If you think wearing a bicycle helmet is uncool look at what happened to me as a result of not wearing one in 1978. I was riding my diamond frame upright bike west on Summit Boulevard when the front wheel dropped into a gap in the steel grating on the bridge throwing me over the handlebars headfirst onto the grating. The following is a quote from the clinical resume written upon admittance to the Emergency Room. (Note: I was tossed from an upright not a recumbent.)
This 37-year-old white mail was admitted via the Emergency Room for definitive treatment of multiple severe full-thickness lacerations and avulsion flaps involving the upper third of the face, forehead and scalp. The patient was involved in a bicycle accident and flew over the handlebars striking his skull and face on the pavement. (note: it was actually a metal bridge grating). The patient sustained skull fracture as well as fracture of the right side of the frontal sinus, superorbital rim on the right and the right zygoma.
If you have ever considered not wearing your helmet please reconsider. I would not want you to go through what I went through as a result of this accident.