I love you hot dog.

Yesterday, I was so hungry that I ran out and got a hot dog on my lunch break.  I’ve sort of stopped eating meat in the last few weeks, kind of as a default: most of my friends are vegan, so when you hang out with vegans, going to a restaurant that has steak is a little hard to stomach.  For me.  Out of guilt.  Not guilt for the anim-

Nevermind, I think you get what I mean.

Anyway, when I was on my lunch break at the ad agency I freelance for, I only had time to run out for a second, and the only thing close by was the hot dog vendor on 37th street.  But I was so greatful to even have that, I absentmindly said: “I love you hot dog,” because, well, just because.  But what was weird, is that the hot dog said: “I love you too,” which made me spit out the bite that I just ate.

So at this point, I’m thinking, I’ve gone crazy.  I’m legitamitely crazy.  I often imagine what it would be like to go totally nuts.  I mean, people who are crazy, most of them weren’t born crazy, right?  So it stands to reason, that at one point, they were normal, regular people, like you or me, eating street meat in midtown before BAM! Nutso.

You know how when people have hard times, you are supposed to say something like, “stick in there!”, or, “keep at it!”, or some other equally obnoxious meaningless phrase, and then the other person, the sad sack person will say something like: “Whatelse can ya do?”

Well, me, I always think, “you could go crazy.” I don’t say it, but it’s a viable alternative to dealing with your problems.

So as all of this is playing out in my head, I look down at the hot dog, which still looks like a regular hot dog, save for the part that I bit, and I can feel somehow that this hot dog is smiling at me.  It didn’t have a mouth or anything.  I mean, it might have been made of mouth for all I know, but it wasn’t like, a cartoon hot dog.  It looked just like a regular hot dog, except it could talk.

So after I catch my breath, I look back down at the Dog, and it says to me:

-Are you okay?

and I’m like:

-No! I’m talking to a fucking hot dog!  Do I seem okay?!

-I think you really should calm down.

- What?!

-If you can just calm down we can have a rational discussion like two civilize-

-People?! Are you for real?

So then the hot dog sighs.  And without any good reason, I sigh too, just sort of catching my breath stealing myself for what ever is about to happen.  Like maybe this hot dog will fly me away, that’d be nice.  Or we could go on some hot air balloon adventure, but even I know that’d be stupid.  So I wait, wait for the hot dog to talk again, but nothing happens.  And it occurs to me this could be like the time when I was five and me and my friend Dave thought the door next door to my house could talk but it just turned out to be a guy on the intercom fucking with us.  Which really hurt my feelings.  I mean,  I went home that night and drew pictures of the Door, and told my mom about it and everything.  But when I went back the next day, the Door was silent, cause the guy wasn’t there.

I mean, it was a pretty good trick and all, and if my apartment had a intercom that worked, I’d do it too.  Because, seriously, telling a kid you are a talking door, and then saying your girlfriend is the door next door to you, but she’s asleep, well that’s pretty genius.

(continued tomorrow: 2.24.09)

Update! Continued Here!