The Miss Jobless Chronicles: Don't Shoot --- I'm Not Katie Holmes

Ed. note: "The Miss Jobless Chronicles" is a weekly series written by Caitlin O'Toole. Read the rest in the series here. I read something recently in the New York Times about a guy whose business is to walk the dogs of guests at ritzy hotels. He has some kind of deal with the front desks -- when their guests need their chihuahuas walked and coddled, they call him. I think the article said he makes upwards of $300 a day. Maybe THAT'S my calling! Dog walker! Flexible hours, cash in hand, little contact with human beings, and playing with dogs! I'm SO there. First, I decide, I need to come up with a name. I decide on "Doody-Free," but then am told by a close friend that people may think it's a free service. Then I change it to "Doody Calls." The name is already taken by a DC dog-walking service. There's no more time for puns -- I have dogs to walk! I decide on "Chelsea Pet Pals." Simple, snappy, memorable, alliterative. I scour the craigslist pets section to get a sense of other people's rates. The going rate in the city seems to be between $12-18 per half hour. One smartass donates a percentage of his earnings to the ASPCA. Other walkers promise trips to dog runs and organic treats. I decide $10 per half hour is fair and will lure people in. As a bonus, I throw in a "buy 10 walks, get one free" deal for new customers. I quickly order a thousand cheap business cards, make signs, and take out an ad in the New York Press. I post a sign downstairs in the laundry room. After the sun goes down, I creep around the neighborhood with signs and a roll of electrical tape and start slapping signs all over phone booths, deli doors, mailboxes, parking meters, and random poles. If there are other dog walking signs up, I pull them down and put mine up in their place. This is no time for guilt; this is business! You snooze, you lose. (Karma alert: By morning, all of my signs have been pulled down.) A few days pass without a nibble, and I'm feeling slightly down. Then, a call comes in. It's Susan, a woman in Union Square who needs her twin Jack Russells, Mr. Pibb and Mary, walked twice a day for a week while she goes on vacation. I accept the job and head over to her apartment to meet my new clients. The walk from my Chelsea studio to her one bedroom in Union Square is a hearty one, and I decide to kill two birds with one stone and turn it into a power walk. When I get there, Susan greets me at the door and immediately pummels me with questions. How long have I been walking dogs? (One day.) Do I have any references? (Um, sure.) What would I do in case of an emergency? (Cry?) Am I insured? (No, but I'm working on it.) Do I know pet CPR? (EWWW!) I muddle through her questions as best I can and seem to appease her. She hands me the keys and says I am to start in the morning before 10am. We agree on $120 for the week (14 walks at $10, plus two free walks.) I set my alarm for 8 and power walk-it over to Union Square, with a supply of plastic baggies and hand sanitizer in my pocket. After fidgeting with the keys in the door for what seems like hours, I finally unlock it and Mary and Mr. Pibb bound out of the back room. I smell poop. I investigate, but don't find the source of the smell. If the dog poops in the house before I've even started my job, it's not my fault, right? It takes me forever to figure out how to get their collars on, and to get them still enough so I can maneuver the collars over their heads. There is one leash with a little "siamese" piece in the front that connects to each dog, so, in effect, you are walking two dogs but only have to hold one leash. It seems like brain surgery to me. By the time I get down the stairs, the leash is in knots so tightly that the two dogs on the end of it look like they are losing circulation. I undo the harness, and take off the collars and leash. Mr. Pibb makes a bee line for the front door of the building, and Mary lifts up her leg and pisses at the bottom of the stairwell. I love my job! I'm flustered and sweating and cursing under my breath by the time I wipe up the pee, capture Mr. Pibb, and get the leash on again. As I open the front door of the building, I am blinded by flashing lights. CLICK CLICK CLICK. A sea of paparazzi is camped outside of the building in the December cold, clicking away at me. AND I LOOK LIKE SHIT! Then, they seem to stop just as suddenly as they started, and they look slightly puzzled. "Why are you taking my picture?" I ask one paparazzo. "We're actually waiting for Katie Holmes, she's living in the building for a few months while she's in some play. We were told to shoot whoever comes out of the building in case it's her." Great. So somewhere, in some newsroom, there are pictures of me, sweaty and about to cry, walking two unruly Jack Russell terriers. The thought makes me nauseous, but I carry on and begin my first walk. Mr. Pibb stops at every pebble, tree, pole and crack in the pavement. When he settles on a mailbox, he lifts his hind legs and climbs up the mailbox and shits in an upward motion. Delightful! I pick up the poop and press on. "Hey," a street person says as he motions me over to him. "Nice dogs. I LOVE Jack Daniels!" This job fucking sucks. I want a desk and a window, an O'Keefe on my wall, a 27" monitor and a speakerphone. Of course, Mary doesn't need to pee because she already peed in the hallway. But she sniffs everything anyway. So does Mr. Pibb. If they are sniffing in different directions, there is a canine tug-of-war on the leash and I must unravel them. Still, I must wait for Mary to poop before we can call it a day. So we keep walking. Past 1st Avenue, to Avenue A, and beyond. I have my limits and stop and say, "Mary, it's cold. Will you please shit?" She looks at me quizzically. "PLEASE! Hurry up and shit so we can go inside!" We keep walking. Finally... she poops. Wow, I can smell that crisp cash now. Fresh and green, and ALL MINE. We walk back up 11th street, towards the sea of paparazzi. What was supposed to be a half hour walk actually took 53 minutes. I clearly need to perfect my craft. After I drop off the dogs and wash my hands eight times, I'm ready to go. I'm exhausted. As I leave the building, the flashbulbs blind me. "It's just me," I laugh. Like they give a shit. Wash hands with sanitzer and repeat 13 more times. Suddenly, I've dropped 5 pounds (I weigh in at Jenny Craig) and it's time to collect. I call Susan. I literally have no money to my name. She tells me to come at 2. When I get there, she looks all frazzled and seemed irritated. "Did you notice anything... strange about Mr. Pibb when I was gone?" I noticed a lot of strange things about her fucking dog, but I lied. "No." "He's been pooping in the apartment. You did walk him TWO times a day, right?" I'm pissed. I sense she's about to try to wiggle out of paying me the $120. "Yes, I did." "OK, if you say so. But he's never done this before." Right then, I decide this is the last time I will be walking Susan's dogs. I am so insulted I can hardly breathe. "Hold on, let me get your money." She disappears around a corner and comes back with a bag. "Sorry, this is all I have. But money's money, right?" It was a bag of dimes. Not rolled dimes, mind you -- loose dimes. Zillions of them. And a few wadded up twenties. I know it's trite to say "I turned bright red," but I must have. I decide I have nothing to lose than to tell it like it is. "What's your problem?" I say. She's clearly taken aback. "Sorry?" "Did you have a bad childhood or something? Christ, who treats people like that?" And I leave with my dime bag in hand, having alienated my only client. And it's back to the drawing board. My only other client is a 60-pound boxer, who "affectionately" head-butts me and gives me a bloody nose in front of his owners. I don't get the job. I think cat sitting may be more my speed. Caitlin O'Toole is a New York City-based writer and editor. A native of Washington, D.C., she began her illustrious journalism career as a Washington Post paper girl. She has since written and edited for Sesame Workshop Digital, Star Magazine, The National Enquirer, Glamour, People.com, Parade.com and Washington's City Paper. Her work has also been featured on Fox News, ABC, MTV and VH1. She lives in Chelsea with her two cats, Lucy and Ethel. She can be reached for work at her LinkedIn page.

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The Miss Jobless Chronicles: Don't Shoot --- I'm Not Katie Holmes

Rachel Kaufman

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Rachel Kaufman