Random Rant-6 : The Shoulder Block Part 3- Blindsighted

This is the last of the Shoulder Block series, and I've chosen it for last because it is the most personal, and I don't think you would have experienced the particularities unless you travel from Hinjewadi Phase 2 to your home or place of residence on the bottleneck that is, well, the road through there.

But you two-wheeler-walas will no doubt understand that basic premise. During the monsoons, precipitation tends to collect on the visor of your helmet (of law abiding citizens who dare to wear a helmet, that is). This is expected and not a wholly irritating phenomenon. However, these little drops of water have the propensity to capture a ray of light and scatter it. And they all do this individually. Also it is the habit of the great Indian populace (baboons!) to ride at night with their high beams on. So not only do their headlights flash right in your eyes, the light-scattering droplets fill your helmet with a beautiful glow that shields your eyes from everything else.

Certainly a frightening situation.

So during the monsoons, when the road gets wet (and mind you, in Pune sometimes it doesn't rain, it just drizzles which serves only to make the road mucky and dangerous without being pleasant at all, but that's another rant), traffic invariable grinds to a halt, and proceeds from then on at a snail's pace. And while leaving the large commercial complex that is IT Park, this can mean encountering A SHITLOAD OF TRAFFIC in the aforementioned bottleneck.

Well, we twowheeler guys are damned if we're sitting through that bullshit. The main road has going and coming lanes separated by a divider which has gaps in it at certain points so a vehicle can turn around without having to traverse the whole stretch. So we cross the gap and go from the other side which is mostly empty. So much for law abiding citizens. But it cuts down travel time to a fraction of what it would be! And trudging through the traffic in a minor drizzle is a pain in the ass! Heavier rain is far better, believe me!

But the worst thing that can happen is you miss the gap. Because if you should, god forbid, you are in for about a kilometer of traffic, all the while roasting in your raincoat, slowly getting damp on the inside with aerosol-rain and sweat, feet getting muddy, and temper growing short. Combine this with the phenomenon of the glowing helmet and you'll see where I'm going.

You plan turn. You gdt blinded by fucking high beams and bastard rain droplets on visor. Bam. You miss turn. You screwed. Fuck.

There is no better way to explain this than a rage. My first. A new trend for a new year.

Random Rant-5 : The Shoulder Block Part 2- Boxed Out

The morning commute is such a hassle. Millions of bees all bludgeoning their way through traffic to the hive to churn out the honey. Everyone's already pissed off, you shouldn't try to do anything that would piss someone off any more.

Well, on my commute to through the bottleneck that is Hinjewadi (through which a hundred thousand vehicles must squeeze through on their way to Rajiv Gandhi Biotech Park, which is actually not a park at all, but a large industrial and commercial zone), I have to cross the highway.

It's often the best part of my journey... open road, bright sun... but sometimes it becomes an arduous task. Like if some fool goes and kills himself, it backs up traffic for ages. Or it may simply be a case of many vehicles accumulating at the same time at the "end" of the highway under Wakad Flyover, at which point I must take a turn.

Anyway, there are two lanes on the road, and to the far left there will be a guard rail and a line marking off the legally navigable road (the guard rail need not necessarily be there, I have included it to represent the total extremity of the road). Now there is a certain unwritten rule that bike-wallahs will form a single line and go along this thin strip of road, while the car-wallahs and other big vehicles will go along the main road (see diagram below). This is highly beneficial to bike-wallahs like myself, and no really minds it.

Line of bikes moving along smoothly,
all is well in Middle Earth.

However, in a move indicative of the epidemic of stupidity prevalent in this nation, sometimes some extremely bright and enterprising car-wallah will endeavor to occupy that thin gap thereby blocking me entirely.

Stupid troll car does the unthinkable. Normal
traffic moves along steady but slow, while I
am fucked.

Behenchod. Madharchod. Fucking chutiya. Asshole. Haramkor. You stupid babboon, You fucking inbred neanderthal. 

My blood is boiling. The stream of abuses forming in my head is limited only by my range of language (which is 1 proper and I can only curse in like 3 or 4). I nearly break my thumb off honking the horn.

Why? Why why why? Why would you do something like that? Does it serve any purpose at all? Is your car going to change shape and slither through this small gap? Are you even going to give another car on your other side space to move? No. What the MUTHERFUCK are you going to accomplish by this astoundingly brilliant feat? What Einsteinian stroke of genius led you to attempt such a monstrosity of idiocy? I am literally humbled and baffled in the face of such high level moronity.

And you know that it is 99% of the time one of those fucking white taxis with the red "T" on the back, which for some reason I call "touristers." I can only assume they don't own the cars they drive, which gives them license to drive like F1 drivers on crack. They are the ones that are always speeding and swerving in a fashion to put Jason Bourne to shame. They are the ones that come behind you and honk like the fucking Devil was behind them, and then when they do overtake you, they don't go away- they are dodging and weaving in front of you, hogging the whole bleeding road because they can't go in front on account of the very traffic that was blocking you in the first place! They have no respect or regard for life! I hate you fucking illiterate* scum!

So I am now boxed out by super intelligent troll car in slow moving traffic. All because I am surrounded by apes that refused to evolve. I shout obscenities and the sound reverberates in my helmet rendering my temporarily deaf. God, help me.

