Homies Plan B: Day 1: Nine Easy Steps to Posting Late

This is the 2nd Homies series. Read the first one here. Start at the bottom and read up.

Step 1) Get re-commissioned by Mommy G. The fact that she didn't have us thrown to the lions was amazing enough. But when Mommy G recently told us she was headed out for a three-day post-thanksgiving digestion fest at her summer home and she wanted us to watch the house again, we were pretty much knocked flat. Of course we agreed without moral hesitation or compunction.

Step 2) Dress up like Indians. It's a family tradition to festoon ourselves as Cowboys and Indians every Thanksgiving. (EDIT: Actually that's Pilgrims and Indians). Every year has gotten a little more extreme; this time around the three said Indians spent more then 2 hours sequestered on their part of the house with lotions, razors, blankets, makeup sticks, loincloths, leather and rubber bands, safety pins, hair gel, and spiking glue. The result was hardcore to the hardcore. The indians walked around with straight backs, deep voices, and broken English and spoke of Indian things. The pilgrims punctuated the benevolent silence with occasional insensitive comments. Life was good.

Step 3) Spend 7 hours in a cold parking lot. My state is notoriously temperate, but when mid-November rolls around, the nights do get a little bracing. Some FCN Contributor developed a hair-brained idea about scalping Best Buy tickets again, and this time, he enticed most of the males of his family, the rest of the FCN staff, and another warm body or two to come along. We set up a circle of chairs in the quarter-mile long line and pooled iPods and Nintendo DSes, blowing on our hands to keep warm. Headphone splitters are a beautiful thing. What really made the wait from eight in the evening to three-something in the morning was our foolish choice not to switch back out of our Indian duds. Running around shirtless and tatooed with feathers hanging off you is fine in the comfort and warmth of your own home. Doing so in sub-okay-that's-cold weather with hundreds of perfect strangers are staring at you is a different story.

Step 4) Get totally busted. Just after four, our group picked up tickets offering 200 dollars off LCD TVs. We then turned, jogged down the line, and started scalping. "I've got a ticket here for a 40-inche Samsung TV here, guaranteed in stock, and I'll let it go for just 50 bucks! Who wants a TV?" I made two or three near sells (which were presumably dampened by my less-than-credible get up) when the bulky form of a security guard broke the gleam of the parking lot flood lights. "Sir, if you're selling that ticket, I'm going to have to take it from you." I handed the ticket to him wordlessly and scampered back to the van, where most of my party was already hanging out. Unfortunately, a fellow FCN Contributor wasn't so quick to give up his legal right to his ticket. He took his civil liberties all the way to the nearest police station, where he called his lawyer, who convinced him to abandon the fight. I believe the exact words were to "run away with your tail tucked between your legs like a little dog."

Step 5) Sleep like an honest man. We arrived at Mommy G's place just before sunrise. I showered the glue out of my hair, tossed a sleeping bag into my adopted room, and fell asleep. The Pooh-Bears stared mournfully at me from all directions. I believe the former tenant had read Homies Day 1 and deliberately placed those Pooh-Bears for maximum spookiness. Fortunately I was too tired to care. "Drink it in," I scowled as my heavy eyes closed for good. "And don't forget it. Tomorrow it's the pool."

Step 6) Be all groggy. We woke just two hours later, ready to deal with the animals. My homie headed off to deal with the dog and I poked my head into the laundry room, which supposedly held - ahem ahem - Jake. The closet door was wide open, and Osiris had his head buried in the cat food. His head jerked up when I came in.

"It didn't work!" He hissed.

"What?" I looked where he pointed. The naughty cat had erected a trip wire tied to a pack of C4 on the dryer. My shins were just inches away from fiery extinction. I backed up prudently. "You tried to kill me?"

"Yeah, pretty much."

"But I was trying to feed you!"

"Do I look like I need help? Listen bub. My masters think I'm a diet. They have no clue about my mad urban foraging skills. I'm totally self-sufficient. So just leave me alone. I've got evil plans to bring to fruition!" He followed this up with an evil cat laugh. I'll leave to your imagination exactly what that sounded.

I backed away slowly and closed the door.

Then I threw all the Winnie-the-Poohs into the pool.

Step 7) Feed the dog his pill already. Apparently Mommy G had collected a new dog; this one's name was Dignity. Dignity had a skin infection; he was being fed pills morning and evening. Mommy G showed us how to tuck these pills into hot dog meat so Dignity would gulp them down. I don't know what we were missing, but that dog just would not eat his pill. He would eat the meat and spit out the little white thing. After a half-hour of failed attempts, we have up on subtlety and took a hint from the French (who make fois gras, you illiterates). We got a blender tamper, held Dignity's mouth open, and forced that little sucker down his throat. Mission accomplished.

Step 8) See step 5.

Step 9) Go "Oh nuts!" and hastily write this post. My eyes still don't really stay open properly, but writing FCN posts has become as natural as breathing. I'm probably deep in REM even as I write this.

I better click Post before I fall off the chair.