Working Hard or Hardly Working


On Saturday I mowed both yards and discovered that the back yard looked better before I mowed it because at least wildly over grown it was green instead of brown. Dirt is not an adequate substitute for weeds, no matter how weedy and over grown the weeds may be. Ask around, weeds trump dirt in most aesthetics polls.

Later on I bathed Nephdog in the front yard. Nephdog has proven to be a popular addition to the dog line up in the neighborhood. Especially with the hard to reach 2-6 year old demographic. He has acquired during his brief run a well organized fanbase as well as an impressive online presence. He has four yahoo groups: Nephdog_Rocks, Nephdog! Nephdog is cool! And the newest Nephdog Fanfiction . He has also picked up a number of LJ groups dedicated to his worship The Church of Nephdog Community, Nephdog Lurve Community and yet another fanfiction group The Nephdog Slash Community, where I belive he is slashed with the dogs from “Dogs With Jobs”.

Since I’ve had Nephdog staying with me I have turned into the fiercest dog walker in the neighborhood. Nobody is going to bother a chick with 170 pounds of dog attached to her wrist - Its just not a good idea. I was made so brave by this discovery that I took the dogs for a long walk that included walking the dreaded Edenton. Today I was not bothered by pan handlers, meth whores or any of the other random freaks that routinely think I look like a good mark.

I had both dogs and I was really hoping that someone would ask me for money, tell me their life story or try to make me believe that they need a quarter because They Are Not On Drugs. The one time I’m all “Bother me just a little, try to intimidate me...” The street people went into hiding and the bangers are scared of dogs anyway. I was all ready to be Dirty Harriet and no dice. I was all by myself.


That was a big drag. How often am I going to be out there armed with two enormous dogs just waiting to be bothered? Of course the other day, sans dogs I got bothered at the burger place because the dim bulb at the window didn’t know that “The Guy Is Panhandling! Tell him to go away” meant that there was a guy outside his store begging and bothering his patron and I wanted him to tell the guy to step off before I was forced to give him my change. I then wished the panhandler hadn’t launched in to his spiel about how he just need a few cents because had been sleeping in the park for three nights because the shelter kicked him out because they found out he had Hep C. - while I had cash in hand. I wished I wore my hair differently so the panhandler couldn’t see SUCKER tatooed to my forehead.

See, if I had both dogs with me the pan handler would have never even started his spiel. With the dogs I could have said, if he was brave enough to not run at the sight of the dogs in the first place and still wanted money “Well, one word from me and one or the other of the dogs could be on you. If’n I were you, I think I would want the boy dog to hold me down and the girl dog to tear my throat out. This one here is the boy dog and that one here is the girl dog. The boy dog is older and has smaller teeth and he isn’t as big a dog, but he’s a lot stronger than her and he likes to play with his food. The girl dog is a bigger animal and has bigger, longer teeth and a harder jaw and she would probably kill you faster - the bad news is that neither dog likes to share or waiting their turn and the resulting dog fight would just end up tearing you up anyway. Do you need something from me?”. I’m thinking I would still have my dollar - but the guy would still have Hep C and would still be sleeping outside and, and... it’s probably better for my karma I didn’t have the dogs with me.