Barking Dog and What Next?

Today was a total waste of time and space; probably shouldn't have even been on the calendar.

Normally, I get a lot done on Sunday, after sleeping in for a little while because it's the quietest morning of the week, but not today and you want to know why? I'll tell you why. A damn stray rooster that's why. In addition, that is, to my neighbor's barking dog.

I know there are some folks around here who keep chickens...I almost ran over a chicken crossing the road right down the street one day...I kid you not...and I'm assuming it came from one of those places but no one can tell me where these chicken people live and no one has come around looking for a lost rooster. This rooster has been hanging around for about a week now and I've been trying to get someone out here to collect it - a rescue group, a chicken person...I even put a posting on Craigslist - but with no success.

Initially, this rooster wasn't bothering me and I was more afraid he'd get run over in the street or my barking dog neighbor would shoot him (he shoots at stray cats and probably other small mammels as well). It never even occurred to me that the thing would begin disturbing the peace. But in the last couple of days Harley has been barking more than usual (if you can believe that) and I realized he, and Cherokee, the normally quiet one, have been barking at this rooster. Great. So now the dog who barks at falling leaves has yet another reason to be barking...

Then this morning, at some ungodly hour before sunrise, I woke up and heard a rooster crowing. I'm not sure if this crowing is exactly what woke me up, because since being awakened several times a night throughout 2009 and early 2010 by Harley's big mouth I have not been able to sleep all night without waking up at least once, or if it was just coincidence. I think I went back to sleep...I'm almost certain I did because next I knew it was a couple hours later (but it didn't feel like it) and Harley & Cherokee were raising hell. Sigh.

So I finally got up, went downstairs, and noticed the rooster right outside of the dining room window, which by the way is under my bedroom, pecking around under the bird feeder...so I ran outside in my pajamas and robe, looked around and didn't see anything to be barking at on Harley's side of my yard and so in a voice I'm sure they heard for a few blocks around I told the dogs to SHUT UP...and I'm pleased to report that they did. Then I went around to the other side and chased the rooster off making sure he made his exit toward the back and not around toward the front where he inevitably would have instigated more barking.

A little while later Harley was barking again but as I got ready to go out to shut him up again he suddenly stopped barking and I noticed both dogs running to their back door, so apparently one of their rude, irresponsible owners heard me the first time (it's about time) and decided to get off their lazy ass and do the right thing for once. Don't get me wrong, I know the rude people didn't let the dogs go inside; I know they just gave them a treat or breakfast in an attempt to distract them from whatever was motivating them to bark but of course we all know they were just enforcing the barking behavior by doing so. No wonder the rude people's human children have so many emotional and behavioral problems.

So that was the beginning of my lovely Sunday, the day that is usually the quietest day of the week since there is little traffic in the morning, and now I'm in a foul mood over fowls and foul dog barking...and rude neighbors who can't or won't control their dogs or chickens.
If one keeps chickens for the sake of having ones own organic, humane eggs, does one need to have a rooster about as well? So much for that future idea.

I recently told my husband that at this point in time I'd gladly live in a single wide trailer - although it would be quite the culture shock after living in a 3600 sq. ft. house - if it was parked in the middle of a large acreage with no neighbors, no roads, and no dogs within sight or hearing distance.

And I mean it. Can we just make it an Air Stream, please???

What's Wrong With People?

It's been a long time since I've written here but I've been really busy catching up on all the things I couldn't do when Harley was barking night & day, like getting sleep & doing yard work. So why today am I taking time out to write? Because on this particularly lovely day my yard is enveloped in a dog crap miasma and it was just not appealing to me so I came inside early.

To digress for a moment and quickly summarize the situation, I live in Monroe, NC next door to a barking dog named Harley. Harley's barking is shrill, abrupt and echoes, made my years ring and conversation outside of my house was impossible without raising your voice when he's having a psycho barking fit, which used to often last for several hours. Harley was barking from the first day they brought him home as a puppy in the summer of 2007 and if he was outside he was barking. Period. Then in the Spring of 2009 he became a full time yard dog because my neighbors were too stupid to house train him. I'd say he barked a good 16 hours out of 24, more depending on how often I attempted to go outside, and I'm not even sure if he really slept or just rested up and caught his breath for the next 3-5 hour round of barking.

Jump ahead to early 2010: after calling the cops & animal control a number of times earlier this year because Harley's barking was ruining my life, my neighbors, or actually their son who had to move back home due to his own misfortune, finally put some effort into making Harley stop barking so much. That's not to say that Harley was always quiet, but he was quiet enough for me to finally be able to relax in my house, get some decent sleep, eat without having an upset stomach, and catch up on my yard work (that's right, I couldn't go into my yard without being barked at the whole time). They even cleaned up the dog crap so I could spend time in my yard without holding my breath, and I could open my windows on a nice day without my whole house eventually smelling like dog shit.

