Welcome to Lonelytown

Sometimes it's not the craft itself, or even it's craftsmanship, that is the most unfortunate thing. Sometimes the most unfortunate thing is imagining the craft being used. Julia's post on sanitary flannel springs to mind. A real L.L.Bean bloodbath, that one. Or this dog here:


I started conjuring an image of the person who would buy this in my head, and then I couldn't stop. He's an older man, divorced or maybe widowed. He loves dogs, but his tenacious lifelong allergies prevent him from owning one. He lives alone in the woods in Maine, subsisting on organic ham sandwiches which are delivered from the closest Whole Foods every week on Tuesday. On Wednesday and Friday his World War II magazines and "Over-50 Mensa Society Word-Jumble Puzzle" come in the mail. He goes out to the porch in the morning, sips his coffee and watches until the mailman arrives and puts the envelopes into his Golden Retriever Mailbox. He waits a minute more. "Go get the mail, boy!" Softly at first. "Go on boy, get the mail! Good boy!" Louder now, the mailman back in his truck and rumbling out of range. "Good boy! Who got the mail? Who got the mail and is a good boy?!" Then he walks slowly across the lawn to the mailbox, takes the envelopes out of his cavernous metal dog, and in their place leaves a single doggie treat.




Oh, BIRD. Right, I knew that. You didn't really need to label it for me, I know a bird when I see one. I should also probably mention that I do not have any eyeballs.