We’re posting transcripts of Working, Slate’s podcast about what people do all day, exclusively for Slate Plus members. What follows is the transcript for Season 5, Episode 11. In this episode of Working, Slate’s Jacob Brogan talks to Jason Mogavero, a professional dog walker for Fairy Tails, a dog walking company based in Washington, D.C.

Jason cares for more than a dozen dogs on any given day. Want to know how this pet care professional juggles so many leashes without dropping the ball? Keep reading to learn about how he keeps his furry clients on their feet.

To learn more about Slate’s Working podcast, click here.

This transcript has been edited and condensed.

Jacob Brogan: Can you tell us who you are and what you do?

Jason Mogavero: My name is Jason Mogavero, and I am a dog walker.

Brogan: How long have you been dog walking?

Mogavero: A little more than a year now.

Brogan: How did you get into that?

Mogavero: I decided to leave my old job to do this. And that same day a very good friend of mine ran into Megan, who runs the company that I now work for, out walking some other dogs on 18^th Street.

She said that she was about to lose two walkers. And I said, get me on the phone with her right now. I called in sick that Friday, went on a walk along with her. I put in my two weeks the following Monday.

Brogan: You work with an agency, then?

Mogavero: Yeah, it’s very small, very loose. We’re all 1099 contractors.

Megan, who I’m sure is listening, stresses “I’m not your boss.” We were trying to think of an actual title for her—den mother, I guess. She runs the show. She takes care of admin and a lot of client relations and financial stuff.

Brogan: What’s the name of the company that you work for?

Mogavero: Fairy Tails. I think it’s an unspoken rule with pet care companies that they have to have a pun name. My friend Robin runs Woof Pack. My friend Tay runs Sassy Steps. There’s Wag Time and Wagamuffin.

And Fairy Tales—I hope that your learned audience was able to infer this—it’s T-A-I-L-S.

Brogan: Do you find new clients through the company, or do you have to track down clients yourself?

Mogavero: It’s almost entirely word of mouth. It’s pretty easy. The word gets out.

This company is really good. We have, last time I checked, universal five-star reviews on Yelp.

Brogan: How many dogs do you walk, all told?

Mogavero: On an average day, somewhere between 12 to 15.

Mondays and Fridays are usually the lightest, because that’s when people are most likely to work from home or take a long weekend. It can be as few as five or six, and on really heavy days it can push 20.

Brogan: When you’re starting to work with a new dog, how many times do you meet with the dog owners?

Mogavero: Once. Megan and/or I will show up, show that the company is bonded and insured. You know, present our IDs so that we’re not just some people trying to steal your dog. The owners will talk about the particularities of the dog: medical needs, dietary needs, behavioral ticks.

You can tell right off the bat, first impressions are usually pretty accurate. If it’s a four-month-old pointer puppy who immediately jumps up on you and starts trying to nibble or kiss you, that’s going to be their personality forever. If it’s just an older dog who is chill but mostly keeps to themselves, that holds true throughout the rest of your time with the dog.

Brogan: Do you have a lot of instinct for dogs to figure out how to take them out or when to work with them?

Mogavero: Yeah. It’s usually two or three dogs at a time.

One of the biggest factors is gauging the dog’s personality, and making sure that you’ve never got two hyper-energetic dogs at the same time. It’s just not going to be as fun for the dogs or anyone involved, myself included.

Brogan: Generally speaking, how long does it take to know a dog well enough for walks?

Mogavero: Dogs’ personalities are as rich and wide and varied as people’s. But they’re also pretty easy to suss out.

Brogan: Have you ever had a dog that really didn’t like you?

Mogavero: Yeah. There was. There was one dog at some point. To the dog, I was probably a slightly overweight white beardo, the dog was just not into it.

Brogan: Just to be clear, are you characterizing yourself as a slightly overweight bearded guy?

Mogavero: Yes. I could not be more of a type. The tattooed pudgy white beardo who walks dogs.

Yeah. It just wasn’t going to work. And last I heard, the dog has a female walker and is doing fine.

Brogan: When you’re first meeting someone, is there anything that helps make sure they feel comfortable with you?

Mogavero: If it’s at the end of a work day, I always make sure to try and get home and just shower and put on a fresh shirt, so that I don’t come in reeking of dog and sweat and sun.

Brogan: You have to repress the fact of the work that you’ll be doing for them in order to make them comfortable?