*by "illiterate," I don't mean the literal meaning. I have nothing against illiterates. Only idiots.

Random Rant-4 : The Shoulder Block

So here's the situation: I'm riding my motorbike on the highway, and I need to take the exit so I can get off and get home. In essence, this could be any road, and any turn that you need to take. The exit off a highway is usually marked by a shoulder (if you don't know what that is, you can check here). This is generally a very easy operation.

So here's the problem: there's a big fucking truck in the middle.

Now, navigating around trucks is a part and parcel of taking to the road, I can't complain about that. But Murphy's Law has a way of augmenting the situation.

Inevitably, it so happens (in my case, several times) that there will be a truck trudging along in the vicinity of this very important exit, which in itself is not a horrible scenario, BUT it does so at a frustrating pace. The frustration arises not from the fact that it is slow or fast. The truck, or other heavy vehicle steamrolls along the road on the very side of the exit you need to take just in range of your exit and its speed is such that
1. You cannot overtake it in time to make your exit.
2. You cannot choose to go alongside it, for obvious reasons. Also, the gap on the near side of the truck is too small for you to fit into.
3. It is going far to slow for you to be able to stay behind without losing your temper.

Too slow                            Too fast                       Ah, just right

Clearly, neither of the above mentioned scenarios is navigable with much panache, lest you wish
to risk ending up as road kill, which you most likely will.

How it can be all these things at once, only Murphy can tell.

However, after a long, annoying day at the crap factory, why must I have to deal with this? Stupid troll truck at the point of the last exit blocking me off the shoulder? How is it that in the all the infinite permutations of traffic, and considering the arbitrary and highly variable nature of the moment I left my destination and the moment the truck left its destination, that the two of us would cross paths in that very 100 meter stretch of the universe... it seems highly unlikely, yes? It would seem I had a better chance of getting struck by lightning while getting attacked by a shark, yes? Maybe even a higher probability of getting a girlfriend, yes? But then how does this keep on happening? Murphy's Law be damned, and the truck driver be damned!

And you can't even do anything about it! Because goddamn if the driver is going to pay any attention to you. No matter how many pointless visions of using Magneto's powers to angrily fling said truck into the horizon, you have to ride it out, or risk death. The choice is yours.

Of course, death may be a better option than trying to overtake evil troll truck and pulling out at the last moment. For if you miss the exit (at least in my case) you have to face the humiliation of riding out the rest of the highway- because the next turn is 10km ahead.

Invariably, the situation results in the precipitation of pure rage. Road rage. Fffffuuuuuu!!!!!!

Random Rant-1 : The Elevator Tango

So its Monday morning (or really, it can be any day and any time, but somehow Monday morning has a lot of scope for pissing people off). You reach the lift (say, in my case at office, but again it can be anywhere). There is no one in sight. There's no way in hell you're taking the stairs (because you woke up at 6:30 to go for a jog and want a break, or you're just a lazy bastard).

You press the button and the machinery makes that annoying bing-bong sound. Down comes the lift, nice and empty, not a soul in sight. You're quite pleased, it's never so easy. Well, of course it's not.

You enter the lift and the door closes... but just as its about to shut- bing-bong - some prick just reaches outside and presses the call button, requiring the door to reopen.

You take a moment to curse under your breath because it's not that hot girl you would kill for a moment alone with, but rather some fat, out of breath guy with a week's worth of beard growth. Prick can't even shave properly and come on Monday fucking morning. You glare at him. The elevator music is starting to piss you off.

The doors close and you regain your composure when suddenly - bing-bong - and enter two giggly, airheaded girls talking animatedly about the latest airhead Bollywood movie they saw. They see your scowl in the reflective doors and smile knowingly at each other, trying and failing miserably not to laugh. Oh yes, its a fucking riot. Ha ha. I can hardly control myself.

Which is fine, except as the door closes- bing-bong - and in walks in a hefty Punjabi, jovial and spirited, all smiles and sunshine, all on a Monday morning. I love the ol' Punjabi energy. But on a Monday fucking morning? Do I really need to face such a chipper attitude from anyone? Which would be fine, except he holds open the lift and shouts, yes shouts, "Oi, jaldi aa jao!" You roll your eyes. Sometimes I think they know one language and one volume. Of course, whoever he was shouting to does not come jaldi, they come at their own damn pace. In waltz in a handful of colorfully dressed happy-go-lucky crowd, all of them very expressively excited that they made it in time. You grind your teeth.

And so it continues. Person after person suddenly appears out of nowhere. They don't come together, oh Lord no, that would be too easy. But as though it was practiced, they all come exactly on cue just as the lift doors are about to close completely. Your back is pressed against the wall, and you are assaulted with the scent of breakfasts from around the country: poha, aloo parantha, idli sambar, chicken roll, coffee and croissant, and what seems to be an entire tandoori chicken. You look at the Punjabi again.

A minimum of 6-7 minutes later you disembark on your floor, shoulder pushing everyone you come in contact with, lips pursed into a fine smile, all the while grumbling to yourself, WHY DIDN'T I TAKE THE FUCKING STAIRS???