Monday in the Park with Dog

My boy Smokey has several endearing qualities. One is that, once he has decided where he wants to dump his load, he runs in a little circle for a couple of rotations before dropping and pooping. It helps me, the bag man, identify the exact location of the poop for scooping purposes.

So there I stand, armed with one of those blue plastic wrappers that the daily Times comes in. The technique is to slide your hand inside the bag, then grab the poop, then roll the top of the bag back down your arm, pulling the poop that had once been on the outside of the bag so that it now resides on the inside of the bag.

And so it goes. And I'm marveling at how warm the poop feels in my hand. I'm feeling very close to the dog. Then I pull my hand away and find that there was a hole in the end of the Times bag and instead of holding the poop through the bag, I'm simply holding the poop.

Uttering the word "shit" at this point has many meanings.