I always go through a bit of an emotional arc when Aaron goes out of town, whether it's for a month or a week. First I spend time alone, trying to be productive but mostly indulging TV watching. Indulging in total slothdom is a good thing sometimes. Then I make nice social plans for a night, then I figure I can take the next night for myself and it turns out to be desperately lonely. Then I cram in lots of socializing with the girls which usually involves drinking. Then he comes home and life is normal again.

I will say, the socializing is quite fun, and I think it's a good way to create fun memories with my girlfriends. So last night involved dinner and karaoke. About dinner...

My current neighborhood is about as far from hipster as you can get, which is sort of a blesssing because it's really hard to keep up with all those people who are self-consciously attempting to look unself-conscious. It's also not overly yuppie, which was what I was afraid of encountering in the 'burbs.

I can safely say that the 'hood is not ghetto. But it is diverse as hell. So we figured wandering into a random Mexican joint would end up being a great experience. And boy were we right.

For one thing, the sign on the door was looking for waitstaff, and especially requested applicants that spoke English. According to one friend, when we walked into the joint, everything sort of quieted down and everyone stared at us (I should point out that it was me, an Indian guy, and a friend who is mixed race...we don't exactly look like a group of hicks from the Midwest). None of the waitresses spoke English, so we sort of had to cobble together some high school Spanish phrases, hoping that we weren't being offensive in the process.

So, the real point of all this. I ordered a burrito.

And it was the size of my head.

Or, perhaps a better description is that it was literally the width of my body:

Can you tell from the size of my beer how big this mother was?

There's no way to get this across on camera, but two of us decided to share an order of seafood cocktail, and the manager (the one who spoke English) said he would serve it in two dishes. Well, this was one of them. It was like a fishbowl.

All I can say is, thank goodness for neighborhood joints. I'll get into the karaoke scene some other time.

What Happens When Doggie Mommas Get Bored

Ownership pitfalls

The pitfalls of dog and home ownership:

We were sitting in the study when suddenly we both heard Otto squeak, and realized that we had no idea where he was. After 10 minutes of searching the house, the garage, front and back yards, the street, and even tearing open the running dishwasher, we still couldn't find him. It was terrifying. Every now and then I'd hear a squeak. I distractedly opened up cabinets in the kitchen, then Aaron marched in, now in sheer panic, saying "He went outside with you when you did laundry, right?" and me being, "I have no idea," and him going "Well he must have!" and I was about to get defensive when suddenly Otto's little nose came poking out of the cabinet underneath the sink.

He must have gone in while I was looking for the dishwashing detergent, while on the phone with my parents, and then I shut the door and walked away.

Of course, the stupid dog that barks maniacally at the drop of a hat could only squeak to let us know his positioning. And now he wants to play fetch. Sigh.

Lots has happened over the past month, but nothing with any major life lessons or repercussions, so the idea of blogging about it has been daunting. I'm afraid I'll just get caught up describing the mundane details and it'll be a long, boring post. So I keep putting it off, and then more small things happen that I want to write about, and, well, let's just say it's a cyclical thing.

I rescued a dog yesterday. Sort of. I mean, as it turns out, the dog was missing for a total of four hours, and he was in my custody for about 3:45 of those.

I was walking Otto on Saturday morning, and found a dog in the middle of the street. No collar or leash or anything. He was awfully cute- all white and fluffety, and he kept following us and squeaking. Yes, squeaking. Not yipping or whining, but squeaking.

I didn't want him to get run over, even in our low-traffic area. So I knocked on a few doors. Only two answered, neither recognized the dog. So I took him back to our place. He was pretty stinky and a little dirty, but not like a ratty street dog.

And thus began my long adventure, which Aaron has deemed "The Case of the Found Dog," a la Encyclopedia Brown.

