The Dogwashing Diaries: Anecdotes of a Modern Career-Girl

I was sick. Feverish, weak, crying, feeling sorry for myself, aching all over, pale. It hurt to swallow, my head throbbed. TheraFlu had become the liquor of the Gods. Its medicinal quality seemed to betray me hours before its box promised. Between bouts of crying and sleeping, I was enjoying my drink of choice: bounties of post-nasal drip. Clots of pea-green were occasionally ejecting themselves from my chest cavity to keep my sink and garbage can company. Lift-off was painful, but satisfying, and I took a perverse satisfaction in eyeing their fallen friends. The plump, pudding-like consistency would deflate and harden into pee-colored, dried egg whites, crusting against the pillowing clouds of discarded toilet paper and Tussin boxes. Carrying myself to the bathroom seemed to warrant a Lifetime Achievement award. Daytime TV would have been far too ambitious. So I just lay in bed.

I was sleeping like the dead.

Slack-Slack-Slack-Slack-Slack! (pause)… Slack-Slack-Slack-Slack-Slack! Someone was mercilessly ramming the security door. Was I in trouble? Was it the flu police? Had they zeroed in on my position? Were they going to drag me in in cuffs? Maybe I had been picked up by low-flying swine-flu-radar helicopters. Maybe the press was here to finish me off so they could have a story. Young woman beaten to death by the swine flu (and our microphones). Story at eleven. Young woman clobbered into an early grave by H1N1 (and our videocameras). Stay tuned. It could be you. Some things you should know to protect your family. Story at eleven.

Disoriented, I dragged my ancient mountain of a body out of the bed and hobbled to the door. Why do people insist on banging that hard on our door? I always picture a big man in a black ski mask holding an uzi, or worse, a matching pair of door-to-door Jesus salesmen blinded with Brylcreem and a sense of inadequacy, armed with pamphlets and tome-sized Bibles in fire-proof Bible cozies. Have you heard about Jesus?...me? No! I’ve never heard of “Jesus.” What’s a “Jesus?”...

I gingerly opened the door, squinting into the light and bending my hands and body into a sickle shape, the weepy, snotty grim reaper readying herself for spiritual warfare. Calling up any faint traces of sarcasm and indignation left over from my pre-flu life.

There stood an insecure, overly friendly Hispanic man in green, tumbling over his English. He said there was a leak in my gas line. Could he come in and wreck my day?

I acquiesed because he had a truck and shirt with official-looking writing. I wasn’t going to give him the satisfaction of appearing shocked or thankful that he was saving me and my house from exploding Jihad-style all over our street, so I just coughed a lot and muttered that I was sick to punctuate the untimeliness of his intrusion.

I followed him outside into the blinding sun and watched him jam a metal shaft into our dirt near the gas meter. He looked up at me seeking approval with each prod. See? The little needle jumped. “Wow,” I lowed.

That was the beginning. He poked around and left, indicating that he really didn’t know what he was doing at all, but that another man from the gas company would be coming. I loped to the couch and sat, rocking slightly and staring into space, a morbidly old woman in a pee-smelling convalescent home. My skin hurt. I had a gas leak. It hurt to swallow. I called my husband, who pressed me for answers I couldn’t give, and instructed me in the language of men for which I have no translation. He would be home soon, he said.

The second man arrived about an hour later. He was in a caramel-colored jumpsuit and spoke authoritatively. I followed him around my house, embarrased by my inability to name large metal objects. Where is the furnace?...Furnace. Furnace. What the hell. I hadn’t seen it recently. I know this big cylinder thing over here is a hot water heater. Is that good enough for you? Can’t you find the furnace? You’re the professional! I don’t know “furnace”. I live in a desert. It’s not as if furnace and I go to the movies together. There are entirely too many big, boring, foreign metal things to keep track of. It’s not my job. Besides, I’m sick. And I’m a girl.

The man was unimpressed by my ignorance, and still had not acknowledged that I had the flu and he is so sorry to hear that, and he is sorry that he is making me drag my wasted body around the house searching for a lost furnace when I need to be resting. The man offered no apologies and remained in wait. Thank God the dim outline of a green metal thing finally materialized from the dizzy mist of my estrogen-soaked memory. Green thing had once been in a little closet somewhere around…here… “Um, here!” I shouted triumphantly, “is that a furnace?”

So far, no one had said a word about how awful I looked, at home in the middle of the day, struggling over my snot to communicate, standing there prone and pathetic in a stained T shirt, gripping wads of used kleenex. At least they could acknowledge something about my suffering instead of focusing all their attention on preventing my house from blowing up. How inexcusably insensitive...

My husband has advised me that I am a defeatist with a "can-don't" attitude. This winning comment came about because I wouldn't kneel down and lift a dryer! Not a hair dryer, a CLOTHES dryer! An eight foot hulk of a clothes dryer! Because I said I KNOW that I can't do that, because I HAVE flipping scoliosis, and I HAVE BEEN TO a sports medicine doctor, a chiropractor, and a physical therapist, and I KNOW MY LIMITS! And I know that if I bend at the freaking waist and try to lift this freaking Sears tower of home appliances, I AM going to throw my BACK out!

...I was wondering if anyone knows where to buy thumbscrews? Where does the CIA shop for the best waterboarding equipment? Anyone? Anyone?

      HE has been SO sick with the same cold that I have, but he just keeps pushing through it! He has his regular job PLUS his photography, which he is behind in. The thing that infuriates me is that I worry about him, DUH! He IS my grrrrrr HUSBAND! Of COURSE I'm going to worry about him...I truly believe he is going to bottom out, but he NEVER DOES! So I DO end up looking pathetic by comparison to Superman over here...

