This afternoon, I took a road less taken. This one was a largely unused road through NagarholE, near Mysore.
At one point, this road was blocked. It was blocked by an elephant standing upon the highway, staring down at me. The immediate question was: do I blow horn or not? The creature rose to some two times my car’s height, so the decision was a no brainer. I waited and watched, hoping that this too would pass, and the elephant would give way.2 minutes passed. I drummed my hands upon the steering wheel. I took a picture of the blighted creature. 2 more minutes passed. My friends Dire Straits, with cruel irony, pronounced over the car audio, “it’s now time to go home.” Some more minutes inched by – I clearly knew what they mean when they say it felt like eternity. The stinker refused to budge – he persisted in staying put right there in the midst of the road, allowing no room to pass.
Finally, the monstrosity nudged himself to life. He took one slow step ahead, and then another. Only, he was walking towards me. Gentle reader, you, who are a million miles away from the action, might find the verbs ‘amble’ or ‘limber’, and the adjective ‘gentle’ appropriate to describe the elephant’s movements. But I, who was behind the windshield, found but one way to describe it – he charged.
So he charged. I ran for what some would call dear life. I made my way to a safe distance, stood panting, wondering what was to happen next.
The worm wasn’t interested in me. It was the car that he lusted after. He approached my car. The lad walked around, thrusting his trunk into the open driver-window. Knopfler offered aloud:“money for nothing, chicks for free”. I could hear the loud audio from where I stood, but the bounder refused to get tempted.
With the safety of distance between us, I was out of panic mode by now. I was more amused than frightened, partly by the loud music from the car audio forming background score to this situation. Then the rotter decided to try toppling the car. He did the heave-ho once. The car rose slightly, but thankfully came back to position. He tried again, but hardly managed to budge the car. Knopfler elucidated “he’s got the action, he’s got the motion.”
The lazybone didn’t bother trying again after he failed to topple the car. He was bored. The blackguard took one step away, and then another, taking care to remain within poking distance of the car. He was on the right side, the driver’s side.
I tiptoed onto the other side, inched the door open, and took one quick glance at the fragments of glass on the rear seat. I quickly slipped into the front passenger’s seat, jumped across into the driver’s seat, flipped gears and pushed down on the accelerator like it was nobody’s business. Knopfler helpfully added, “dice was loaded from the start.”
As I sped away, all I could think was, “this will make for a great blogpost”(http://xkcd.com/77/ ).
Scary, but could be comment by one sophisticated elephant about your taste in music!.
[Herb] – Indeed, quite a possibility, that. In that case, the elephant was as much a man of taste as I am. This redeems him ever so slightly.
And oh, hi, and thanks for coming by!
damnations. beats me how I missed this. Alas! Had I known this, I would have taken care to ensure that I would taste your cooking and test your driving.
[Hrishi] – Let this be a lesson to you. Never again miss my cooking or driving, what?
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