Mogavero: Yeah. You’re basically lying about how gross you are going to be when you’re going into their houses.

Brogan: But it’s an honest kind of lie.

Mogavero: Yeah. For sure. You want to be more Schroeder than Pig-Pen when you’re meeting them the first time.

Brogan: When you’re getting ready for a walk, what kind of props or tools do you have to bring with you? Why don’t we go through the contents of your fanny pack.

Mogavero: OK. On the outer pouch is perhaps the most important tool, which is rolls of poop bags. I say rolls because I never carry just one.

You know, if your dog does its thing in a planter box in front of their house and you don’t have a bag, that’s just a recipe for disaster.

Brogan: How many bags do you think you go through in a given day?

Mogavero: 15. 20. Depends on what the dogs had for dinner or breakfast.

Brogan: So you’ve got your poop bags in there.

Mogavero: Got the poop bags.

A pair of ear buds with a mic and a button—really, really important. If you’re out there with two or three dogs, you don’t want to actually have to handle your phone. I probably talk to Siri more than I do a lot of the people I know.

Brogan: What kind of things are you asking your phone?

Mogavero: If I get a text message, I ask it to read the text messages.  I’ve become very practiced in the art of speaking clearly so that Siri gets text messages right.

I also keep a bandana on, mostly to dab sweat, but every once and a while you will need it for other things. For example, I will occasionally walk a five-year-old Poodle named Benny and a one-year-old English Bulldog named Bricks. Now, despite the fact that Bricks is probably two or three times Benny’s mass, Benny still very much has an older brother complex. And so a thing that Benny likes to do is wait until Bricks is doing her business, then run up behind her and pee on Bricks’s butt.

And, I mean, that’s not going to be adequately taken care of with a poop bag, so it’s good to just have an actual cotton something or another.

Dogs can be every bit as cruel and vicious as people.

Brogan: Sometimes that bandana is for you, and sometimes it is for another dog who just had its own butt peed upon.

Mogavero: In which case it is not for me again until I get home and wash it real, real good.

Brogan: Apart from the bandana, do you have a standard dog walking outfit?

Mogavero: Yes. And you’re looking at it.

Brogan: Tell us what you’re wearing.

Mogavero: I’m wearing a black tank top. Very light cotton shorts. New Balance athletic sneakers. And short cotton socks.

I learned on my very first day the importance of good shoes, because that first day I just wore a pair of Converses, and I could barely walk for two days after that. I was in completely debilitating pain. Because you’re walking for seven hours straight, you better have the right shoes, or you’re going to be hurting.

Let’s see, what else? A pack of gum. A spare leash.

Brogan: Why do you have an extra leash?

Mogavero: For two reasons primarily.

One, if I can’t find a leash at a client’s house, rather than waste the dog’s time looking around for one, I’ll just use my own. Secondly, if I don’t like the client’s leash, and they don’t have another option. That’ll happen because a dog is really high energy and might have a tendency to pull a little bit. And if they’ve got a rope style lead that hurts my hand. It’s a rope digging in your hand.

So I’ve got this flat, vinyl lead, about three-quarters of an inch wide. It’s a lot more comfortable.

Brogan: How long should a leash be?

Mogavero: This one is four feet.

It’s much safer to have the dogs as close to your side as possible. You’re leading the walk. They’re having fun. If they smell something good in a planter box, then you guide them that way. Shorter leashes are better.

I really, really despise retractable leashes. This is an industry-wide thing. Retractable leashes are not safe. I don’t trust that little plastic clasp in the slightest. There’s no way to pull back. If you let the dog get 10 or 15 feet in front of you, and a squirrel jumps out or something, then it’s terrible. Again, too many X factors. I don’t like it.

Brogan: Do you find that you’re more cautious when you see other people with dogs on retractable leashes?

Mogavero: Yeah. That’s when I will absolutely cross the street.

Brogan: Because you assume they’re not going to be able to control their dog? Are there any other emergency supplies that you found you needed or things that you’ve brought along?

Mogavero: Antacids. I start walking at 9, maybe 9:30, and I don’t stop till 4 or 5. And maybe there will be a 15 or 20-minute break in there, in which case I’ll grab something from Subway, thus necessitating the antacids.

And this is what always tickles people. The massive thing of keys.

Brogan: How many keys are on there? It looks like a lot of keys.

Mogavero: About 30 or so.

