A Beer

Left the car in the garage for the Hammer walk today. The Hammer sniffed noses with a nasty looking, friendly giant dog tied up by its owner to a telephone pole while she watched her kid play soccer in the rain. In the nearby schoolyard Hammer licked out pudding cup after pudding cup littering the grounds left behind by the piggie, piggie kids. That must have been one fuck of a big pudding cup sale I missed out on.

At the corner store I checked the lottery ticket Sonja gave me to check. It was a piece of crap. So I bought another ticket. I'm a hopeful motherfucker.

From the store we continued our walk through the 100 year old city of Steepleton. I considered making an ass of myself by publicly kicking down a few election signs. Every night piles of them are whacked down. Why not do it in the day too?

Pretty soon we were by the tracks where I let Hammer do some running. I can hear the trains coming from a long, long way away should I need to leash her up. We said hello to a homeless looking guy with a garbage bag of empties slung over his shoulder. He said, "Just trying to clean the place up a bit," like you or I would say about our living room if someone walked through while you were vacuuming. Further down the track a couple having a smoke, sheltered from the rain by a pathetic little tarp, complimented me on my dog and even guessed her breed - something most people with homes get wrong. They seemed like regular working class people like me down on their fucking luck.

My years in Sliverville and the East End of Dope City prepared me well for interacting with the poor and poorly treated of the world. It is easy to walk by the camps set up in summer. In winter it makes me want to cry some.

I should have bought a pudding cup at the store.

A beer will do.