I love you hot dog
By Chioke Nassor
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-
Never mind, 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 closest thing by me was a hot dog vendor on 37th street. But I was so grateful to even have that, I absentmindedly 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 must be legitimately insane. 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 phrase, and then the other person, the sad sack person will say something like: “Well, 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?