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Colder than an owl claw outside! Salt burn paws like Nazi torture and Heidi always shivering! Awful!! Heidi live an eternity in this stupid den. Been so long since Heidi go out that her nails now all long like reclusive billionaire. Life Heidi lead no life at all, just lie around with four-eyed, two-legged treat giver and listen to him breathe. Such shallow breath! Always smell of fear, too. Weak, four-eyed, two-legged treat giver, very weak.

Heidi so bored ready to kill other pack members, but that make Heidi BAD DOG, so Heidi no kill pack. Heidi GOOD DOG, Heidi, PRETTY DOG. Heidi decide that right thing to do to stave off winter fever to get job. Heidi take test on-line to get prepared.

1. Would you rather have world peace or have a treat?

Tough question for Heidi. Have to think long time. Decide treat.

2. Are your instincts to lead or to follow in a crisis situation?

Heidi born pack leader! Heidi always first to stick her head in hole or eat thing on street!

3. Would you rather chase a squirrel or would you rather save a dying child?

Heidi think world without squirrels safer for the children. Heidi chase squirrel. For the children. Heidi always think of children.

4. Would you rather dig a hole in the garden or be an Olympic champion?

Not enough information in question. Heidi need to know what sport. Is digging hole in garden Olympic sport?

5. Would you rather kill a cat or kill a squirrel?

Heidi think about this question long time. Think about this whole life. Cat very deserving of being killed, no doubt, but as squirrel live in sky most of time, more of challenge to kill squirrel, so Heidi have to choose squirrel. Heidi ambitious leader, very good employee!! Not scared of a challenge! (But truth is Heidi really like to kill both squirrel and cat at same time. Heidi think poison.)

6. Would you rather lick a bowl or learn to fly an airplane?

Lick bowl.

7. Describe the work environment or culture in which you are most happy.

Heidi at her best on fetch field! Very fast dog! Hate other dogs, though. Dogs come to steal Heidi ball! Very bad situation! If no fetch field Heidi like to work on grey blanket or red blanket in den. Play with squeak toy there, never get boring! Heidi very versatile dog.

8. What role does your manager or supervisor play in your personal motivation at work?

Give treats to Heidi, take her walks, get her things and collect poo.

9. Would you rather have a nap or read a good book?

Nap.

10. In the news story of your life, what would the headline say?

Heidi good dog.

Across from this, splayed on a bench lay a dusty, shirtless man baking in the sun, all of his life’s possessions scattered about him like discarded Kleenex. It felt like he was trying to defy his circumstance, the weather and all the people who had been trying in small ways to help him.

As I was locking my bicycle a tall, beautiful Russian woman, just as thin and cruel as a switchblade, walked toward me. She was a tennis superstar, a billionaire’s trophy, somebody who would never fall in love, and the language she used with her companion was precise and directional. There was not a sentimental bone in her body, and concealed beneath her sunglasses she was still able to make it clear that she wanted me out of her way. Disdainful, she was a supermodel who would not break stride, and I hurried in my task, trying to make myself smaller and less obtrusive as the city beyond opened up before her terrible beauty.  And then, just a few moments later, a middle-aged man talking to himself, his hands a fury of unknowable intent, walked past me too, “ I don’t care, I’ll take the day off work, end up downtown and probably get a blow-job,” he said to nobody living in the visible present.

At the Real Thailand restaurant, beneath faded pictures of some Thai King, sat a scattering of elderly, single women sitting alone at various tables. With swollen ankles and sunken faces, they stared straight ahead. Their hearts and minds elsewhere, they existed within humid, little bubbles of sadness.

In front of a corner store a beggar noticed my Montreal Expos t-shirt and we fell into a conversation about the city and baseball team, discovering that we lived there at the same time. Free associating, as if on some sort of game show, we shouted out the names of all our favourite players:

Andre Dawson!

El Presidente!

Casey Candaele!

Pasquel Perez!

Hubie Brooks!

And then we reminisced  about the unhurried evenings we had each spent at the Big O watching games. Sitting in the cheap seats smoking cigarettes and drinking our knapsack beer, the future we were both living on this hot afternoon so distant and unimaginable.