The Banana Effect

I took a banana on my walk today.  No.  Really.  I walked an overgrown hyped-up banana this morning for about an hour.  The banana was eager to leave the the bunch and parade about the town.

Snapping random shots of this banana sniffing voluminous piles of fall leaves, stopping for sudden squirrel-like noises.

Shots of this banana shaking its hiney every now and again.  Shots of this banana sitting at the curb and watching the cars with their staring smiling drivers go by.

There was never a worry that this banana might pee on itself and thus end up with a sodden stinky peel because this banana never voids it bladder, nor its bowels, during its exercise with leash and master.

Earlier this morning, this banana got ahold of my kitchen shears (my daughter was unfamiliar with the word 'shears' and asked for clarification), causing my heart rate to climb as I attempted to extricate the scissors from the strong banana jaws before something worse than the loss of the handle ensued.  I'm tired of taking the banana to the vet.

Now, why, you might query, would I take a banana for a walk on a lovely post-Halloween morning, the first day of November, my birthday month, in fact?  Well, I needed a laugh.  I needed several laughs.  And this banana makes me laugh.  I also wondered if perhaps other folks out there might need a good laugh, or at least a smile, in the same way.  After the reaction from various and sundry trick-or-treaters last night, I felt certain that my goofy banana would most likely elicit some form of positive emotion from any drivers-by or joggers or fellow walkers.

And I was correct.  Being correct made me smile.  That was bonus happiness above and beyond my initial purpose for walking the banana with the swagger in its step and cavernous mouth of household horrors.

Speaking of enormous toothed openings, did I mention that this banana swiped my Girlfriend -- my 3GS iPhone which can now be purchased for 98 cents through ATT with a 2-year service contract renewal -- from the counter over the weekend and crunched the lens of the phone's camera THROUGH the protective Otter Box housing?  This on top of the eyeglasses, stick of organic butter, deli-sliced Boar's Head muenster cheese, tennis shoe laces, and myriad other items which it felt the need to orally explore!  Most un-Chiquita-like, I can assure you.

In light of these surreptitious, but not nearly as sneaky as the banana thinks its being, home heists of Valdez Family belongings, I find that I have little or no compunctions about the fact that I've joined the ranks of pet owners who have been accused of humiliating their pets by dressing them in costume.  Rather, turnabout seems totally fair play.  And I daresay that once my furry banana friend accustomed itself to the headgear, being a banana became an enjoyable experience.  

I can also report that after my morning constitution with said yellow fruit, I believe the $14 + tax I spent at Target the other night was well worth it.