However, as the year has progressed to the present, my neighbors, and Harley, have begun to slack off. Harley is being allowed to bark more and more and, well, like I said, the dog crap is piling up again.

Oh, of course, I can't blame them. After all, I'm the one who embarrassed them because the police and animal control showed up at their house so many times and because of this I really deserve to be awakened at 6:15 a.m. This is when my neighbor goes out and makes all 3 of her dogs bark just long enough to wake me up, and yes, I caught her doing it one morning when I was awakened into a foul mood and ran out to see what the hell the dogs were barking at, and I believe she (the passive aggressive sociopath) does this regularly both in the morning and in the evening...just to remind me of what a bad neighbor I am. Forget Sundays...which used to be the quietest day of the week around here, and on which day I knew I could look forward to sleeping in without traffic noise. Forget it now.

And I'm the despicable ass who put up the cat fence around my yard (after they blamed my cat for all the barking, even when he was in the house, and threatened to trap him and send him to the shelter) and so now they can't pull their Coachman RV around my driveway which enabled them to then easily back it into their parking area.

My fault!!! Why should they keep their dogs quiet now and why should they continue to clean up the dog crap after I've been such a bad neighbor for not wanting to hear their dog bark 24/7 and for wanting to keep my cat safe on my own property?

Yes, once again Harley has begun to bark at this & that and at me as soon as he hears me in the yard and they just let him go on and on. It's not nearly as bad as it was last year, but still very loud and it's extremely annoying and stressful when he is carrying on. To top it off, the folks behind me, who had 3 dogs, then only 1 dog, but now have 2 dogs, all chained up and ignored (one dog is chained & penned...), are allowing their dogs to bark for hours, day & night, and if they aren't already barking they begin barking when they hear or see me in my yard (and both dogs are practically swimming in their own feces). And, since I'm such a crappy fucking neighbor, the folks on the other side of me now have a dog which doesn't bark, thankfully, but which they allow to crap all over their yard, front & back, and there the crap sits to fester on a nice warm day. I even stepped in a pile of it in their front yard the other day when I walked over to talk to my neighbor, who was sitting on the picnic bench in her front yard. The pile was right next to the picnic bench.

My fault!!! Silly me; why would I dare think there would NOT be any dog shit next to the picnic bench where my neighbors and their friends are always hanging out?

You know, I'd gladly buy dog poop bags for my all my neighbors if they would just use them. Unfortunately, I don't think those bags would get used for poop. Not dog poop anyway.

Don't they realize that even Barbie picks up her dog's poop?







So add the 1 dog's crap to the left of me + the 2 dogs' crap behind me + the 3 dogs' crap on the right of me and what do you get?

And add the 3 dogs barking on the right + the 2 dogs barking behind + maybe 5 other dogs barking in a 2 block radius of my place and what do you get?

What you get is a pretty shitty piece of property that nobody is going to want to buy so I can't even move. But why should my neighbors care? It's not my dogs who are barking and stinking them out of house and home. Hell, I don't even have a dog.

Why should any of these charming folks clean up their dogs' poop, or teach their dogs to be good? Well, I don't know. Maybe out of respect for yourselves & your dogs, if not for your neighbors? When I had dogs I did it because I didn't want disgusting stinky dog crap all over my yard, because it's disgusting to go to the park and have to watch out for dog turds in the grass while you are walking around (or wonder if you are laying on a piece of decomposed dog shit in the grass), because I didn't want unruly dogs who didn't know how to behave, and because I like to be a good neighbor (even if I don't like my neighbors).

And another reason I didn't leave dog shit laying around and let my dogs run around barking like a pack of wild animals (which, by the way, is an incorrect cliche because wild dogs don't run around barking like that) is because I'm respectful and I feel bound to the integrity of my ethics and morality to not only NOT add to the pollution of the earth but to also be the type of neighbor that I would like to live next to. And even if my neighbors have much lower standards I refuse to let them dictate who I am or to allow them to drive me to compromising my integrity. But being kind and considerate is becoming more and more difficult living among all these passive aggressive, unhygienic, rude, irresponsible...uh...people.

So I want to know, what is wrong with people? Why don't people respect at least themselves, if no one else, enough to clean up the dog crap in their yards, and why don't they care enough about their own dogs to teach them to be good, quiet neighbors?

I realize there are a lot of conscientious and responsible dog owners, and I know some of them, but the irresponsible dog owners give you all a bad name. I know there's a lot of good dogs out there, but these days when I first meet a dog I'm suspicious of it's barking habits until I get to know the dog, and when someone says they have a dog I view them with suspicion even though they might be the best dog owner on the planet. You can all thank my lovely neighbors for that.

