Just another Manic Monday

Monday 7/12/2007-
ok, so i may not lead THE most exciting life in the world, but I have to say there aren't many days that I don't have some very interesting events take place...

So I'm the first one home monday night, which for the last 2 years means that I get the pleasure of walking the dogs to logan cirlce to take care of "business". Some days this is actually quite enjoyable, a time to relax and get some fresh air and a little exercise. Today, unfortunately, it was 98°F as I'm walking out the door, i think even the dogs wouldn't mind skipping the walks on days like today if I gave them the OK to "work from home", but I'd rather beat the heat deal with their, ugh..."conference calls"? (i couldn't think of a good work analogy for that one). So I leashed up the dogs and we were on our way.

This started out much like any other afternoon walk with jack hitting every fence, twig and stick from our place to Logan. Once at the circle, on que, shelby makes her way to the very edge of the circle (even on leash it freaks me out a little how close she gets with the cars screaming past her)to, I believe mountain dew puts it best, do-the-dew. Jack does his thing and we're on our way.......until we see one of the logan circle regulars screaming at some guy. He's yelling something about breaking his dogs leg. Sure enough we see Max laying on the ground, with his leg obviously broken or severely dislocated. It turns out that Max, a miniature pincher who's a regular at the park, was getting a little frisky with another dog at the park who was in heat. Well either the owner, or a friend of hers, didn't take to kindly to max's advances and grabbed max's leash (he was running free with leash attached) and flung him in the air. He must have realized what he did so he immediately exited Logan Circle. So we, along with 2 other regulars, stayed with Max while his owner called the police and followed the dog-flinger. About 5 minutes passed before Max's owner arrived back on the scene. At this point, one of the other regular's asks him what happened, and he says he "took care of it", which to me is much like the army's policy related to gay's in the military (I'm not gonna ask, and please don't tell me). But someone else was a little more inquisitive than I and asked what that meant. He said something about a brick and an ally, and thats about all i wanted to hear.

So on the way back we (jack, shelby, and I) came across a housing-impaired gentleman talking loudly to himself. He kept repeating to himself about how clear the water was in the lakes in Jefferson County. There was construction on the other side of the street so there was no real way to avoid passing this man unnoticed. And for some reason I decided to ask him where Jefferson County was, perhaps because I know Jack loves to swim in lakes and he might like a nice clean lake. So if you ever ask a man talking to himself a quick question expecting a quick answer, you will be disappointed. Eric, 40 years of age, proceeded to tell me all about his friend Matt, who was 18, and his father, the retired FBI agent. How he and Eric went down the path and through the woods (and through the sea of swirly twirly gum drops and under the Lincoln Tunnel) to the crystal clear lake. How Matt was brave and jumped off the rock cliff so Eric did too. How matt's father used to have him over for dinner and how Matt had told Eric how he was the first "black man" that his father even talked to. He told me all about the He also told me about the job in baltimore at the factory that he left, but never should have left. Jack was not impressed whatsoever. When eric got down on the ground to pet jack he actually backed away, at which point Eric informed me that he could "do this". Apparently this means talk to dogs, because Eric then told me that Jack told him that they were cool, but that he didn't want to let eric pet him in front of his master (me). Not that I didn't trust Eric, but I thought it best not to walk directly home while Eric was still telling me about him and Matt. So about 3 blocks passed our house Eric finally decided it was time he shared his story with someone else. I said goodbye to Eric was he crossed the street, at a red light, with cars slamming on their brakes and horns in an effort not to hit him.

Anyway, just another Manic Monday...

As a side note, check out the wikipedia entry for "Manic Monday", its pretty interesting (for those who haven't yet figured it out, blue underlined text is a hyperlink to click on for additional material).