permission granted: irony at its finest/crime doesn't pay

A friend of mine just recently moved back to this area (her hometown) from the sonoma area. She invited me out for dinner a few weeks ago and said that she had two things to tell me. After requesting and receiving her permission, I simply must share one of them. The first thing was just a general tidbit about an anecdotal coincidence - no big deal, but the second was kind of different and goes a little something like this:

"One of my friends from sonoma decided that she was over paying rent and she was determined to find a way to live rent free..." Apparently this gal then discovered house sitting and moved to SF to do so. She then got a day job to help with general expenses and started house sitting through an agency at night. Early on, she got a great 1 month gig, all she had to do was get the mail, feed the dog and stay over night. The first couple of weeks went great, but then one evening the gal comes home and finds the dog dead on the living room floor. The poor girl is devastated, not only did she grow attached to the dog, but she also assumes the owners will blame her and fire her immediately (important to note: it was not her fault in any way.) She calls the owners, who are vacationing in Sweden and in tears, breaks the news to them.

Amazingly, the owners were very nice about it and very concerned for her. After a long talk and everyone calming down, the gal asks the owners what they would like her to do with the dog, with its body, now that it has passed. The owners tell her not to worry and to just call Animal Control because they will take care of everything. Feeling relieved and tired, as it was quite late at night when she reached the owners, and not sure if animal control is 24 hours, she decided to go to bed and deal with it in the morning.

First thing the next morning, she calls animal control, who politely informs her that they will be happy to dispose of the body when she gets it there, but they do not pick deceased animals up. This presented some dilemma, as the dog was a very large 8 month old St. Bernard, and the gal, not only very very petite but was also without a car. Determined to take care of this somehow, she goes through the house looking for something she can put the dog into and help her to get it out of the house. After some effort, she finally finds a large travel duffel bag, the kind with wheels. She managed to get the dog into the duffel and then proceeded to get it to the street. Once there, she rolled the dog containing duffel bag to the correct bus stop to take them both to the animal control station.

Once the bus came, she tried to get the duffel up the bus stairs, but wheels or not, couldn't. A man, already a passenger on the bus, feeling bad for her, jumped up and helped her load her bag. When she got to the nearest animal control bustop, she again attempted to take the duffel herself, but again required help. The same man, then helped her take the duffel back off the bus. The gal was so grateful, it had been such a bizarre and disconcerting circumstance, she turned to express her deep gratitude to the helpful man. As she turned, she felt a crushing blow as he punched her in the face and then ripped the duffel bag out of her hands and ran off, leaving her on the ground with a bleeding broken nose...

DUDE - WHOA...WHAT?!!?


Yes, seriously, this really happened. (also important to note that the gal will be fine)



Ok, I know that parts of this are sad and well probably shouldn't be funny but, c'mon, some of it just is.

a few thoughts:

Ummmm, I am going to guess here that she never mentioned what was in the bag...there had to have been that first moment where she was just reacting and like "hey! stop, don't take my...oh, well...uh, never mind!"...and the look on the guys face as he anticipated his illgotten treasures and found only a large dead dog was probably quite a sight - hell it is a fully twisted amex commercial:

rolling duffel bag: $100
bus fare across town: $2.00
doctor bills: $1000.00

look on creeps face: priceless

and last but not least, even on the tightest budget, that might have been one of those things that justifies a cab ride...

and people wonder why I don't miss living in the city