Brady was all excited and so was I!. After arguing about her damn cell phone and cigarettes, I convinced Robin that she really could live without both of them for an hour and she left them in the car. Called my friends who lived right around the corner and told them that we were there. They'd be there in ten minutes. We're walking toward the gate and I'm sizing up the other dogs. "Brady is so much better looking", I thought. Thought? No, I knew. There's a girl with a volunteer shirt on and she approaches us. Surely she's gonna compliment Brady about his beauty (boys can be beautiful).
"Can I see his rabies tag?"
Uh oh. Shit. Sue warned me about this and I totally forgot. Have been to plenty a dog park in my day and never had to provide proof of anything.
"You'll have to go to the lady at the table". The lady at the table was very nice and everything, but when it came to letting us in, no can do. Brady and I were devastated. (Too strong. Disappointed. Very disappointed.) Robin was walking quickly toward the car because, afterall, she had been without nicotine for three and a half minutes.
Got in the car and called my friends. They had a spare rabies tag from a kitty gone to heaven and would save the day.
So they show up and we put the tag on Brady. We made it by the people whom we had just told that we live all the way in Miami and it was too far to go home and get his tag. Had they asked, the answer would have been, "Whaddya know! His other collar was in my glove box! Ta ta". But we didn't have to lie. Well, we deceived the system, but...
We get in there and Brady instantly jumps for a ball in a shallow pool. Ouch! Found the deep pools. He jumped prettily in again but this time he couldn't figure how to get himself out. We had to coach him and a man came up to me and told me how quickly his dog got in and out of the pool. Was he insinuating that his dog was smarter than mine? Oh no he dint int!! Then he patronizingly suggested that Brady hang around his dog to learn a thing or two. Just as the mother in me was about to go off, my friend came up to me and said, "Bill! Kim! I see you two have met." The jack ass was my friend's neighbor.
We spent the next hour and a half praising Brady everytime he jumped in and got out. I took pictures. Robin was having fun. Then I noticed a professional photographer who had taken an interest in Brady. She took tons of pictures of him. I was so proud. That's my beautiful boy! Patty Ramsey, mother of Jon Benette, temporarily possessed me and I went up to the photographer and asked if she thought my Brady could have a career in modeling. She basically dismissed me and went on to another dog.
A fight broke out between two dogs. Then a man and a dog. Then a man and a man. We missed it, but the park was abuzz.
After a stop at the concession stand for a "Frosty Paw", we left. Our friends took their dogs home and then met us at a dog friendly restaurant. It was very windy outside. As soon as the food was delivered a little plastic cup full of hot sauce blew straight at me and drenched my chest and left leg. White shorts. Then, my super huge soda blew over and covered my right side. And Brady. But the best part was when the waitress was clearing the table. Half of the discarded food, (salsa, sour cream, guacamole, lettuce - we were at an Irish Pub. Just kidding. Mexican. But you probably knew that) blew in to my purse. I heard the waitress apologizing, but I was engaged in another conversation, so I wasn't really paying attention. When I realized there was food in my purse was right after we got in the car and I reached for my cell phone and came up with a handful of Taco Hell. Robin was like, "Yeah. The waitress did it". Well thank you for getting it out of there. Or at least telling me. Have you ever heard of a napkin?
Then we stopped by the condominium that we manage - 197 units full of old -- let's just say "people". I stayed in the car while Robin ran in to pick up some paperwork. And pee. (Clarification - she didn't pick up pee. She peed.) As she exits the building I see two old "people" call her over. Evidently, there had been a couple of "reDDD CATipillahs by the back dorah. They haDD blacKK striiipes." They needed Robin to do something about them. Wow. Maybe she really had needed her cellphone while in the dog park. Good thing we got there when we did. Red caterpillars by the back door? With a black stripe? I shiver to think what could have been.
Got home and Brady crashed. He's wide awake now and demanding his dinner. They all are. The time change has been hell on them. Who eats dinner at 4:50? Well. Besides the old "people" in our condo? And Robin just fed them. I can stop typing now.
