Keeping Me in Stitches

Tuesday, July 31, 2007

the need to vent....

So just went out and got my mail (yes, at 9:30 PM....I just woke up), and in there was an envelope from the Humane Society.

I'm thinking "Hmmm....it's not time to pay the annual pet registration fee. And I've never gotten mail from them before." Open it up to find a WARNING NOTICE!!!!

Evidently, one of the people who lives next door to me (I'm not calling her a neighbor because neighbors don't pull this crap on you) called the Humane Society to report that "your small dog was barking all evening on your deck". I'm pretty sure it's the bitchy lady next door to me who had never introduced herself until she came over to accuse me of stealing her garbage can in April. They are the only ones living around me who don't own dogs. Unfortunately, these complaints are made anonymously. But I'm 99.9% sure that it's her. Why am I sure?

Because the weekend of the HP7 book release (Saturday the 21st), I got up a little later (kind of like tonight) and let Phoebe outside. This lady and her teenage daughter (who has parties at the house when her parents are gone) were sitting on their back deck. Because of the different builds of our houses, her back deck is all of 2 feet off the ground. Mine is about 10 feet, so it's very easy for Phoebe to see over the fence and see people and bark. This particular evening, they were sitting outside and Phoebe would go out, go potty, come back up to the deck, bark and I'd let her in right away (repeat every 10 minutes or so for about half an hour). This is the ONLY TIME this summer that I've seen these people use their deck. And they feel the need to file a complaint against MY DOG!!!!

It doesn't even piss me off that I got a warning. What pisses me off is that they didn't come over and say something to me first. I could understand filing a complaint if they were out there every night and Phoebe kept barking and barking and I just left her out there for hours on end to bark at them. But for pete's sake!!! At least have the common courtesy to confront me to my face!!!

Oh....and one more thing. This warning letter I got also quotes the City Ordinance about public nuisances. Let me share. "It shall be unlawful for anyone to permit an animal to unreasonably obstruct the use and enjoyment of property held by others in the community by allowing such animal to habitually bark, howl, yelp, bay or make other noise which by loudness or frequency causes a breach of the peace." (emphasis mine) A one-time deal (which I dealt with right away by bringing her inside each time when she was barking) suddenly means "habitually" to these people.

I'm still debating whether to call the Humane Society in the morning to ask questions and debate this. Anyone have any ideas or opinions?

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4 Comments:

  • At 10:53 PM, Blogger dragon knitter said…

    i'd definitely call. that's annoying!

     
  • At 12:25 AM, Blogger Nea said…

    I'd call. Because the fact that it was a one time thing that they happened to see really doesn't fall under 'habitually'.

     
  • At 3:49 AM, Blogger Lyndsey-Jane said…

    I too would be annoyed as surely the Humane Society have better things to do than follow up on this, like finding people who are actually mistreating their animals - something you definetely couldn't be accused, from the sounds of the LnV podcasts Phoebe is dearly loved and treated as good (or maybe better lol) than a human.

     
  • At 9:21 AM, Blogger Susan said…

    I'd call, too. That way, there will be a record that you responded to the warning and weren't just brushing it off. And you'll get a chance to get your side of the story out. They can probably tell you how to proceed from here, too, to prevent any further BS.

     

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