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....Glad your OK.

Do we get to read the details of your "Long Story" sometime??

Thanks... my wife was probably a bit disappointed at my survival but I faired pretty well considering what could have happened.

It wasn't really any big deal and it wasn't even associated with motorcycling except for the fact that the event was put on by a local riding club.

Every summer for the past five years, my band has participated in the Portland Adult Soapbox Derby up on Mt. Tabor here in Portland. On the last run of the day, what they call "The Guantlet", we collided with another soapbox car and flew off what was essentially a cliff. Our guitar player was driving and I was riding on the back and when we collided with the other car, our steering system failed completely and pitched us to the right.

Unfortunately to the right of the track was a 20-25 foot drop off... and the wreck happened so fast that our guitar player didn't have time to brake. So, we went pell mell, kit over tea kettle, over a cliff. I bailed just as the front end of the car went over the edge and dug in to the soft dirt and I became the "diseased carcass in the catapult", so to speak. I don't remember a whole lot other than thinking, "awwwww crap. This is gonna hurt", as I watched the pavement from below come rushing up to grab me and caress me in it's hard painfulness.

I landed on my left shoulder and my helmet. I was knocked out completely and when I came to, I had a bunch of people holding me down. My left arm was laying under my body and my hand was going numb and I wanted to roll over... but they had my c-spine immobilized, so I wan't going anywhere. I don't really remember a whole lot, other than I wanted to take a nap. The next thing I remember completely was my wife coming into the ER and me bursting into tears like a little girl.

Then I had a bunch of X-rays and an MRI for me noggin and then they put me on a rotating schedule of morphine and vicoden... every hour I'd get a dose of one or the other. I was high... heh heh heh. I remember the nurse being a cute Russian girl with a slight accent and her asking me when the last time I had pee'd was. It had been a long time since I drained the main vein... so she started threatening me with a cathater. There was no freakin' way I was having that done... so I unleashed a gallon or two after some serious concentrating and avoided the cathater.

The next morning I was taken back in for another MRI because I had some bruising on the brain and was given the old "get the hell outta our hospital" routine. I guess my brain was ok (I'm sure THAT could be debated)... but I had my first broken bone, ever. I fractured the top of my humerous (which is not very humorous) in a circular kind of crack and chipped the top of the bone (at the ball joint). They didn't put me in a cast, but I did have to wear a sling that completely immobilized the arm. That sucked.

I guess my dosing myself up on vitamins and minerals did some good. I was given permission from my bone doc to start weaning myself off wearing the sling after about five weeks. I went home that day, took the damn thing off, and only wore it when I was sleeping (incase I made the mistake of rolling over onto it during the night). After about 1 more week of wearing it at night, I finally took it off for good.

Here's a couple of pics of our car ~before~ the fateful ride...



Here's our bass (guitar, not fish) player on the first run...



Here I am on the last run before the trip over the side...



And here's our guitar player and I, just moments before we went flying...



I've got some ~after~ pictures of us saved but I don't have them hosted anywhere... those ones are great. It's me... without my shirt.

Good Story! I like your REBEL Cart!

& the Moral is.....



Those Box Cars (Billy Carts here in OZ) are bloody dangerous eh!

After the fact.... pretty funny. In the sense everyone lived to careen out of control down a hill again....

Even though I'm sure it sucked in a big way at the time. Glad you made it out alive, Dude.

CentralOzzy wrote:Good Story! I like your REBEL Cart!

& the Moral is.....



Those Box Cars (Billy Carts here in OZ) are bloody dangerous eh!

Funniest part is? The car was literally crafted out of a coffin. It was a cremation coffin... a pine box coffin shaped out of fiber board. We built a frame for it and then have raced in in various color schemes over the years. The course itself was steep and long enough for the fastest cars to hit nearly 50mph. Our average speed was somewhere around 40-42 in our fastest year. The winner was haulin' butt!!!

Our car didn't fare so well after the crash. In fact, it was dismantled shortly there after because it was a total loss. I'll see if I can get the after pictures hosted somewhere for you to see... they're wacky.

Thanks Buzz... I'm glad I made it out too. I have a feeling that this was the last year for the Adult Soapbox Derby... a spectator claims she was hit and lawyered up. Now everybody's insurance company is trying to pawn the responsibility off on someone else. I don't think the riding club will be allowed to host the race on the hill... and I don't think they'll be able to get insurance for such an event after this. I believe our guitar player is being sued personally... he was driving. Lawyers...

You know what you call a thousand lawyers at the bottom of the ocean?

A good start.


How many lawyers does it take to shingle a house?

One, if you slice him thin enough.


A man went to a brain store to get some brain to complete a study. He sees a sign remarking on the quality of professional brain offerred at this particular brain store. He begins to question the butcher about the cost of these brains.

"How much does it cost for engineer brain?"

"Three dollars an ounce."

"How much does it cost for programmer brain?"

"Four dollars an ounce."

"How much for lawyer brain?"

"$1,000 an ounce."

"Why is lawyer brain so much more?"

"Do you know how many lawyers we had to kill to get one ounce of brain?"


How many personal injury attorneys does it take to change a light bulb?

Three--one to turn the bulb, one to shake him off the ladder, and the third to sue the ladder company.

That really sucks about the lawyers and all. I am totally with you on the lawyer mistrust thing too. And lovin' the jokes....

I'd love to eliminate every lawyer in the world, but I have to give them one bit of credit..... they have wormed thier way into our daily lives so deeply that our governments and society can't function without them anymore. And that SUCKS......

2-300 hundred years ago, they should have rounded all the lawyers up and got rid of them. I fear it's too late now......

And it bites that your club has lost both a source of funds, as well as a source of good fun once a year.

We have an excellent 1/2 mile flat oval with grandstands, pit areas and everything needed right here in town. It gets used 1 weekend a year to race chuckwagons as a qualifier round to the Calgary Stampede. It sits untouched the rest of the year.

It's a perfect flattrack facility! But the Town won't even consider it, and 'insurance' is what they bleat to end the discussion.

But I think I might have found a way around that.....
Met some guys at the bike show this year who race on the rodeo track in a town a few hundred miles away. They might be able to help tack a rider onto the Rodeo Associations insurance policy. That's what they do and it only costs them $2 per rider per event.

Course that don't do any good if nobody wants to put a bike on the track.... but nobody wants to commit to building a bike without a track to ride on..... but they won't consider opening the track without a decent group people with a reason to use it..... but noboby has a bike to run.... I'm getting dizzy.

I might just cut the gate open and pirate a few laps the odd night this summer and save the hassle.....

At least then there's only 2 lawyers. Mine and the Prosecutor....