What if...

Do you ever wonder how your day would have gone if you'd left home 5 mins later, or taken the long route instead of the short? Or had the cheese sarnie instead of the steak pie? Well a few days ago, Mrs BC and I nipped into town in the truck and trailer to drop some stuff at the skip, I then had to wait while she 'nipped' into the Post Office, although if that's 'nip'.... Anyway, turns out it was lucky that she took so long as on our way home, we were about 3rd on the scene of a serious bike crash. As we pulled up to the scene, we could see a biker laying across the road, the bike mangled some feet behind him, and a car with a huge dent in the front wing. A guy was with with him, and a lady from the first car that arrived was looking after the driver of the car involved, but it appeared that nobody had phoned 999, so I did. After sprinting back to the truck for the map to give them a road number, as it seems you can't just say "we're on the road from Turriff to Cuminestown about half a mile from the castle by a house called whatever it was called, oh and here's the exact postcode", I was instructed to stay on the line (good job I'd charged my phone the night before) and report on his condition. He was out cold, literally, sort of a pale shade of blue, so it was just a case of monitoring his breathing and the blood loss from his mouth and nose until the ambulance arrived. The second thing we did after calling 999 was to get blankets from cars and keep him warm. Then it was just a case of waiting. And waiting.

The police turned up, eventually, and proceeded to display an amazing lack of intelligence and coordination. Six of them spilled from two cars, one marked and the other, a fancy unmarked silver BMW - I made a note of the number of course. They marched around, ignoring the poor bloke laying motionless on the ground. They tried to send Mrs BC off home (big mistake for a 12yr old with a funny hat!), and it was only after she pointed out that she was with me, and the fact that I was on the phone reporting back to the control centre, that they even noticed me!After about 20mins the ambulance arrived, just split seconds after a medic turned up and then the cops kicked us out. Call it gory, but what we really wanted to see, was how, and if, they did anything with his helmet because obviously, we didn't touch it. We've had first aid talks and demos at the bike club, but it's one thing practicing on someone who has the giggles and quite another to witness it first hand. It got me to thinking, when would a member of the public who arrives on the scene ever have to decide whether or not to remove the helmet? In this case, the way the guy had landed was almost in the recovery position, and although he was bleeding from the mouth, his breathing wasn't obstructed. I think it's time to refresh the first aid skills.

You wouldn't believe the amount of idiots who tried to get past the accident. With a police car blocking the junction and an 'accident' sign, there were still people driving up to the back of the unmarked cop car, wondering why they couldn't get past. Numpties.

Anyway, I'm up at 6am tomorrow, so this'll do you for now and I'll put a Skorpy update here as soon as I can.

**I should have added that the guy was whisked away in air ambulance to Inverness hosp suffering from serious chest injuries. I haven't heard any more news yet.