“I just feel like the only thing that matters now is the dog,” I said.

“She’s a puppy, we have to take care of her,” my wife Abby said.

“Yeah but that’s all we do anymore,” I said. “We don’t fuck, we barely hang out, we barely talk. I asked you on a date last weekend and you said no because the dog’s been cooped up all day. Fuck the dog, what about us?”

“This is just part of growing up,” she said. “We have responsibilities now. You can’t just do whatever you want anymore. And the reason we don’t fuck is that it’s kind of hard for me to be attracted to you when all you do is lay around the house. Maybe if you actually helped out with the chores I’d have less things to do when I get home and more time to spend with you.”

Fair enough.

We decided on a compromise. Every day, she’s going to tell me one chore to do before she gets home. I am literally 12.

“Do you have anything else you want to talk about?” she asked.

My secret drug use crossed my mind.

“Nope, nothing I can think of,” I said.

I found these gummies. They’re called Delta-8 Nanos. I don’t know what Nano means, but they’re about 10 times stronger than any Delta-8 product I’ve ever tried. I used to think the 8 in Delta-8 stood for the number of edibles you’d have to eat to feel something. These Nanos are something totally different, man.

“Take 1. Allow 1-2 hours to feel the full effect,” the bottle says.

Normally I see that and go, blah, blah, blah and scarf down three on the spot, but these Nanos, these are serious business. They’re better than actual weed, they’re that good.

These suckers crack my brain open and all the ideas spill out like ghosts trapped in a haunted antique vase. I get next-level creative when I take these things. The medical term for it is mania, but as anyone else who’s bipolar will tell you— the mania is pretty fun.

I mean, it’s a hell of a lot better than slunking around all day. That’s a word I just invented. I asked my brain for a word to describe what I do when I’m depressed and that’s what came to mind.

Slunking (verb) — to sulk around like a depressed bitch.

When you’ve slunked as much as I have in my life, you almost feel like you deserve the mania. Like… I’ve earned this shit. I’ve been to hell, I’ve shaken hands with the devil. You’re telling me I can’t have a little me time?

I’ll stand in the shower and talk to myself for two hours straight. Riffing, dancing, doing stand-up comedy for an audience of half-empty shampoo bottles and black mold. I rarely enter a state of borderline psychosis. When I do, it’s scary, but things go back to normal after a while. Unlike life, which is just always scary.

It’s not all fun and games and goofing off and escaping existential dread through rote hedonism. I actually get a lot done while high. I have some of my best ideas while high. I came up with the idea for this website while high. I came up with the idea for this article while high. I’m high right now!

Just kidding, I’m drunk.

There are, of course, some… shall we say… side effects. They should have a label on these things that says:

Warning, this product may cause:

• Severe insomnia

• Manic episodes

• Impromptu trips to the mental hospital

The last time I did these drugs heavily, it did culminate in a trip to crazy college. I was doing them way too often, in ever-increasing amounts. I started to genuinely lose touch with reality. I was having angry and destructive outbursts, losing complete control over my emotions, smashing holes in the wall, balling my eyes out multiple times a week... My mood swings were out of control. The smallest thing would send me completely over the edge. I became a real monster.

And I know this. I’m aware of this. My wife and I have talked about this. Marijuana (or in this case, Delta-8) has a tendency to exacerbate symptoms in people with bipolar disorder. Shit is no bueno. I’m playing hopscotch in the devil’s driveway. I know I shouldn’t be doing this shit. But I am.

My wife was out of town for the weekend the first time I caved. I bought a 5 pack and told myself I was only going to have one. I had two and then threw the rest away. The next morning, I was fishing around in the dumpster out back for the remaining three. I feel particularly gross about that.

Fast forward to a couple weeks ago… I’m not sure what happened. I can’t remember my excuse but it must’ve been a good one. I bought a 10-pack and did them over the course of the next two weeks, always in secret, careful to take them after she’d fallen asleep or when she was out of town.

10 edibles. 10 nights of getting high. I got away with it all. I didn’t feel too looney toons at that point, so I said what the hell, why not go in for more?

I stopped back at the CBD Shaman and bought another bag on my way home from work. The store is in a commercial building, across the hall from an unemployment office. To steal a line from my buddy Todd— that’s like putting a Jenny Craig next to a McDonald’s. How many people were so close to getting a job and then failed a drug test because they got talked into the benefits of Delta-9 lip balm?

Abby wouldn’t be home until 9 that night— the perfect conditions for a high jerk-off sesh. These opportunities don’t come around too often anymore, now that I work a 9-5 and have a dog. You gotta eat these chickens while they’re crispy.

I took Butter for a walk in the Wisconsin snow. It was the first snow of the year and also the first of Butter’s nine-month life.

