Stupid dog-owners make me go "Mrrrrrr."
Dec. 6th, 2008 10:57 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
wordinistaHad a slightly weird thing happen tonight, and I'm finding myself kind of... still vaguely annoyed over it.
In the middle of watching the 'Bama-Gator game, Darwin ran over to the front door, barking. He shoved his muzzle through the mail slot and started sniffing, and then paced the foyer, really agitated. I peeked through the window and saw two dogs standing in our driveway. Since I'd seen a flyer around regarding two lost dogs in the area, George and I went outside armed with a flashlight, leashes, and liver treats. They weren't the right dogs, but had collars and tags, so they were obviously someone's pet, and we brought them over to Mom's house, since she's got the fenced-in yard. (I'll just skip over the part where I tried to call her over and over again and she did not pick up her phone which seems to be par for the course when there's actually something wrong.) We got her two little dogs inside, and herded the two strays into the yard, at which point we got the collars off the doggies to look for owner information.
Now, one of the pups was a fairly young-looking Golden Retriever. I'd guestimate him to have been about a year old, maybe a year and a half. He was pretty small, and his coat hadn't come in completely yet. The other dog was a Leonberger, and ... y'know, "huge" really does not cut it. A giant, bear-like dog, who had absolutely no manners whatsoever, and seemed obsessed with humping the Golden, and then tried to hump ME, and he and I had a talk and I expressed to him quite clearly that that was not on. Neither seemed to know the "sit" command, and neither had been fixed (made evident by the Leon humping everything and also marking various points around Mom's yard -- Gizmo will be very busy tomorrow...).
Now, the Goldie was ... he was actually in pretty good shape. But the Leonberger looked like he'd been roaming for a while. He stunk to high heaven, and his coat had just... godawful mats, especially around the collar. According to their collars, the Goldie was named "Sparky," and the Leo was named "Mattei."
But anyway! Called the phone number on the tags! Like you do!
...The phone number was out of service. Insert WTF here.
The address, however, was less than a mile down our street, and I volunteered to drive down to the house. George wanted Mom to go with me, which subjected me to a round of "Mom Standard Time" -- when she says she'll be out in X minutes, but the reality is anywhere from two to four times the initial estimate. SO! We finally got to the house, and there were cars in the driveway and the lights were on (cue sigh of relief here). I knocked on the door and apparently the owner did not realize his dogs had Houdini'd out of his yard, and was like, "ZOMG ON MY WAY," so we went back to the house, he collected his dogs, and all was well.
Except.
Um. What the hell, man. Who in their right mind has a dog like a Leonberger and not only doesn't teach it basic manners, but doesn't bother to make the effort to train it to a point where the dog is remotely controllable on-leash. Because, uh. This guy? Had NO control over his ENORMOUS, GIGANTIC, BEAR-LIKE DOG. None. Seriously, NONE. The dog all but dragged the owner to his truck, and he needed me to help the Golden get to the truck, because he was so overwhelmed by the Leo. (Also, the Goldie seemed kind of hand-shy, which broke my heart and pissed me off in turns.)
And also. ALSO. The condition of the Leo's coat was DEPLORABLE. There were mats ALL up in his fur, some of them roughly the diameter of a dime. How -- HOW do you let your dog's coat get to be in that kind of condition? And if you ARE a lazy sumbitch, then why have a dog with a high-maintenance coat in the first place? According to the breed-club's website, the Leonberger requires daily brushing. Now, maybe you can push that to a couple of times a week, or maybe even a weekly brushing, but if that dog's been brushed within the past month, I'd eat my hat.
I just... don't understand people. I'm trying not to think too hard about this, because both dogs tails started wagging like crazy when the owner came to pick them up (even if they were utterly out of control). But I'm still feeling... vaguely annoyed.
AND WHO THE HELL KEEPS A DISCONNECTED NUMBER ON THEIR DOGS' IDENTIFICATION TAGS?
Argh. People.
