Skiing

Finally it happened.  It has been threatening to happen for at least two years; that is probably how long ago it was she bought those two pairs of shoes.

F asserts they are very comfortable shoes, but on the smooth surface of many of Piraeus's footpaths, they have the friction co-efficient of ice-skates.

Even ice-skates have stopping designed into them; the shoes don't.

We have had a few close calls when one F foot or other started the sudden slide on a downhill section of our route to work (it's all downhill, but some bits are sufficiently potholed to pose no real risk of prolonged sliding). It a distinct design fault of humans that they don't really have a 4WD system.  They usually use their front legs for carrying stuff (or controlling Donkeys).

When your braking system depends on the contact of two near frictionless surfaces, you don't really have a braking system.  It adds a certain frisson of fear to the trip to work, the idea that I might get a desired burst of speed but that it might also suddenly result in an uncontrolled career downhill and end in a crash.

She has managed to find a route that largely reduces the risks to a level that medical insurance underwriters would approve of, but there are days (like last Friday) when she is wandering along contemplating lunch (or possibly dinner), or the next blog post,  or whether that International Market shop we are passing has Japanese light soy sauce in again, .....

..... and then we are flying.

Interestingly, when human feet go frontwards out from under them you might expect them to fall on their padded backsides.  Even though one foot was skiing away downhill, F managed to fall forwards and land on the other knee. My experience of sitting in laps tells me that knees are boney.

Bang.

That's going to hurt.

Strangely there is no bruising, no swelling, and no pain apparently.  She has poked the knee a few times in the days since just to make sure, and no, it seems to be perfectly OK.  

Now - how does she explain that bruise in her elbow, and the skin knocked off her left knuckles, and the long scratch on her right forearm?  She can't recall any of the reasons for those real injuries.

Protecting her from dangerous stuff....