“Good morning Bob. I found some great open houses for us to visit today. One of them has, and I kid you not, I am reading this from the actual listing: “Two swimming pools, one inside the other.“ That I gotta see."
“I’m not going anywhere with you, ever again. I am only still here inside your head because I’m waiting for you to tell me how to sell DripDrop. You owe me a presentation, and it better be good. Then I'm outa here. And I'm taking all your readers with me, too."
“But Bob…”
"Fuck you Frank. I went through your computer last night while you were sleeping. I found this old email you sent. You’re a fucking monster Frank. It’s one thing to try to kill off the imaginary voices in your head, but Monty?
“What? When did I ever try to kill Monty?”
“Last year. Here, let me read to you this email I found:
“Halloween Horror Nights was awesome. You have no idea how cool it was being chased through the streets by 250 so people in theatrical zombie make-up when you’re tripping balls. Awesome. That’s the good news. The bad news happened after I got home. It’s kind of a funny story, but not really. It could have ended very, very badly.
So I am asleep in front of the tv Sunday night around 7:30, and awoken by a noise I had never heard in my life. I look around, and there's Monty, lying in her dog bed. All of a sudden, she makes the noise again. Now, while I was up in Orlando, she stayed at the vet who did a dental cleaning and removed a couple teeth, so I figure it's her new 'bark'. I get up out of my chair, and look down only to discover that she’s gone through my overnight bag, chewed through three layers of Ziploc bags, and eaten what was left of the chocolate bar I took to Orlando. The one I bought on Silk Road laced with mushrooms. I was wide awake and freaking out in seconds. For her part - she's laying in her dog bed looking at me with scared eyes. And making these unholy noises. Not noises of pain, not noises of alarm or hunger or anything I had ever heard come out of a dog's mouth. I was tempted to video her, just so I document the sound she was making, but I didn't want to be the guy who wasted time videoing his dog dying instead of trying to help her.
My first thought was to rush her to the vet, obviously. But she is so freaked out I was afraid to move her. I thought about forcing hydrogen peroxide down her throat to induce vomiting, but I didn't think was a particularly good idea either.
So I did exactly what I would have done if Monty were a human. I put on a pot of coffee, gulped down about half of it, and lay on the floor next to her. I rubbed her head & stomach and told her how much I loved her, what a great dog she was, what a fine rabbit hunter she was when she was younger, how smart and loyal and excellent she was. All the while she's making these noises, trembling, looking like she wants to get up, but unsure if she was capable. I lay there on the floor petting, rubbing, and pouring on the love for maybe 3 hours. I actually thought about putting on some Grateful Dead for her, a Dark Star or a Stella Blue, but realized that that was dumb even by my standards.
Eventually, the noises subsided, and she got out of the dog bed and tried to walk around. 30 seconds later she stumbled back into bed. Shortly thereafter, she closed her eyes and fell asleep.
I stayed up pretty much all night checking on her every now and then, just to make sure she wasn't going into a coma or something.
I must have fallen asleep at some point, because next thing I know, it's morning, I'm laying on the floor next to her and she's licking my face. You can only imagine my relief. I took her on a walk, fed her, and she seemed fine.
She's a-ok now, so as I said, it's kind of a funny story, but not really. Especially when you do the math. She ate exactly half of that chocolate bar, which means she ate 3.5 grams of shooms. As she weighs only 30 pounds, that would be the equivalent of a 180 pound human eating 21 grams of shrooms. 21 grams of shrooms. Can you imagine how fucked up you’d be if you ate 21 grams of shrooms? And you’re a dog?
Makes you wonder - what do dogs think about when they trip? Something to ponder, next time you’re tripping. Regards, F.”
“Yeah, Bob, I know. That wasn’t cool. And not particularly well written either. But Bob, it wasn’t like I fed her the shrooms. She tore through that overnight bag, and ripped through some serious amount of Ziplocs. But it is a true story. And I am not proud of myself for letting it happen in the first place. Still though, it ended well. And it could explain why you two are such good friends.”
“Huh. I never thought of that.”
“You sure you don’t want to go see ‘the pool within the pool’?”
“Aw what the heck. Let’s do it.”