Bad Dog!

-Sir, I must apologize for my dog, she was never quite right after the Ford administration.

What? What did your dog do?

-What did she do? WHAT DID SHE DO? She's been completely insolent all evening and didn't even deign to recognize you after the second encore, she sniffed the air with... with a touch of disdain during the étude, if I were to put it lightly, and she specifically ignored the entire 1st movement of the Shostakovitch symphony you so gloriously conducted to perfection when she was, in fact, the one who requested that it be performed. She's been an absolute terror the entire evening and for God knows what mercurial reason.

Well, from what I saw she was a most dignified animal, and put the rest of the audience to utter shame. Why, I heard from the third clarinetist that during the oboe solo, which was a truly magnificent performance, yet was so subtly done that I felt its minute affectations would be lost on the masses, that he saw her visibly perk up out of her seat in rapt attention, her snout trained with expert grace towards the stage, moving back and forth wisely in time with the music even during the cadenza in which the oboist took nearly excessive liberties with the rubato... yes, nearly but not quite... anyhow... and then at the end of that movement she stood up on the balcony and uttered a most sonorous bark... I hesitate to call that sound a bark... which sounded more clearly and sincerely to my ear than any "bravo" I've ever heard from our own species. And all this as the rest of the audience, too uncultured and sycophantic to decide for themselves whether they enjoyed the movement or not, sat in sheepish silence twiddling their thumbs, but who soon found themselves resorting to a standing ovation which must have lasted thirty minutes after the third gloriously persuasive "bravo" shall I say, of this impeccably astute canine.

-Jesus Christ, I must doubly apologize, sir.

Whatever for? I cannot understand your dire mood!

-Sir, you must understand... she has been going through a lot lately, what was that? Shut up, no, I am going to tell him! He deserves to know! Sorry about that. This animal, this good for nothing mutt-brained bastard is a reckless alcoholic in the final stages of the disease, her liver is a shambles as are all her friends and family, human and dog alike, none of us have found a way to get through to her... and so I hope that with this information you can understand in some small way what she has done to you, what a shameful thing she has done... the bravo, it... it was sarcastic, she made a mockery of you and the audience, she spurred them on to applaud what she undoubtedly considered an unnuanced and Philistine performance so she could laugh at you all privately within her own mind, all the while putting on an act which suggested that she enjoyed the performance. I can think of no higher indignity a conductor could suffer, and again, I apologize from the bottom of my heart, sir.

I hardly think that it was ironic and... how could your dog be an alcoholic, do you give her the stuff? If she is an alcoholic it surely must be at your own behest.

-DO YOU DOUBT ME? Surely you do, you are like all the others who don't know her as well as I, whom she has dissimulated with abandon and coaxed into her endless web of lies. No I have never given this dog alcohol, she finds it of her own accord, she started out hanging around the liquor stores and tricking unsuspecting passersby into buying her a six pack or a bottle or two of wine. But these days both her habits and tastes have taken her addiction to a whole new level. After sampling every sort of alcoholic beverage, she decided that none of them had a taste which matched her palate, she became unable to drink anything at all, such was her hubris at this time. She finally sobered up for about two months for this reason and we all thought that things had finally changed, that she had turned over a new leaf and was ready to face the world head on and not as a cowardly drunk, unfit to even rise in the morning without a quart of gourmet vodka in her belly. But no, suddenly it was clear that she was getting drunk again, just absolutely plastered and though I cannot say for certain, it is probable that she now distills her own variety of hard liquor in what must approach commercial quantities, such is her current minimum level of drunken excess. She is a two-faced egotistic brat who cares for nothing but drink and making light of truly great performances of classical music, and I admit that this is again what has happened on this woeful night. I thought she would behave herself, but instead she has outdone herself again and gone on to prove me wrong in thinking that she could not sink to a yet lower level. I hate her, I hate her and yet I still love her and cannot get her out of my mind, I remember her as she once was and cannot forget, though it is becoming increasingly clear to me that that part of her, the one I fell in love with, is dead now, and that though her body still walks upon the earth, it is devoid of emotion, of the slightest shred of empathy, of any regard for any other being than herself... but a husk of flesh numbly puppeting the motions of life only as a result of her former life's brilliant momentum, but which now is animated by some ignominious devil whose disdain for the living permeates her every movement, and each of those movements only draws her closer to the grave which she begs for falteringly and without understanding, cowardly looking for existential solace in the everlasting abyss which she fondly imagines death to be, though not even the reaper's callous touch could save her now from what she's become, destined to walk the earth forever, yes, but never to feel again, inexorably cut off from everyone that loves her, perfect fools though they are.

...

-I've said too much already. The disease of her soul has passed on to me and it tears me apart from within even as we speak, I will leave before you contract it as well. I beg your forgiveness, I implore you to forget this and live a happy life apart from what this detestable... but I won't go back into that again... I must away at once... forgive me... forgive me...

...?