Barking Dogs

Yesterday I mentioned pets can sometimes be a nuisance. While this is true, I certainly don't want to come off as an animal hater. On the contrary, my friends. I love animals. They're delicious! Don't you know PETA stands for People Eating Tasty Animals? No no no... just kidding. The fact is I really do like animals. Dogs and cats are some of the cutest things going. Sometimes I look at a photo of a puppy and my heart gets all mushy. I just don't want to live with them.

Now, getting back to pets sometimes being a nuisance. Please don't take this to mean I think all pets are a nuisance or that some pets are a nuisance all of the time. It doesn't mean that at all. It just means other people's pets sometimes can be an annoyance to me.

When we lived in Finneytown we had a neighbor named Tom. Tom was a single guy and owned a big St. Bernard dog known as Boomer. Boomer was aptly named. He had the deepest sounding bark I have ever heard. Tom would leave Boomer in his back yard all the time and Boomer did nothing but bark while he was outside. When I say he barked for hours on end, I mean he barked nonstop from morning till night. Tom would leave Boomer in the yard while he was at work and Boomer would bark the whole time. Sometimes Tom would leave Boomer outside at night and he would bark incessantly. (I forgot to mention that Boomer's position near the fence was no more than twenty feet from our bedroom window). We lost count the number of times Boomer woke us up early or kept us awake at night. One particular night/morning Boomer started up about 4 A.M. Tami having had enough jumped out of bed and called Tom on the phone. She not-so-nicely told him to take Boomer in the house and to make him stop barking. Tom had the nerve to tell her Boomer wasn't barking. WHAAAAAAAAAT?????? You must be kidding! Your dog is barking at 4 A.M. disturbing the whole neighborhood and you don't know it? Sheesh! Therein the problem lies. After that phone call we usually resorted to calling the police. What choice did we have since Tom wouldn't take responsibility for his own dog? I remember another time Boomer started barking early in the morning and didn't stop all day. We tried throughout the day to call Tom, but he wasn't home. He had put Boomer in the backyard and left for the day. About 7 that evening we called the police. They responded and we told them Boomer had been barking for more than 12 hours. They did write Tom a citation, but do you know what he told the police later? He said his dog doesn't bark. That really took the cake! Boomer was a nuisance and a major annoyance to my family for many years. Fortunately Tom moved before we could do him bodily harm. At the end of this story, I don't really blame the dog. I blame the owner. Boomer wasn't properly cared for. I'd bark too if somebody threw me in the yard and left me there alone all day.

Fast forward to our current home. We now have next door neighbors with TWO dogs (Rally and Max). Oh joy! These dogs aren't outside much, but when they are... they bark. They bark at each other, they bark at squirrels and they go completely nuts when someone is walking their dog down the street. Once again these dogs are less than 20 feet from my back door. These dogs are a nuisance, but not anywhere close to what Boomer was. I have to laugh at my neighbors who own Rally and Max. When they bark, the owners scream at them to stop. They never, ever stop, but they keep yelling anyway. When Rally and Max go outside to answer nature's call, my neighbors yell at them to hurry up! I think this is hilarious! The dogs don't seem to speed up doing their business... they just mosey around sniffing everything in sight. Hurry up, indeed! And do my neighbors really think Rally and Max understand what they're saying? Sorry folks, but Rally and Max are a nuisance as well.

Not to pick on just dogs... my neighbors on the other side have cats. The cats don't make any noise, but I will tell you I often look outside and see them walking along the rail of my pool. I've also seen them walking across my pool cover in the winter. Are these cats really doing any harm to me or my pool? No, they're not. However, the point is I don't own cats and I don't want them prowling around my deck and pool. Picky? Maybe. But c'mon people! Take care of your animals.

And I won't even get started on dogs who jump up on you when you walk into their house. That's a discussion for another day.

In conclusion, I'm not saying everybody who owns pets is a nuisance. I just think I've had some bad luck and have had some bad experiences with neighbors and their pets. There are plenty of pets I like. Griffyn, my grand-dog is a very nice redbone hound. He has the softest ears ever! We have good friends with a very sweet lap dog named Chewy. I like her. In general, pets are nice... when they live with someone else :-)