At first I considered the obvious: that parkway could be the final resting place for Pippi’s used poop bags. Except I’d have to be careful not to get caught, which meant night-time walks, which I didn’t want and old Pippi didn’t need. For that matter, the yard was at least a block farther from home than our regular ambles, so it just wasn’t convenient. Not enough payback for the effort.

I started thinking satirically. Take a ridiculous position (No Dogs!) and defend the hell out of it. And I started chuckling. Imagining the anonymous help I could give this advocate …

But first I thought I’d better do a background check. I called Libby.

If you want the skinny on an unfamous person, talk to a woman. A good, networking woman. Better: a Jewish woman. Best: a Jewish homosexual woman. My friend Libby.

I’m not gay (yet), but most of my girlfriends are. We have free loving supportive open friendships but they don’t invite me to their parties. They don’t pressure me but most are biding their time, me-wise, waiting for me to discover my full gayness, as they all did in time, after mucking about to their varying levels with people of the other sex.

I want to tell them it really isn’t a matter of choice, but the subject almost never actually comes up, so my words would sound like protesting too much, and I am silent. However, I can use the resources. So when I wanted something on the resident of 3978 Fresno, I called Libby and started her snooping.

She was even more amazing than usual. Only three degrees of separation, she said. It was easy once she knew that Charlotte was both gay and a paralegal.

Briefly, Charlotte was despicable. Middle-aged and bright enough to know better, she filled her life with affectation in place of passion. She was rude to waiters and bellmen, which was always a bad indicator. She insisted on traveling with a large carry-on bag even though she’d never had her luggage lost. For that matter, she was compulsively cautious – fearful of all bumps in the night and also dog shit – and she was amazingly (megalomanically?) self-centered. Everything had to be about her. Even Paula leaving her – Charlotte’s primary response was argument, because it didn’t make any sense to her that Paula would stop loving her enough to leave her.

So her dog deal wasn’t a cultural thing. And while maybe Charlotte could have used some Prozac or Paxil, it didn’t sound like any psychotropics were around. I felt safe enough to prank.

I made the signs Monday evening and first planted them that night. One said, “They make us laugh but NO DOGS!” and another said “One million years of co-evolution but NO DOGS!” and my favorite, the one I really spent some time on, read:

YES
They’re the best
home security
But
NO
DOGS!

I felt a little weird, walking over there late at night, but it only took a few minutes to push my little sign poles into the parkway. At first I thought I’d pull hers out, but I concluded that more was better and left that little plot of weeds with six messages sprouting from it.