The dog’s got my bat…er, back

Wow, how ‘bout this weather?! It sure is unseasonably warm!

Warm enough to turn off the furnace last night.
Warm enough to sleep nekkid.
Warm enough to wake up a hibernating flying mammal, in fact!

How can I be so sure? Because one of the fuckers was flying crazy-ass loops, as bats are wont to do, around my bedroom at midnight.

It was one of those rare instances that I had an eensy, teensy amount of regret for kicking out the Man of the House.

As I lay in my bed, under the covers, screaming like a little girl, my new hero sprang into action:

Yes, that is a look of proud victory on the Monster's face. In this picture, he has just made use of his hunting-dog genes to help me tag team the bat. While I was locked in the bathroom shrieking and getting dressed (because the only thing less dignified than running from a bat screaming is running from a bat screaming and nekkid), he was keeping an eye on the bat.

When I emerged, fishing net in hand, he helpfully led me to the intruder, which was being all freaky and shit hanging upside down from the top of the window. When I knocked it out of the air, again and again, he pounced on it, and kept nipping at it till it rose no more.

Me, I can't kill anything bigger than a mosquito. But it's OK if the dog does. That's just nature taking its course. Like the freaking Discovery Channel, right there in my hallway. Hey, that's why I keep their rabies vaccinations current, right?

Oh--and where was Big Head Dog, the vee-cious 10-headed beast, while his master and cohort were bravely doing battle with the 5-ounce dragon? Cowering in the corner. Then he went to hang out in the bathtub for a while. I'm sure, though, if it were, you know, a person attacking me, he would be all over it. He just doesn't do bats, I guess.

what the hell happened?

Mark Knopler said it best: "Some days you're the windshield, some days you're the bug."

This is me today:

As I type, I'm "working from home," while a plumber replaces my entire kitchen drain and garbage disposal. I knew the fuckwads who used to own this house didn't install it right, which is why periodically my sink turns into a foul-smelling, brackish, grease-film-covered cesspool. Like it was this morning when I went to make coffee. I hope he puts a big-ass red bow on it when he's finished, because it's my six hundred and forty fucking dollar Christmas present to myself. Ho fucking ho!

And then there was the meeting last night of one of the groups I volunteer with, at which the discussion suddenly and horribly turned to Deputy Joe .... and his girlfriend. That's right, girlfriend. With no small measure of effort, I stifled the urge to yell, "Girlfriend??!! He doesn't have a girlfriend!!!"

Oh, but he does. I tried to maintain composure while one of the members of the group recounted her conversation with the two of them at a Function a couple of weeks ago, in which Deputy Joe told of his plans to return to some impoverished third world country with her for a few weeks after the first of the year. Another member of the group, a contractor, piped up to add that the girlfriend called him about getting a quote on some work at his house.

His house?? The one that may or may not still have a pair of my underwear lost in it? The one with the floor from which I collected my clothes at dawn a matter of weeks ago???

That mother fucking goddamn slimeball piece of shit.

Of course, while this was all going down, I was sitting directly across the table from Bob Sanders, and therefore stifled the urge to begin violently stabbing my notes with my pen.

Since I'm "working from home" today, I had the chance to do some research on this...person. She's a member of a Family of Note, is an incurable do-gooder who loves children in third-world countries (which, I'm sure, she helps with the Family Money, because her teacher's salary isn't going to finance all those trips), and--get this--wears pigtails. Low on either side of her head, braided. Maybe Piggy only did that once, but even once past the age of 13 is completely unacceptable, particularly when there's a camera in the vicinity.

It's noon now. I think it's beer o'clock.

all by myself

One of these days I'm gonna have to figure out how to do all this fancy Internets stuff so I can pimp my blog.

Today, for instance, I'd hunt down an audio clip of that godawful song in the title.

You see, my house is empty today. The ex called while I was working my weekend gig Friday night to see if he could have Big Head Dog and the Monster for a few days. It took every ounce of self-restraint I have (which is about 4 ounces anyway) to not say, would it have killed you to ask me that a couple of weeks ago when the Greek refused to come to my house because my "vee-cious 10-headed beast" (that would be Big Head Dog) would've tried to attack him when he got within 10 feet of my bedroom?

And he's not even the guy who Big Head Dog bit in the ass.

Anyhoo, I kept my mouth shut, packed the boys' suitcase (actually an empty Trader Joe's bag) and took them to their dad's for a long weekend yesterday. And the roommate's gone for the weekend, too.

I'm shocked to find I'm completely discombobulated by all this. I don't know what to do with myself. There are no furry creatures interrupting me every 5 minutes for their favorite game, Inside Vs. Outside, and there's no one sitting on my sofa watching television and distracting me with valuable insights into the latest episode of America's Next Top Model. It's going to drive me to do something completely wacky, like clean.

I planned to get an early start on the day, but of course I didn't come straight home after work last night, like I'd planned to. I stopped by the friendly neighborhood tavern (it is, after all, on the way home), and it's a good thing I did. Otherwise, I would have missed the first meeting of the Crabby Club.

I also would have missed important discourse on topics such as programming home thermostats and whether or not the theme song to Baywatch had words, and if so, did David Hasselhoff sing them?

I also would have missed the Marines birthday party, where a bunch of ex-Marines, average age 68.2, drank a lot and periodically broke into increasingly distressed versions of "Halls of Montezuma." You couldn't miss 'em--they were the big group with the big red USMC flag duct-taped to the wall (Crabby Club--do we need a flag?). I actually got saluted on my way to pee.

ch- ch- ch- chia!

Hot damn! The grass has sprouted and my front yard is all, like, fuzzy and shit!



For the first time, I can almost--almost--understand the national obsession with lush verdant lawns. They're such cute little blades! I am SO proud of this grass, I am going to be the best lawn caretaker EVER! I will never let its waving blades be marred by dandelions, ground ivy, violets or crabgrass. I will fertilize twice a year, and I will never, never, allow it to grow so tall that I must cut off more than 1/3 of the blade height.

Unless, you know, I like, get busy and have a lot of other stuff going on.