THE LOST DOGS OF LANGSTON.

Entry 17.

So you know how people at work are always saying, When I retire I wanna move into a big house in the country and take care of ALL THE DOGS????????

And then they sigh, and flutter their eyes, looking up to heaven????????

Well be careful what you WISH FOR.

Because since now there are three Great Pyrenees mixes outside your gate and two of them you don't know well, you have to take your cell phone with you in your bathrobe pocket (since you take care of ALL THE DOGS now you don't have much time to bathe and get dressed anymore so you just wear your jams and your bathrobe, or cocktail blanket as it is fashionably called in some supernal realms, all the time) to call Miss Ilene when you go over so that you can leave her popcorn for her on the porch and you want her to know that it's there so they don't get it before she does.

Then you have to go to the mailbox in your mask and you don't want to get castigating looks from people driving by so you prepare a carefully-oiled defense such as "it helps my allergies" or "fuck you it's none of your goddam business anyway whether I am wearing a mask to my mailbox or not, maybe I'm a little weird, you should be praying in church for me anyway is what you should be doing"

but then you never see these imaginary people even though you might someday and then you'll be ready, by gum

John Brown my socks, you'll be ready...

...and so then when you get back you have to check on Tinky, since she doesn't like other dogs she has to play by herself in the back yard which she does very well, and you like to see if she's doing okay so you go back there and notice the vast amount of poop you have to pick up with the plastic bag and muck out, with your left hand probably since the right one is a little on the fritz these days...

...and what you have to also do is remember to check on Sophie who is in her crate because Sophie plays too rough and Angelo is not ready so soon after his operation to play with anyone...so you have to keep everyone separate and dole out attention as you have it, and if you need a nap then so be it

and you will

and so you go see about Tinky and you say Come here and she merely blinks at you and offers a desultory tail wag (read: a half-ass tail wag) and keeps on eating grass or whatever it is in the yard that she's eating

and so you might as well go check on Sophie but now Angelo needs something, he's up front whining so you go to let him out

and then you think I'll put this in my blog, so that people may know that THIS is what it's like to retire to a house in the country and take care of ALL THE DOGS.

And Angelo is so cute making noises with his squeaky toys and you really hate to miss it but you are SO TIRED that you just have to lie down for a nap

and you really didn't get time much to sit with Sophie, in fact not any time at all because she's already dragged the hose attachments out and chewed parts of them up and the plastic drain water catcher has been dragged to the middle of the yard and there are pieces of rubber everywhere in the yard and maybe you'll have to catch up with Sophie later tonight.

But in the meantime not even a double shot of espresso in a grande dirty chai latte from Cafe 153 at the Bridge Street Mall could keep you from falling asleep.

Sic transit Gloria Moody (that's what we used to say back in our old school days, that's the lady who renovated our music building at THE University of Alabama. Yes she has probably passed on into the next dimension somewhere, unless they are keeping her hologram alive for special appearances at parties involving getting funding from heads of state. But not the ones having the affairs with the wrong girls who come out and tell every detail of what happened.)

(You can tell I'm kind of obsessed with this Cesaire and John Merrill thing. It's like a weird little horrifying drama that I keep revisiting redundantly, over and over. Like the guy in Eraserhead who keeps looking into the radiator only to see that girl with the weird makeup on her face, dancing and singing that little song about Heaven, and stepping on those squishy things that keep falling down from the "ceiling.")

Oh now here's the cat. She wants to get in my lap, I can't type anymore right now.