     This is going to sound absolutely Satanic, but I'm going to say it anyway: part of me WISHES he would just collapse just so I could be RIGHT! There! I said it! Now you know the true colors of catwoman89.

       I don’t know about anyone else, but lately, our Mars and Venus have been crashing together with explosive impact, splintering and shattering, zipping lightning-shaped splits across their previously pristine surfaces. We fight like the catwoman and the dog, but then, I don’t know that we’re getting ALL of it resolved. I feel like there’s still some left over each time. Even though he’s said the apology once, twice, or three times (he’s good at apologizing. That’s one thing my husband does. I must say, even **I** can’t apologize nearly as well as he can) Still some hiss left in my whiskers. But, I don’t know, dear readers, that I should be worried, because somehow we have managed to stay together for 13 years.

        However, the longevity of our relationship does not mean that this can-don’t kitty is not still seeking to purchase a few choice torture devices.

 Got a new dog, "Russell," in San Diego. He sure is a handful!...tearing up shirts, eating people's pizza, pooping on the floor...but when he looks up at me with those big, doleful brown eyes I just HAVE to forgive him! I know I should be more strict, but...some photos below!

A common saying that is puzzling to me is, “I don’t give a rat’s ass.” The statement expresses the assumption that the speaker has, in his possession, a fair number of rats’ asses.  Not only does he have them, but he dispenses them to show he cares.  So, the recipient of the rat ass must feel a measure of comfort upon receiving one, because he is assured that the giver of the rat’s ass is concerned about his situation.

            Conversely, in the event that one did not receive the rat’s ass, he would subsequently know that his plight has been unrecognized.

            Though I have heard many people say “I don’t give a rat’s ass” many times, I have never witnessed the actual dispensation of a rat’s ass, and I wonder if that might be because the development of rat ass transport systems has not yet come to pass.

            I am interested in developing this product, as people who would normally insist on not giving a rat’s ass would perhaps give significantly more asses in a given day if they had a convenient mode of carrying them all. They could be showing their care and concern all over the place.

            The objective would, of course, be to maximize the number of rat asses that could be carried at any given time, and, also, to keep them relatively fresh, as those who receive the rat ass, again, as assurance of good will and concern, would certainly not want the rat ass they received to be plagued with maggots or tics.

            I propose some sort of soft backpack with a cooler-lining, the sort of satchel one might take camping, or to the beach, to keep beer and food cold.

PROPER ETIQUETTE UPON RECEIVING A RAT’S ASS

            In the event that one does receive a rat’s ass, recipients must be sure to accept it with gratitude, remembering that it is a gesture of care and concern. Recipients must don a wide smile, and advise their benefactor that they do appreciate the gesture, and it will just be one moment as they find a paper towel, or, even better, a pair of gloves capable of carrying hazardous waste they might use for protection. In spite of the best transport system, parasites and other small creatures might also be utilizing the rat’s ass, recognizing its value and finding purpose in it besides that of a simple gesture of good will.

HOW MAY I USE MY RAT’S ASS NOW THAT I HAVE RECEIVED IT?

In the event that the rat’s ass is reasonably fresh, your next step would be to determine whether or not you know of any snake owners who live reasonably close to where the donation has taken place. If so, you may excuse yourself and go and “give a rat’s ass” to someone else for purposes of serpent supper.

            In the event that you do not know a snake owner, or he / she lives too far for your own rat ass transport system to keep the ass fresh en route, your objective is to dispense with the rat ass as soon as possible, once again, for sanitation purposes. The trick, however, is to maintain, to the donor, the illusion that you are cherishing the ass, so as not to displease him/her.

            One method of maintaining the illusion that you are going to cherish the ass and hold it close to your heart no matter how ripe it may become, is to slip a mickey in. That’s right. Along with your rat ass transport system, perhaps you would also receive a rubber rat ass that looked uncannily like the real thing. You might point at an object in the distance and say, “Whoa! What is that?” While your giver looked away, you could throw the real ass in the bushes and pull out the rubber imitation. Then, you could say something like, “Oh, never mind.  It was nothing.” As soon as the giver looked back at you, you could be cherishing the rat ass, caressing your cheek with it and reiterating your gratitude, “You know,” you could say, “you really gave a rat’s ass about my situation today, and I won’t forget it in a hurry.  You truly are a special friend.  I am so lucky that I have someone who gives a rat’s ass about me. I’m going to remember this.  Maybe someday soon, I will be able to give a rat’s ass about you, too.” Then, rubber ass in hand, you could pick up your own rat ass transport system, strap it on your back, and head on home, where you could store your concern in a deep-freezer until tomorrow.

I love stretch jeans. I gain a little weight over the summer because I'm not teaching, and my husband has taken to grabbing the top of my paunch and the bottom of my paunch and making it talk. He pretends it is Jabba the Hut. He goes, "Monkeechaka...oh ho ho ho...heh heh heh heh." He makes the belly crotch talk in time with the Jabba the Hut impression. Stretch jeans are the best 'cause they're a little forgiving. You know what I mean? You sit down to a meal out and you don't have to secretly unzip your pants under the table, as I am wont to do, or pull the bulge up OVER the top of the pants so the top of the pants jabs below your belly button so you can still breathe and digest. None of that with stretch jeans. 

Plus, I get the pleasure of looking at that small size on the tag still. It says "4," but Gap is a conglomerate of bullshit artists, and I SO love them for it. 

You know what would be cool? A salon hair dryer in my house. I have a vision of myself sitting there, reading a Jen Lancaster novel, with a cute, shell-pink nail polish drying on my toenails, my toes separated with those little foam hands, so they’re all splayed out like frogs’ feet…

            And how hip would it be to own a salon hair dryer in the first place?