Lamenting the Foulness of Life

My dog’s stomach is growling. She had a bunch o’ rib bones and now I can expect puddles of barbecued barf in my bed tonight. Disgusting, huh?

This dog weighs ten pounds and is by my side night and day. She’s laying snugged up next to me on the couch while I type, right in the path of the 140º heat blowing out of my laptop. It’s like someone strapped a heating pad to my leg.

I generally like heat – love those seat warmers. My cousin always wants to drive my car when we go somewhere and all winter I’ve got my seat warmer on. He’ll be sitting there in the driver’s seat, talking about his latest BM.

“Boys, you should have seen what came out of me this morning.” He says boys no matter what the gender of his audience is. “Black as coal and all of 12 inches, coiled up like a cobra, part of it floating like it was ready to strike.”

“I do NOT need to hear about this,” I say.

“It was remarkable,” he’ll say. “Never seen anything like it. I got a picture of it here on my phone – take a look, you won’t believe it. Here, see? Why is it so friggin’ hot? My nuts are roastin’!”

He says it every time we’re in the car – like the seat has launched some sneak attack against his scrotum.

Worse than his stories are when my dog barfs in the car while she’s sitting on my lap. I hear this little burbing noise and a nano-second later she heaves and there’s a puddle the size of a spilled glass of milk on my thigh – slimy and the color of whatever nauseating thing she ate out in our woods. Sometimes it grass in a clear slime like some kind of Tai pad lemongrass soup. Others it’s brown and lumpy.

The worse part is that you can’t do anything about it. I’ll be on the freeway going 65 mph when she Ralphs on me. First the sound, and I try to get her off my lap but I’m never fast enough. Just about the time I get my hands on her waist and snatch her up, I feel the warmth on my thigh, then the wetness. Anyone who’s had a baby knows what that feeling is like. That baby’s happy and coochie cooing one minute, and the next minute you’ve got this foul ooze traveling south down your silk blouse.

At least the dog barf doesn’t smell so bad. You talk about smells, I went into the ladies bathroom at the permit office the other day. Oh my gosh! Women’s bathrooms after they’ve had their morning coffee are worse than paper factories. Woo-whee! Brings tears to the eyes.

I don’t know what’s made me write about these things. Oh yeah, it was that dog’s growling belly. It’s my lament of the unwelcome bodily functions I encounter daily.