As I mentioned earlier this week, it was a gray, rainy Memorial Day weekend here in NYC. While I wasn’t bothered, my long-haired Chihuahua My Guy was none too pleased with droplets falling on his newly-coiffed mane. That’s just not the way a patriotic dog likes to celebrate his country’s heroes! Such wasn’t the problem for Manhattanite Kelly Ripa and her dog Lena. Those rich bitches flew out to Palm Springs in sunshiney California for the weekend — they had date shopping to do! Not outfits for date night, the ladies went out to buy the fruit from a favorite street festival. When Kelly was back to hosting Live with Kelly and Mark on Tuesday, she described the lovely date day she and Lena had out west… until Kelly accidentally locked her keys, phone, and Lena in the car. Did I mention Palm Springs is a desert? And hit 90 degrees over the weekend??
Kelly explained that she traveled to Palm Springs, California, to purchase some “amazing dates” that her family likes from a local street festival. “We’re gonna walk the street festival. We’re gonna have the time of our lives,” she said.
“She [Lena] made friends. She was like, ‘I’m a California girl now!’ She was prancing down the street. Typically, she’s very afraid of large groups of people and other dogs, but Thursday night, no. She was like, ‘This is who I am now. I am Palm Springs Lena. I have dog friends. I’m not afraid of people. I love it here,’” Kelly added.
After purchasing the dates, Kelly returned to the car and placed her dog in the passenger seat. However, upon walking to the driver’s side, she noticed the car doors were locked. “Now, I’m like, ‘Oh, my god! What do I do?’” she said.
Kelly enlisted the help of “a man in a van”. “He looks just as afraid of me as I am of the van. And I say, ‘I’m sorry. That is my car — I lied, it’s my husband’s car — that is my car. I locked the keys and my human dog and my phone inside the car.’ I said ‘my human dog,’ because they need to understand this is more than a dog, this is a person,” she shared. “And he says, ‘We’ll call AAA.’ And I go, ‘I would, but my phone is also locked in the car. And, if I’m being honest, I don’t know what AAA is.’ And he goes, ‘What’s your policy number?’ I go, ‘I don’t know what that means. I’m sure it’s all locked in the car.’”
The star had no choice but to then call 911. “I’m like, ‘Hi. I’m in the parking garage at the casino, and I have locked my human dog and my phone and my keys and my wallet and everything in the car. Can you send someone to break into the car for me?’” she said. “And they said, ‘Ma’am, we don’t break into cars,’” she recalled.
Kelly continued: “This tow truck guy comes. He doesn’t say one word to me. He doesn’t ask any questions, like, ‘Is this your car?; He just gets right to it. He comes. He breaks into this car in three seconds. I’m not even kidding.”
“I sit down in the car, I fasten my seatbelt, and Lena’s head pops up. And she was like, ‘You have no idea!’ She looked at me like this, like, ‘There were strangers trying to break into this car. I stayed hidden. Girl.’”
Noooo, you never ever want your dog stuck in a car on a hot day! Or, you know, at all! But the heat really turns up the panic. I think Kelly took the right steps after realizing all the valuables were locked in the car: she got someone with a phone to let her call for help. Of course, it’s always good to know about AAA, and I hope Kelly files that resource into her mental awareness for future calamities. But I’m not gonna pretend that I’d know my policy number without looking it up on my phone, either. And hey, Kelly was probably embellishing just a little for the sake of storytelling (something certain raconteurs do… so I hear… speaking for a friend). Which by the way, Kelly really has Lena’s voice down in this tail! (No surprise, we already knew Kelly’s fluent in many animal tongues.) I could hear Lena herself in the whole inner monologue pup pep talk: “This is who I am now. I am Palm Springs Lena. I have dog friends. I’m not afraid of people. I love it here.” Sometimes we need a change of scenery to come into our own! But I think we can all agree the absolute best phrase to come out of this anecdote is “My human dog.” No explanation required, we know exactly what this means.
PS(A) — As summer settles in, let’s all make sure to be extra mindful of our human dogs in the hotter temps!
Photos via Instagram and credit: Robin Platzer/Twin Images/Avalon, LCY/Avalon