In the middle of watching the 'Bama-Gator game, Darwin ran over to the front door, barking. He shoved his muzzle through the mail slot and started sniffing, and then paced the foyer, really agitated. I peeked through the window and saw two dogs standing in our driveway. Since I'd seen a flyer around regarding two lost dogs in the area, George and I went outside armed with a flashlight, leashes, and liver treats. They weren't the right dogs, but had collars and tags, so they were obviously someone's pet, and we brought them over to Mom's house, since she's got the fenced-in yard. (I'll just skip over the part where I tried to call her over and over again and she did not pick up her phone which seems to be par for the course when there's actually something wrong.) We got her two little dogs inside, and herded the two strays into the yard, at which point we got the collars off the doggies to look for owner information.
Now, one of the pups was a fairly young-looking Golden Retriever. I'd guestimate him to have been about a year old, maybe a year and a half. He was pretty small, and his coat hadn't come in completely yet. The other dog was a Leonberger, and ... y'know, "huge" really does not cut it. A giant, bear-like dog, who had absolutely no manners whatsoever, and seemed obsessed with humping the Golden, and then tried to hump ME, and he and I had a talk and I expressed to him quite clearly that that was not on. Neither seemed to know the "sit" command, and neither had been fixed (made evident by the Leon humping everything and also marking various points around Mom's yard -- Gizmo will be very busy tomorrow...).
Now, the Goldie was ... he was actually in pretty good shape. But the Leonberger looked like he'd been roaming for a while. He stunk to high heaven, and his coat had just... godawful mats, especially around the collar. According to their collars, the Goldie was named "Sparky," and the Leo was named "Mattei."
But anyway! Called the phone number on the tags! Like you do!
...The phone number was out of service. Insert WTF here.
The address, however, was less than a mile down our street, and I volunteered to drive down to the house. George wanted Mom to go with me, which subjected me to a round of "Mom Standard Time" -- when she says she'll be out in X minutes, but the reality is anywhere from two to four times the initial estimate. SO! We finally got to the house, and there were cars in the driveway and the lights were on (cue sigh of relief here). I knocked on the door and apparently the owner did not realize his dogs had Houdini'd out of his yard, and was like, "ZOMG ON MY WAY," so we went back to the house, he collected his dogs, and all was well.
Except.
Um. What the hell, man. Who in their right mind has a dog like a Leonberger and not only doesn't teach it basic manners, but doesn't bother to make the effort to train it to a point where the dog is remotely controllable on-leash. Because, uh. This guy? Had NO control over his ENORMOUS, GIGANTIC, BEAR-LIKE DOG. None. Seriously, NONE. The dog all but dragged the owner to his truck, and he needed me to help the Golden get to the truck, because he was so overwhelmed by the Leo. (Also, the Goldie seemed kind of hand-shy, which broke my heart and pissed me off in turns.)
And also. ALSO. The condition of the Leo's coat was DEPLORABLE. There were mats ALL up in his fur, some of them roughly the diameter of a dime. How -- HOW do you let your dog's coat get to be in that kind of condition? And if you ARE a lazy sumbitch, then why have a dog with a high-maintenance coat in the first place? According to the breed-club's website, the Leonberger requires daily brushing. Now, maybe you can push that to a couple of times a week, or maybe even a weekly brushing, but if that dog's been brushed within the past month, I'd eat my hat.
I just... don't understand people. I'm trying not to think too hard about this, because both dogs tails started wagging like crazy when the owner came to pick them up (even if they were utterly out of control). But I'm still feeling... vaguely annoyed.
AND WHO THE HELL KEEPS A DISCONNECTED NUMBER ON THEIR DOGS' IDENTIFICATION TAGS?
Argh. People.
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no subject
Date: 2008-12-07 03:44 pm (UTC)I'd say the next time you see this fool, inquire how the dogs are doing, and possibly bring up the fact that the phone number on the tags was disconnected the last time you called it. It's at least a good thing to have the address on there, but dogs can roam pretty far and the next time they [the dogs] may not be so lucky to find someone close enough or willing to bring the dogs back to him.
no subject
Date: 2008-12-07 08:45 pm (UTC)