" ...there I was, wiping loose shit off the carpet while wearing my comedy clothes..."
I Am My Dog's Bitch, April 17, 2001
Between spots on Saturday night, I snuck back to the Upper West Side to walk Pinky. I turned down a last minute spot on a friend's show because I promised Gennady that he wouldn't always be the one who walked Pinky at night. I did the same thing on Friday night, also missing out on an extra last minute spot.
She sleeps in our bed, this Pinky does. My fault, because I encouraged her to leap up next to me one night. Then I dressed her in my cow pajamas and covered her under the blankets, putting her little dog head on a pillow. I placed her pink paws on my Powerbook and she wrote
last week's hoax. She prefers the bed to her crate and, like the Jeffersons, she's movin' on up. Wheezee, where's my bone?
Pinky got scared during a lightening and thunder storm last week. She ran into the bathroom and shook with fear for two hours. When she was finally coaxed from the bathroom, which I should point out is furnished with a toilet and a tiled floor, she pooped on the carpet in the living room/bedroom.
Purina Dog Chow gave Pinky diarrhea, which was much more unpleasant for us than it was for her. All she had to do was let it run like taffy, then clear out of the way with a relieved grin on her face. But me? Well there I was, a human being- one of God's preferred mammals if the Bible is to be believed, late for a spot and stuck wiping loose shit off the carpet while wearing my comedy clothes.
I am my dog's bitch.
There are a few dog runs near our park and they are small, enclosed areas where dogs are allowed to play off leash. They are filled with freaks. I am sure the normal dog owners have been driven out by people like the old woman who blows a whistle every time her dog starts to run.
"Jimmy, no!" she shouts to Jimmy, who, like the rest of the world, has learned to ignore his master.
"Is that a pit bull?"
I hear this all the time. I rolled my eyes and prepared to explain for the umpteenth time that Pinky is a mix and very sweet tempered. When I turned around, the speaker was a huge Hispanic biker who took my licking, leaping Pinky in his tattooed leather vested arms and baby talked to her in Spanish.
At Central Park, after 9:30, the cops look the other way when you let your dogs off leash, and there is a core group of normal people who meet in a well lighted area off 94th and Central Park West. Pinky plays especially well with two dogs: Suzy, a large pointy ear-ed dog and Pup, a spaz of a black lab. Pup and Pinky run each other to death in huge fast circles, and Suzy and Pinky wrestle like gladiators for up to 45 minutes straight. After a night at Central Park, Pinky sleeps like a rock, especially if a rock were to snore, fart and curl up in my half of the bed.
I have decided that since I cannot say no to a dog, children are out of the question. If owning a dog a dress rehearsal for having kids, then the play has been cancelled and your tickets can be refunded at the box office.
