Dorky Guffaw and the Traffic Signal Misadventure

Well, adventure seems to chase around Dorky and is stuck to him very much like a third nipple would have (had he had one), and shows its presence in the most mundane and irregular of times, one such of which is being documented here for posterity.

Dorky has had a new means of transport, a bike, that his Ameyzing friend couldn't fit into the cargo baggage on his study-cum-recreation-by-watching-every-possible-artist-perform-live two year stint in some place named Buffalo (where, the most abundant type of four-legged creature, incidentally, are people who are bent over, doggy-style), and hence had to leave it at the airport for Dorky to take back home, after it almost made the conveyor belt break under its weight.

Last heard, he was upgraded from economy, and flew business class for some inexplicable reason. Dorky likes to believe it was good Karma.

Anyway, the bike needed a little servicing, and once it was taken care of at the service center, Dorky set about traveling all across the city on it, although never for arbit reasons as he might once have. After a thorough wash, and some cleaning, and a few new things to spruce it up, the bike was back in the condition that it was supposed to have been in.

The people that inhabit the city that Dorky lives in know for a fact that most of the time spent on the road is invariably spent at traffic signals. Traffic signals and the inevitable delays associated with waiting at them have now become a way of life, such that most highly ingenious people have resorted to utilizing this time for more fruitful purposes.

Portable potties on the side of the road help people take a dump, while washbasins are kept in place for people to brush their teeths (sic). If the wait time at traffic signals goes up further, portable showerheads and shower curtains will also not be too far off for the bustling signal-sidewalk trade.

Some people end up buying their vegetables in the evening while on their ride back home, while students, specially those majoring in electronics and communication at VTU, have, according to unconfirmed and somewhat authentic reports, managed to study the entire syllabus for some subjects while on their way to the exam in college.

Love stories now happen at traffic signals, as lovers of opposite sexes and sometimes, non-opposite sexes (21st Century India is coming out of the closet) , faces hidden in their helmets or behind tinted glasses of neighbouring cars engage in an intimate and intricate courtship ritual that is the stuff that the next Bollywood fop film will derive inspiration from.

Dorky himself was witness to a plethora of such phenomena, and was slowly inured to it, with the passage of time. However, something happened the other day, that brought about an interesting twist to the whole commuting phenomenon.

Dorky was traveling on the bike towards a secret unspecified destination, that he himself had no idea about, while listening to some Arch Enemy (a band he'd recently started listening to) on his ipod. The helmet that his friend had purchased was one size too big, which was perfect for Dorky, as he could listen to music while on the move, albeit at a low volume so as not to prevent him from hearing the traffic. The intense decibel level didn't really warrant a volume reduction, just for the record.

I come to you in the night,
I am your dark subconscience
I keep you awake knowing
I am the Heart of Darkness

Dorky was trying to headbang with a big helmet on his head, and looked strikingly like a spaceman with epileptic seizure trying to ride a bike, but since he was unaware of how he looked, ignorance being bliss, he continued his appreciation for the music, unabated. He spotted a traffic signal ahead, well, he actually spotted a whole bunch of vehicles ahead of him on the road, and guessed correctly that a traffic signal lay about 200 metres further ahead, which toughly translated to ten minutes of wait time for him.

He slipped the bike into neutral, switched off the engine and folding his arms, kept listening to music, while intently staring ahead, his mind blank for everything except the music playing in his ears.

His musical appreciation reverie was suddenly disturbed by a loud screech of the kind that you can see right below.

Screeeeeeeeeeeecccccccchh!!!!!!!

Yup, that kind. Noisy and irritating.

He turned around and saw a dude, in a black leather jacket, on his super bike, matching Dorky's (hopefully)menacing stare, eyeballs to eyeballs, through the visors of their respective helmets.

Dorky noticed that the dude, who we shall call Mike (simply because it rhymes with bike), had skidded and come to a halt dangerously close to his bike, and gave him a look, that motorists all over the world know and acknowledge as the "don't fuck with the silencer of my Gaadi by coming too close" look, to which Mike took extreme umbrage.

The high noise levels of the vehicles surrounding them on a busy road then prompted the two of them to engage in conversation through a mode that transcended beyond the usage of mere words for communication. They just needed the language of glares, stares and hand gestures to put their respective points across.