To sum up: First, the dog humped Otto's back repeatedly, and Otto took it like a bitch (sorry for the language, but honestly- Otto tries to act tough, but if he ever went to jail, we know which position he'd take). Then we spent half an hour coaxing the dog into the crate, which required 2 hot dogs, us crawling on our bellies, and a broom;

I then took the 25 pound dog in a crate into an adoption place where they told me to go to the city shelter; lugged him back to the car and to the shelter, where it was determined that he does not have a microchip, and that my options were to leave him there where he could get sick or hurt by another dog, or back to my place; begged the shelter guy to carry the dog back to my car because my arms couldn't take it anymore.

Then I took photos of the dog, made a flyer, got them printed and photocopied (did you know that Kinko's doesn't charge for the first 20 copies of flyers for lost children or animals?), put up flyers at Petco, the shelter and an animal hospital (it was a little satisying to put up "Found Dog" flyers amid all the "Lost Dog" ones); came back and Aaron and I suited up for our quest.

I put on my sneakers and bike helmet, Aaron packed a backpack with the flyers and a stapler. We rode our bikes about a block either way, which was pretty major for me. I hadn't ridden a bike in about 20 years, but had been wanting to, so Aaron bought me a bike for my birthday! It's a Diamondback, but all I really cared about is that it's little and red. I picked it out at the bike shop, where I happily embarrassed myself in front of the staff by proving that the phrase "It's just like riding a bike" is a fallacy.

Six flyers later, we passed by some neighbors; I asked them if they recognized the dog, and sure enough, they said someone around the corner was asking about him. So off we rode, trying to figure out which corner house they meant (I'm not very good at listening to directions). This, I think, is where Aaron made the Encyclopedia Brown reference.

We found the house and there was an older Mexican man sitting in a truck in front of the house. Now I'm no racist, but this is like the second or third guy in our neighborhood that I've seen just sitting in a truck, seemingly going nowhere or waiting for anything. I'm just saying.

As I hopped off my bike, he said very mournfully, "Do you have my dog?" I was all "Yes! I do!" He didn't speak very much English, and when I said "Why wasn't he wearing a collar?" He just looked confused. Then he pointed to the house and I asked "I should talk to your wife?" He goes "No, my wife died. Ask my daughter." As I went to the door, he started talking to Aaron about how his wife died and now his dog was gone. It was all very strange and sad.

Anyhoo, the daughter was there, and she was SO relieved to hear that he was okay. Turns out she took off his collar to groom him, and he wandered away. Apparently they leave him off leash with the door open a lot, but he's never escaped away before. We think he may have been in some kind of male dog heat, which would explain the humiliation that Otto had to endure. His name, we know now, is Toby. And his owner is awfully nice, so that was a happy ending.

And today I took Otto jogging in Balboa Park for the first time. It was so beautiful. Driving to a park seemed like a big investment- I had gotten used to jogging to the park that was two blocks from our old apartment, and that was just a crappy little ghetto park. This one is a proper park, with a lake and everything, and is really only a 5-minute drive. The loop around the park seemed to be about 1.5 miles, so we did two lazy laps and enjoyed the view.

Of course, I kept trying to convince myself that this is still a byproduct of fake suburbaness- after all, it's clearly a manmade lake inside a manmade green area next to a freeway. The purist in me thinks I should see it as a pale imitation of real wildland and all that is good and natural about the world. But honestly, I'm very easy to please. Give me a quaint little New England town where you can see fudge being made through big picture windows; give me thatched roof cottages outside of London; and give me sparkly lakes in the middle of LA, kids bicycling and old people sittingon lawn chairs in the shade, and my heart goes "Awww."

I still think this falls into one of those terms I never really understood- a simulacra: an imitation of something that no longer has an original, or never had an original in the first place. Like Disneyland as an imitation of a perfect American city that never existed. Well, today's suburbs are an imitation of a 1950s America that was never as idylllic as we make it out to be, but it sure is nice to see people out on a sunny day having a good time.

And in other Sarktale news: I turned 31, went to New York, and am having doubts about my career. 'Tis all for now .