I’ve got on average 12 to 15 dogs a day, so it’s going to have all those dogs’ keys. But every once and a while there will be dogs where you’ll walk them once a week, maybe once a month. There are a couple cat keys on there.

Brogan: How do you keep that many keys straight? Do you ever find yourself fumbling as you’re at a door?

Mogavero: No, after a while, you get used to which key is which. And they’re color coded by neighborhood. I’m just looking at them now. The green keys are for LeDroit. The yellow keys are Shaw. Purple keys are for occasional walks. And cats.

Brogan: And presumably they don’t have the addresses of the people on them or anything?

Mogavero: No, just the pet’s name. Because if I get mugged or whatever, that’s literally the keys to people’s houses.

Brogan: You have a lot of access to people’s lives. Their pets are a privileged, treasured part of their lives. Have you ever run into trust issues in that regard?

Mogavero: I don’t think so.

Some people will be very particular about how you are to use the space. Sometimes people will tell you that they don’t want you using the bathroom. I have one older client who said, “I don’t want you moving beyond this point into the apartment.”

But by and large, if they’re trusting you enough to give you their beloved pet, then going into their space is usually not an issue at all. Some of the clients have cameras. I don’t think of it as a problem.

Brogan: How do you decide which dog to walk first?

Mogavero: It’s pretty rigorously established.

There’s one dog whose mom spends a lot of time out of town, and so that dog actually needs morning, midday, and night walks. You have to be there at 8am and then 8pm, or 9am then 9pm.

Obviously most people want the walks between the hours of 11 to 3, and we’re usually able to meet that. It’s a balance of making the times that people want and the geography of the walks.

Brogan: Do you work out the scheduling via the Web?

Mogavero: We use an app called Pet Check.

When we’re out doing our thing, the client’s actually have a QR code on a magnet, so we clock in and out. At the end of the walk they get a report card that lets them know if the dog did its business, what kind. There’s a little fill in box for the report card—like, here’s something funny the dog did. And there’s a GPS tracker. They can see exactly where we walked.

Brogan: How long does a typical walk last?

Mogavero: No less than 30 minutes.

If it’s rainy out, we’ll bring the dogs home a little earlier to dry them off. And it’s not like the dogs want to be out in the rain for a full half hour anyway.

Brogan: What has to happen for a walk to be successful?

Mogavero: A successful walk is when the dog has peed and/or pooped; anything else that we might need to do; if the dog gets a snack or a midday meal; but mostly if the dog has fun.

Brogan: If you run into another dog walker, or stop by a dog park, do you ever let the dogs relate to their fellow canines?

Mogavero: I am really, really cautious about that.

Definitely no dog parks, except if the dog park is empty. And even then, if I see another dog approaching, then I’ll call the other dogs back. There’s too many X factors. I don’t like the risk.

Whenever we see another dog coming, I’ll stop and see what they’re going to do. And most people know—they’ll cross the street. Or I’ll hop up on a set of stairs and wait for them to go by.

Brogan: What about when someone wants to pet a dog or otherwise interact with a dog that you’re walking? How do you respond?

Mogavero: I’m pretty cautious about that, too.

I don’t like kids running up suddenly and sometimes freaking out the dogs, being less predictable than their larger counterparts. If they’re clearly OK, then sure, I’ll let them say hi. But even then, I’ll tell them, OK, just hold your hand down with the palm up and let her or him come to you. So, it’s the dog’s decision. And even then, I’m keeping the dog on a pretty tight lead in case anything remotely close to weird happens.

Brogan: Are there other issues that you run into while you’re out with the dogs?

Mogavero: Yes. And they are all people related.

People walking up to you and maybe trying to just say hello without permission. People riding their bikes down the sidewalk; I can’t even tell you how low of an opinion I have of cyclists who ride on the sidewalk these days. I’ve had dogs nearly get run over. I’ve had dogs freak out and start barking because a cyclist comes right up behind us unannounced. It’s not a good look.

Motorists. People blowing through lights. People blowing through stop signs. People barreling out of alleys.

You have to be hyper aware of your surroundings at all times and learn to anticipate the unanticipated. I’ve mastered the art of holding the dogs about a foot behind me, so I can angle my head around the corner of an alley, just to make sure that we’re not going to get hit.

Brogan: How many dogs are you able to handle at a given time?