However, since words need to be employed in this blog post to put forth the actual gist of the exchange, it nevertheless warrants a translation of the various messages traded across amongst Dorky and Mike, which are as follows:

Dorky - Don't stand, don't stand so close to me.
(which sounds so much like a Police song)
Mike - I'll stand wherever I want to, balls to you, you skinny runt!
Dorky - Oh yeah? Wait and see, I will beat you to pulp.
Mike - Watch me beat YOU to pulp.
(It is then that Dorky proceeds to take out his Rubik's cube and solves it within 15 seconds. What Mike is unaware of is that Dorky had solved it earlier and had just rearranged it into another pattern by twisting each surface by two turns, to make it into an alternating criss-cross-cube-colour-combo.)
Dorky - Let's see YOU do that, spazzo!
(Mike then proceeds to call up his girlfriend, and gives her a telephonic orgasm in 10 seconds. Dorky has no way of knowing whether it was faked or stage-managed)
This whole battle continued as the people about them went around taking showers, taking a dump, solving Sudoku puzzles and cryptic crosswords, engaging in courtship rituals and the like, and 'both these two' guys hadn't bothered with their morning ablutions still, because of this particular clash.

They finally decided to settle it like grown men usually do, by having a bike race, with the one who won being the champion (of what exactly, nobody knows till date, and nobody cares either. It is plain human tendency to try and prove you're better than others, even in inane contests like being stupid, for instance).

The traffic signal countdown showed 60 seconds till the green light. Dorky put the side stand of his bike, got down, went on the side walk and did ten sit-ups (all with his helmet on, the ipod still playing away songs in his ears). After stretching his arms, when there were 25 seconds more, he mounted the bike. (He mounted the bike - heheheheheheheh - don't think of what you're thinking of!)

Mike, on the other hand, lifted his bike, and did a couple of bench presses on the road, with the bike above him. Onlookers, Dorky included, were astounded by his display of strength, but Dorky knew, because he had read the Panchatantra when he was a kid, a few months ago, that 'mighty brawn is no match for nimble brain', but Dorky failed to notice that he had neither quality in abundant quantities while Mike had atleast one of the afore-mentioned ones.

With 25 seconds to go, both men were on their bikes - the signal counting down the last few remaining seconds of the life of at least one of the two people involved in the race, for it was going to be a fight to the death, gladiator-style, so help them God.

The sweat on Dorky's brow began to cloud his vision, as it formed huge droplets that fell on the lenses of his spectacles, and he had to remove his hanky and wipe it clean, so he could see ahead clearly. Mike, on the other hand, was surprisingly cool about the whole thing, as he started his bike and revved his engine loudly, in an unnecessary show of strength, increasing the carbon emission content in the atmosphere when it wasn't absolutely necessary.

Dorky started the engine of his bike too, and with a high idling time for the engine, did not resort to making the kind of revving noises that Mike did, as the countdown entered single digits.

6...5...4...3...2...1

Dorky didn't know about Mike, but his heart was traveling up his oesophagus, all the way till his vocal chords, and was thumping away like a bongo drum in the hands of a drunk chimp with drum-sticks.

Both the bikes were into first gear, as the riders were valiantly trying to look ahead and see if the traffic train, which was thirty metres to the signal, was clearing fast. Dodging their way through the other motorists' path, receiving not-unjustified curses from the other people waiting to cross the signal, the twosome zig-zagged through, and surged ahead.

Dorky, in a cool and calculated move, just went past Mike onto his right, forcing Mike to the left, and then moved left again, so that Mike didn't have space and was forced to move further to the left yet again - resulting in him coming dangerously close to the footpath.

It was then that Mike realized that Dorky had tricked and out-manoeuvred him, and that defeat was imminent, for just ten metres ahead, lay a traffic cop checking post, and Mike was stopped by the cops. Dorky had read Mike's license plate and knew that he was an outstation donkey who'd probably not paid his road-tax, and thus, he chose to make this move to force him onto the left side.

Dorky stopped the bike, parked it on the side stand and watched as Mike was forced to pay up a hefty fine for his offence. Without any further ado, he flashed a thumbs-up at Mike, gave him a big trademark grin, and got on the bike. This time, he almost stumbled and fell as he was about to start if again, but he managed to retain his balance and rode off to his unspecified-destination, with the melodious strains of We Are The Champions by Queen ringing away in his ears.

It should've been an evening adventure, he could have ridden away into the sunset.

Ah well.