Last night I slept six hours, then was up this morning (at ten) to do last-day-house-sitting chores before heading to Northwest Arkansas to see a play. The play was called Until Just Moistened. I could have sworn it was going to be about something sexual, but it was actually about cornbread. That being said, cornbread and many other carbohydrates have served as substitutes for my sex life more than once, so maybe it’s all the same. Regardless, the play was by Crescent Dragonwagon and was part of the Arkansas New Play Festival, put on by Theater Squared. The festival is this weekend and next, and since I have an all-access pass, I’m sure I’ll be talking about it off and on for the next week.

After the play, I killed some time in a new-to-me bookstore, then met my friend Sydnie to teach dance at a wedding reception. (Dancers get asked to do all sorts of things. When there’s food and an open bar involved, we often say yes.) Y’all, as a former wedding photographer (assistant), I’ve been to A LOT of weddings. But this one was in an old airport hangar. And whereas it was hotter than Satan’s front yard on an August afternoon, the atmosphere was killer and the food (Brazilian) was delicious. Granted, getting people to dance felt like pulling teeth, but those that participated did a wonderful job, and it all goes with the territory.

Fresh off last week’s house sitting and cat wrangling gig, tonight I picked up a friend’s dog to watch for the week. I normally don’t bring animals home, but I LOVE this dog. A standard poodle, she’s a total sweetheart, and not only do we get along famously, but we also have the same name (CoCo). Well get this. As soon as I got CoCo to Mom and Dad’s, she quickly ate our dog Ella’s food–the dry and the wet–then promptly defecated all over the carpet. (I had actually just let her outside, but she waited until she was inside to go.) Y’all, it looked like a dinosaur with diarrhea had been through the living room.

And smelled like it too.

A friend I was texting suggested it was just nerves, which I guess makes sense. It’s a new environment. Plus she did eat some foreign food, so it’s not like I can blame her. Still, it was no fun dealing with the mess, which took an entire roll of paper towels and a half a bottle of Resolve to–well–resolve. But now it’s done, and CoCo is in her kennel, resting.

Personally, I can’t wait to go to my kennel.

When I finished dealing with CoCo’s mess earlier, my mom said, “You’re really good at cleaning up shit, Marcus.” This isn’t the type of compliment one goes around looking for, but I guess it’s a compliment nonetheless. Marcus Coker, good shit cleaner-upper. What can I say? I’ve had a lot of practice. Last night while looking behind a couch, I found two cat-vomit spots several days old. They were absolutely hard as a rock, concretized to the floor. Seriously y’all, they should use that stuff to repair interstates. But I digress. I suppose this is life, full of messes and clean-up jobs. Sometimes it’s your mess you’re cleaning up, sometimes it’s somebody else’s. I’m talking about emotional messes, the damage another human can cause. Often in therapy I’ve thought, I didn’t create this problem–my parents did–my ex did–whatever–why should I have to clean it up? But of course, we all cause damage we don’t mean to. And what are you gonna do, leave shit on your carpet?