I was cleaning my track bike the evening before new year's eve around 10 pm, and my finger got caught between the chain and the chainring. On a fixed gear bike, the chain tension is very tight, leaving no slack for error. My first thought was "Good, I still have a finger", but I had heard a crunching noise and figured I had broken it. After the initial panic, I experienced the burst of adrenaline and then started to feel as if I were burning up with a fever, which then made me feel faint. After pacing back and forth for a few minutes, I had to sit down. Then, the adrenaline subsided and I was calm again.

Now what? We called some doctor friends (doctors marry doctors sometimes) and they happened to be at home watching a movie. In ten minutes, an orthopedic surgery resident had numbed up my finger and cleaned out the cut with saline. The finger was not broken and the cut did not need stitches. The alternative would have been the ER, which would have sucked. I probably would have waited until the next day to see a doctor, and then would have been dealing with an infected wound.

Hooray for home-administered medical services.

I will probably wear work gloves when cleaning my fixed gear bike chain from now on. The crunching sound of skin being cut to the bone gives me the heebie-jeebies.