I saw a dead dog on my way to work, his eyes wide open and a stream of blood from his mouth still wet on the pavement. I threw up a little and cried. The police said he would be collected within 48 hours. There's no particularly acceptable weather to keep a good dog out of heaven, but spring in Baltimore is certainly not it.

I have to find a new way to walk to work. It's all wrong there now.

I'm going to call him Ghost Dog and take his spirit with me wherever I go. "Get him, Ghost Dog," I'll say and gesture to some adversary. When the enemy stares blankly, I'll shake my head and add, "Let's go, Ghost Dog. No one understands us."

brunch drawing:

Yesterday I got a lovely note, as I sometimes do, from Mofaha. He shared some of his new animations, which always please me to the gills. He's a dear, that Mofaha.

In his note, he mentioned: "The 'why is Frito crying' quote from your site is an often-quoted meme in our house. It still makes me laugh." It's funny he should say, as it touches on a conversation I had with my mom not two weeks ago. So many family jokes have their origin in some passing comment made by a stranger, or erstwhile acquaintance. Quotes that are so firmly rooted in my family's lexicon were first uttered by people who have no idea their words are the stuff of legend.

When I was nine, I invited a girl from my summer pottery class to play at the neighborhood pool. Sadly, she turned out a little understaffed in the brain department. Every few minutes, she would say "Wanna know something?" and then deliver some piece of personal trivia so useless it was embarrassing, even to my single-digit sense of whimsy, like "When I was 5 I got a sliver. Then my dad took it out.". Perhaps that's the day I learned the dark side of the "time flies" coin. My mom watched in amusement as I struggled for an endless afternoon not to grit my teeth and announce, "I do not. Want to know. Anything. Ever."

We've been annoying each other for twenty years asking if we wanna know something.

At least in my mom's case, she was being deliberately obtuse about Frito the hobbit. She brings Family Mofaha joy, which is a fine repayment indeed for hours of kittinjoyment. I'm sure I'm not so lucky. I have to wonder what useless, foolish, truly moronic thing I was caught saying in my youth that is endlessly bandied about in the family vernacular of people I don't even remember.

Well. I hope it makes them happy.