Tired Human Feels Better

First of all, I must thank you so very much for your sympathies and very kind words about the whiny post I wrote yesterday. I truly appreciate the time you took to care.

I thought I'd give you an update.

After I posted, I actually got a call from an Animal Control officer. She had pulled up the complaints listed for the address and told me there were 5 of them (over the past two years), but they were all anonymous. This was also frustrating to me because I know I have called many more times and each time (except for the very first time) I called, I left my name and phone number, my address and the address of the house with the problem dogs. I realized though, they must have a sort of revolving door in the Animal Control department because each time I made contact with a real person, it was a different person than the time before. So, I'm sure many of the complaints fell through the cracks. The upshot is, the first few logged calls spanned over 6 months between them, so, according to the department, they have to start from scratch then. I didn't know this (and secretly wondered if some of my calls weren't getting logged so they wouldn't have to deal with it, you know?). And she told me because the calls were "anonymous," they could only leave a notice and not take any further action.

But, she noted that there were 2 calls within the last few months and my call the other night. She said they could ticket the owners if I was willing to write up a statement for the complaint. This is the FIRST time anyone has ever asked me to do something like this. Tired as I am of the whole situation, I agreed and wrote up a complaint for this last incident only (although I worked in that it was an ongoing situation into the complaint). She stopped by and picked up the complaint and told me that how I worded it was perfect (whew). That means the judge won't throw out the complaint. If the owners fight the ticket, I might have to go to court to testify, but she said it rarely gets to that point. The ticket means there is a fine involved. She said, basically, all they can do is ticket the owners, they can't take the dogs away or muzzle them or anything. But the tickets get progressively more expensive. So, maybe, just maybe this will let the owners know that there are consequences for having dogs that constantly bark.

I thought I'd let you know that these owners are renters in the house. They are young adult males, in their 20s, I think (this is also the house where they let the weeds grow as tall as our privacy fence). They work odd hours and the way our houses are situated, ours sits a little higher than theirs, so I can see pretty well into their back yard from my house. They occasionally have parties, but it's not a problem at all. They may play their music a bit loud, but it's never for a prolonged period of time. I honestly don't know why they have the dogs since it appears their lifestyle isn't conducive to giving them the love and attention they deserve. I suppose it's the fact that having a dog can help offset the potential for someone to break in...but I don't know how helpful that would be if someone actually got INTO the house, because the dogs are OUTSIDE the house, but whatever.

There are two dogs that live there. One was there first and isn't too much of a problem. They brought in a puppy, (to keep the other dog company) and it's THAT dog that is the main problem. He's been a barker from the get-go. Although sometimes he gets the other one riled up enough to do his barking thing.

I know the dogs are bored. There isn't anything really for them to do. And they don't bark ALL the time, but it's often enough that it is incredibly annoying when they get going. Given that I can generally see they aren't getting attention I know WHY they do it, and I feel terrible for them living such a sad life. I don't know that the other neighbors say anything, mostly because they are neighbors, or maybe they work a lot, too and simply aren't around to realize how often it happens. There is foliage on either side of the backyard and that could be muffling the sound so we alone get the full "benefit" of the noise. All these are guesses on my part.

And it's usually worse when the owners are gone from the house. If they are home, it's not much of an issue, although I can tell when they are home and they let the dogs bark endlessly (without coming outside to see what's up). If they are gone for the weekend, I know we are in for a noisy time.

I did get a much better night of sleep and feel much less like a zombie this morning. My perspective is returning and I think I can handle the annoyance of this situation much better. (They haven't barked as much since I called, thank goodness~that helps).

Thanks again for listening! I really appreciate it! Hope you have a great weekend! I'm gonna try really hard to enjoy mine!