Mogavero: I never walk more than three. Very occasionally, I’ll do four at a time, if I know that it’s an entirely residential neighborhood with very safe streets. And even then, I have to make sure that all four of the dogs get along nicely. That there isn’t anybody reactive or high energy.

Brogan: In terms of getting that kind of pack attitude going, do they calm each other down at all?

Mogavero: Oh, for sure. I’ve got a young Pointer named Oliver who’s not even a year old, and he recently picked up a friend, an eight-year-old fellow named Sam. And they balance each other really, really nicely. They get it and they respect each other. And there’s usually a natural balance with the packs.

Brogan: How engaged do you have to be while you’re out walking with these dogs? Is there time for reflection? Or are these very focused walks?

Mogavero: It depends on the area.

If I’m walking along 7th Street, that’s a minefield for chicken bones. So you definitely need to be a lot more aware of your surroundings. But every once and a while, sure, you can go into a Zen-like meditative state, without actually floating away on a cloud.

You have to be paying attention somewhat. But if it’s a nice day and you’ve got like a nice long walk on a sidewalk through a residential neighborhood—yeah, absolutely. There’s time for that.

Brogan: You’re also a musician. Does that play into your dog walking life at all?

Mogavero: Occasionally.

If I get some of that meditative time, I’ll switch on the voice memos app on my phone and just free associate some lyrics or sing a drum beat or a guitar melody or something. That may or may not turn into a song later. Or if I’ve just uploaded a fresh batch of CDs or music onto my phone, I’ll bring a dog back and then be sure to add especially good songs to an iTunes playlist, which then I can use for a radio show or DJ set later.

Brogan: When you bring a dog back home, do you have to make sure that it is ready to chill out on its own?

Mogavero: I don’t know. It depends on the dog. Some people let their dogs just wander around the apartment or the house. If it’s a crated dog, I’ll make sure they get some water, especially in the summer time. You know, give them some time at their bowl. And then when they’re done, they’ll look up at me, and then I’ll put them in the crate.

Brogan: Are the rates standard? Is that established by your company?

Mogavero: Yes. For an individual walk, it’s $20. If you’re walking a pair, it’s $25.

Overnights, which could be staying over at your house, or us boarding your dog, that’s $100 for 24 hours. That’s something I do a lot. Actually, I’m picking up a pair of dogs this evening.

Brogan: How many do you have to do for it to be a reasonably healthy career?

Mogavero: About 12 to 15 a day. That’s about the average. It’s a comfortable living. I mean, it’s much harder than my previous lives and office-bound jobs to be sure, but it’s ultimately more rewarding for a couple reasons.

Brogan: Are there any other side benefits? You have a nice tan right now.

Mogavero: It’s a tan. I don’t know if it’s a nice tan, because as you can see it’s quite tank top shaped. When I first took the job, I lost about 30 pounds inside of two or three months. How can you not? You’re doing low-level aerobic exercise for 35, maybe 40 hours a week.

Brogan: Do you have any advice for people who would want to get into dog walking?

Mogavero: It’s starting by, I don’t know, working from home if you can and using your lunch hour to go take care of people’s dogs. Because that is absolutely the peak time, is smack in the middle of the day, between their owners leaving and them coming back. If you can do that, if you can spend the night at their house, if you make it clear that you’re interested in pet care and get the word out, that’s the way to do it.

Brogan: What is it that makes dog walking rewarding for you?

Mogavero: Think about the day from a dog’s perspective.

You’ve already gone through the worst part of your day, which is master leaving. You’re just sitting around the house, or in a crate, for a couple hours.

And then you hear the keys jingling and you know what’s about to happen. Your dog walker walks in and you freak out. You’re panting. You’ve got a big smile. You might be jumping up on the dog walker. And then you go have the best part of your day. Have a drink of water. And then wait until mommy and daddy come home.

Now, imagine being on the other end of that, again, 12 to 15 times a day. That’s it. Can you imagine, just on a physical level, the endorphins that come from that?

But also knowing that you have helped bring joy to so many people’s pets.

About a week and a half ago, this dog, Abby, who was just one of the most wonderful creatures I’d ever come across, just a sweet little lovey bear, her family moved from their old apartment to Capitol Hill, which is well out of our service area. Her mom and I had a tearful goodbye. It was huge. I mean, I’m actually getting a little worked up thinking about it, because when you and the dog become part of each other’s routine, it would be strange for an emotional bond not to form. And that’s the one bad part of the job is goodbyes.