Once upon a time, on a beautiful summer day, I was enjoying a nice, peaceful bike home from work only going about 20 mph or so. When I was just about home, I saw the neighbor’s evil and possessed dog out of the corner of my eye. He seemed to be minding his own business, but then all of a sudden he darted out into the street, wedged himself right under my front tire, and we collided. The ugly little dog yelped like nobody’s business, and I was launched straight up into the air and landed in the ditch. I didn’t care about the dog; I didn’t care that my glasses were broken; I didn’t care that my helmet was cracked open, or the fact that I myself was hurt. I just wanted to make sure that my bike was okay. The bike survived with a few scratches, a slightly bent pedal, and a derailed chain. The dog also survived, unfortunately.

I found out later that that wasn’t the first time something like that had happened to the dog. It turns out that it has actually been hit by cars multiple times. Yesterday I was driving my car home from work and there it was standing right in the middle of the road. I figured he would move out of the way when I got closer, but evidently he’s not that smart. He looked pretty sick, almost half dead. He may have wanted me to put him out of his misery. The thought was awful tempting, but I thought to myself, I said, “Self, if he’s been hit by cars before and nothing happened to him, then it’s no use to risk damaging my car trying to get rid of him.”