Dogs, roses and footprints

“Earth Day”

    ROOFTOP -- Today is Earth Day. Well, not as we sit up here, but when the article comes out, it will be. Earth Day is a lot like Daylight Savings Time in that most people don’t find out about it until it’s right on top of ‘em.

It is the one day of the year we’re supposed to tread lightly on the planet. Leave a small footprint. After today, you can pretty much stomp the daylights outta the place.

    Kay and I want to be leave li’l baby footprints. We even haul our plastic containers and cans across town to a recycle place. It’d be nice if there were a closer facility, but, hey, this is Conroe.

    A good thing you can do for the planet is to plant stuff. That’s why they call it “planet.” I wouldn’t bother planting a tree, ‘cause in Conroe somebody will just cut it down when it gets big enough for shade. But, planting flowers would be a good thing.

    Kay just planted some pop-up roses in the front of the house. Knockout roses? I don’t know what they are. And, no, don’t hang over the roof to look at, or you’ll end up in the hedge. You can see ‘em when you climb down.

Kay had me pick up four pots of the strikeout roses at Kroger last week. I didn’t even know Kroger was into potted plants.  

    By the way, a guy pushing a cart of potted plants in a grocery store becomes a chick magnet. That’s what I became. I was fighting the ladies off with a celery stalk. -- “I don’t know, I think they’re copout roses. And, no, I’m not looking for a relationship, just the pitted prunes.”

    I made it a point to tell Kay about the experience so she wouldn’t ever asked me to buy potted plants again. It didn’t faze her. It’s somewhat emasculating when you realize that your spouse considers you low-risk. I’m fairly certain it’s ‘cause she’s seen me in my lounging shorts. But still…    

    While Kay was outside planting the fallout rosebushes I was inside trying to read the newspaper with the windows open. All the while this bird kept repeating the same chirp over and over. It was two sets of two shrill chirps followed by a three-chirp. It was cute at first, but after an hour I was ready to throw a bookend. 

I eventually went outside and saw a mockingbird chirping away like it had good sense. I don’t know if it was the original chirper, or was just mocking the instigator. I didn’t do anything to the bird ‘cause I didn’t want to increase my tread pressure on the planet.

Speaking of unusual animal sounds, last week I got to hear a singing pig. Piglet. I think it will get a lot bigger. It was at the Montgomery County Pet Parade. Remember? I emceed it. That’s why you missed it.

Anyway, a kid named Li’l Buck brought out a small baby carriage with a pig in it named Veti. Veti was dressed up like… something. I’m not sure what, but it was cute. Buck said the thing could sing. So I gave it the green light. How do you tell a kid that his pig can’t sing?

Buck picked up Veti and that pig started squealing. Squealing loud. Reminded me of the lead singer of AC DC. That wasn’t meant as a putdown, ‘cause I actually like AC DC. It’s just that the pig was that good.

The pig got second place in the miscellaneous category. Got beat out by Colton’s chicken. Skinny chicken with a moustache. Proving the old adage that it’s impossible for a singing pig to beat out a chicken with a moustache.

By the way, the Pet Parade was a blast. Al was one of the judges and he had a big grin through the whole thing. The Large Dog category was won by the biggest-headed dog I’ve ever seen. It was a mild mannered pit bull named Cash. Brooke, the handler, came out dressed like June Carter and Cash was dressed like… well, Johnny Cash.

And the dog sang. I dare you not to grin when you see a dog dressed like Johnny Cash singing. It had to be humiliating for Cash, but I didn’t make fun of him. Did I mention he’s a pit bull?

I feel certain that I’ve created a “first” with today’s article. No one has ever included a singing pig and a singing Johnny Cash dog in an article about Earth Day. You sit on a roof and some of the weirdest things happen. Let’s see what comes up next time. – Oh, and let’s tread lightly out there, rooftoppers.

    END

You can reach Mark at mark@rooftopwriter.com