw one earlier and so my head went there…) while making a cucumber sandwich. Sound easy? You’ll need a knife, a cucumber, a bread board, two slices of bread and a tub of margarine.
Consider it a blog challenge. And, if that doesn’t take your fancy, you could always try making a cup of camomile tea while skipping gaily down the street.

‘Look, Mum! Burned hands!’