For being such an asshole, she almost makes up for it with moments like this… watching her frolic through the snow, on a silent November night, so carefree and excited… it makes my Grinch heart grow two and a half times larger.

There’s something so totally wholesome about watching a dog play in the snow. Butter doesn’t care how crazy I am, or that I drink or do drugs, she doesn’t care about how broke we are, how my car is a piece of shit, how we can’t afford a house with a yard. She can find joy in something as simple as snow, so why can’t I?

I forgot what real joy felt like until I got this dog. I also forgot what real stress felt like. When you bring an agent of chaos like this into your home, it really tests your mettle as a person. Wanna figure out how much shit you can put up with? Get a puppy. Try to keep your house from getting destroyed. You can’t. It’s impossible.

And man, I got the puppy to end all puppies. Let me tell you about this little demon:

After our chat last night, Abby and I spent like five minutes brainstorming all the items this dog has destroyed in our home. Here’s what we came up with, sorted from least to most expensive:

Note: Some of these can be proven with photographic evidence.

• Toilet paper rolls ($1)

• Toothpaste ($5)

• Cord to the dog camera ($5)

• Prescription medicine case ($5)

• Face cream ($10)

• Glasses case ($10)

• Lube ($15)

• Lunch bag ($20)

• 2 computer chargers ($20)

• Various decorations (including one that said “best dog ever”) ($20)

• Multiple iPhone cords ($25)

• Bathroom rug ($25)

• Couch pillow ($25)

• Winter hat ($25)

• Hair straightener ($35)

• Wallet ($36)

• And last but not least, THE FUCKING GUEST MATTRESS ($500)

If you’re keeping track at home, that’s $777 of damage, just off the top of our heads. Lucky us.

That doesn’t count the toys, the food, the thousands we’ve spent on vet bills, or just the shear structural damage she’s done to our apartment:

I locked myself in the bathroom and took an edible. These things cost 20 bucks, I wasn’t gonna take any chances.

When I emerged, I caught her running down the stairs with a tin of nicotine pouches in her mouth.

“BUTTER!”

The tin cracked open and about 18 white pouches, 6 mg of nicotine each, spilled out onto the carpet. She slurped up about three and ran away.

“God damn it, Butter! You’re gonna have a heart attack from those things!”

Just what I need— to take a dog to the emergency room while I’m stoned out of my gourd. That’ll play well in divorce court.

“Can you just try to not destroy anything while I do the dishes?” I said, to an animal that doesn’t speak English.

She tried stealing one of the forks. I growled at her, and then immediately felt stupid. Screaming at her in English didn’t work. I thought I’d try speaking her language.

The edible started kicking in as I made my way upstairs to fold laundry, per the legally binding guidelines of my wife and I’s new martial agreement.

The plan was to take the edible, let it kick in while I do some chores, then throw a bunch of various meat down the stairs to distract Butter and then lock myself in the bedroom to masturbate. I call it the Butter Bomb and it’s been very effective in the past.

That’s the other thing about these edibles, man. Doing one of these and jerking off is…

I’ll spare you the gory details. One thing I’ve learned after 7 years of being open about my masturbation habits on stage is that people don’t like it. They just plain ol’ don’t wanna hear that shit, man.

If I was a woman, hey, maybe a different story. But for some reason, men aren’t allowed to express their sexuality in art. Kind of a double standard, if you ask me. When I jerk off, it’s gross? But when you jerk off, it costs $6.99 a month on OnlyFans?

Whatever. I jerk off like a champion. 25 tabs open, I put on a Doja Cat album, I make a night of it. I use my normal browser too, none of this incognito bullshit. Yeah, I jerk off. Big deal. So what if you use my phone to Google something, and you type the letter “P” and Plumperpass.com pops up? Wow, congratulations on the discovery, detective. What did you think? I was some kind of Mormon? You think I’ve never touched my dick?

I hate how prude we are in this country. We like to think we’re this enlightened liberal society but you start talking about ass-play and the whole room gets uncomfortable.

Anyways, so I blast a fat rope, walk outside, and what do I find?

Remember like three articles ago when my dog ate my wallet? Well, it fucking happened again! Look at this shit, man!

She also took a bite out of each and every one of my credit cards, but I’m not going to show you those. Nice try, hackers.

To top things off, the DoorDash that I ordered canceled. I didn’t even know they could do that!

I sat there, starving, waiting for my wife to get home to cook me something because, like I said, I’m 12. The dog sat on my head and watched the snow fall from our living room window.

I try to make her out to be the bad guy, but Abby’s right. I can’t do whatever the fuck I want to do forever, man. The universe has made that abundantly clear tonight.

The doorknob turned and Butter shot up from the couch.

“Hi baby!” she said. “What did you guys do when I was gone?”

I sighed.

“I did an edible. I’m sorry.”