they come to snuff the rooster

One time, I was driving home from Borders and I stopped at a light behind a large pickup truck with a bumper sticker that read “Yes, this is my truck. No, I won’t help you move.” I got a kick out of it, and I could certainly understand the sentiment…but that didn’t stop me from asking HangDog if he would help a sista out.


So yesterday after work, he and I hopped in his truck and headed towards the old homefront. We were chatting, and he said, “Man, my neck is bugging me. I didn’t think that MRI would take so long.”


“What MRI?”


“The one I had this morning.”


“[HangDog]!” I shrieked. “Why didn’t you tell me? I would never have asked you to help out today if I’d known.”


“No big deal,” he said casually. “I said I’d help, so I’m going to help.”


I love HangDog.


When we got to the Happy Ranch, our first priority was lugging our two couches out to the dumpster. Now, of course, K and I need furniture in the new place, but there was no way we were going to bother taking these two pieces of shit with us. We bought both of them used for a grand total of $40, and they have more mileage on them than Paris Hilton’s pussy.


Much groaning and grunting and dragging and swearing later, HangDog and I had managed to get the couches out to the dumpster. We dusted our hands off and returned to the apartment to begin grabbing boxes and bins.


On one of our trips out to the truck, a woman I’d never seen came over and said, “Excuse me, did you two just put those couches out there?”


Now, her tone of voice was neutral, but I didn’t like the way she said “you two”. I was sweaty and achy and felt about as filthy as if I’d been dipped in Crisco and rolled in the pubic shavings of a horrifically hirsute man. I wasn’t up for anyone stepping to me, and I was about to deny any knowledge of the couches when HangDog said casually, “No, uh-uh.”


“Oh, okay,” she said, walking away.


Once she was out of earshot, HangDog grinned at me and said, “See, sometimes it helps to have a Jesus fish on your truck.”


Did I mention I love HangDog?


Pretty soon K showed up, and we continued loading up the truck and her car with as much stuff as we could. There’s still plenty left over, but at least we have the biggest and most important things moved, and all (in a world where “all” means “god, there’s more?!?”) we need to do now is get the remainder of our crap moved to the new place and clean the holy hell out of the old one.


Bleh.


But! I know I’ve mentioned it before, but the Merry Mansion (as we’ve christened the new place) is so damn wonderful. I was able to sit on the carpet and not feel like I needed to put an ass gasket down first.

Bliss.


I will say this, though, that first night in my new room was extremely surreal. The shadows filtering through the blinds were different, and I had to be careful when getting up in the middle of the night, lest I take a wrong turn and wind up tumbling down the stairs. It was like spending the night in a stranger’s house, but I don’t anticipate it will take too much time to get acclimated…


…with the sole exception of the rooster.


Yes, someone in the neighborhood has an actual ROOSTER. Fortunately, every time I’ve heard it, I’ve already been awake, but if that thing ever wakes me up on a weekend, I’m going to find it and I’m turning it into dinner.