As any Chicagoan knows, there's a dark side to any thaw in the weather: dog poop. As the snow melts, it reveals piles of piles that unscrupulous dog owners have "buried" beneath the white stuff. I don't appreciate having to navigate all the newly-exposed crap on my walk home from the train station, but keeping my small children and their strollers, bikes and small feet away from it, that really gets under my skin.
So imagine how delighted I was as I took my kids for a walk yesterday to watch a dog take a dump--not on the frozen tundra--but on my neighbor's newly exposed grass. And the woman walking the dog just walked away.
"Excuse me," I called after her, "aren't you going to pick up after your dog?"
"Not with my bare hands," she replied.
"You don't have a bag with you?" I asked, incredulously.
"No."
"So are you the reason I've been picking up so much dog poop from my front yard for the past couple of months?" I asked.
"Probably," she said, and continued walking away.
This woman's got me steamed. She lives in an apartment building around the corner from me and she knows I know where she lives; I'd just seen her leave her building! She didn't even pretend she'd "just forgotten" a plastic bag or say she'd "be right back" to clean up her dog's mess. I guess some people have no shame.