Oh, and another thing. I want to know why the law enforcement does not enforce the codes? It plainly states that seriously annoying barking is a violation, as is allowing any type of smelly waste to accumulate on your property.

Barking Dog Advice from an Expert

I was going through some of the Barking Dog Yahoo Group messages that I saved and came across the following, which makes excellent sense. The bottom line is, if you have recently begun to be tormented by your neighbor's barking dog, don't wait to do something about it - jump into action immediately.

Dr. Craig Mixon, an expert on the subject of barking dogs and their owners, and founder of BarkingDogs.net, says...

"To a large extent, your best course of action is always determined by your own individual skill set. You need to do what you are good at doing, and what you know how to do. Some people are brilliant at confrontation ­ others at maneuver, persuasion, or politics ­ still others do best to steer clear of all categories.

"But as a trained behaviorist I can tell you that the longer you let any given response continue, and the better established it becomes, the harder it is likely to be to get it stopped.

"So if your neighbor gets a dog and the barking starts, then, if you are ever going to talk to him about it, you had better do it immediately. Because every minute it continues, the less likely he is to be willing to bring it to a stop. That is true of dogs and humans alike. The research shows that beyond the slightest doubt."

I now, well over 2 years later, realize the above statement from Dr. Mixon is true and I wish I would have come across his works sooner. In retrospect I could have saved myself from over 2 years of barking torment and the mental, physical & financial side effects of this noise trauma had I acted sooner. As it is, I allowed myself to be victimized for well over 2 years by my neighboring sociopath barking dog owners and their incessantly yapping psycho dog since day one of the dog's arrival as a puppy, hoping they'd recognize the problem and put and end to it.

This attempt to be patient did no good at all.  The barking did not subside, in fact just got worse & worse,  and just caused me immeasurable stress, anxiety & tension and also ended up costing me a lot of money. The dog's owners are as hostile toward me today as they would have been then, if I'd jumped into action when they first got the dog, but at least I could have saved myself from a lot misery (and also saved some money). At this point, I don't care if they hate me. Neighborly relations were ruined the day I realized they were just going to let him bark and bark and bark without any regard for neighbors, which was on day one when they brought the dog home and he was running around the yard yapping & yapping at me and everything else that moved or didn't move.

From the first day, at the end of November in 2009, that we began complaining about the barking...first by "talking" to them about it, which was a one sided conversation and a complete waste of time and breath, then by me calling them at night when the dog was barking, which only put an end to the barking temporarily that night, then later by calling the police and animal control, which at least put an end to the dog being out at night...it has taken less than 6 months to attain relative peace again. Fortunately for us the neighbor's oldest son, unfortunately due to his own misfortune, had to move back home and started working with the dog to make him stop barking.  The son has done a marvelous job with the dog, especially considering he has his own mother working against him by inciting the dog to bark when her son is not around... 

Beginning sometime in late March this year, things began going along very nicely and quietly (it was odd but I wasn't going to question it), and then suddenly there were a couple of weeks late in April when Mrs. Barking Dog Owner, who claims to be a good Christian, was letting the dog out very early in the morning (like between 6-6:30 a.m.) and allowing him to bark which had very rudely & traumatically awakened me 4-5 times. One morning I actually caught her in the process of provoking some barking, at least it seemed so to me when I witnessed her standing on her screened porch making some sort of noise which, everytime the dogs heard it, caused them break into a barking fit. Some people whom I've told about this, who have also heard the unbearable ruckus, asserted that it sounds like spiteful behavior on the part of the mean old bitch...

The second time this happened, I went outside, probably looking like some sort of psyco myself as I'd just been awakened from a very deep sleep and was still trying to get my wits about me...fortunately my sleeping attire was not going to get me arrested for indecent exposure..., and let her know that I was not happy about being awakened. Of course, she lashed out with hostilities and accusations about me being a bad neighbor for calling the police... blah, blah, blah...and accused my cat of instigating the barking (he was in the house, still sleeping...that's how early it was) and then she, the good Christian, threatened to trap my cat and send him to the shelter...etc., etc. It was difficult to get a word in but I was finally able to casually mention that I had video/sound recordings of her dog being left outside to bark for hours, at all hours... Apparently she, oddly enough as I don't credit her with much intelligence, realized that along with telling her I had the barking evidence on tape (so to speak) I was also implying that the evidence points out that she neglected the dog by allowing him to be unattended during these sometimes hours long barking fits because she seemed to be taken aback and lost for words...at least temporarily until she lamely got the last word in and again reiterated how she couldn't believe I would ever be such a bad neighbor. Boo hoo. Realizing I'd have better luck communicating wtih a rock, I walked away.

This early morning barking occurred several more times and so I again called the police and animal control. They never came out again as by the time I called them Mrs. Sociopath had locked the dog up (nice, huh? lock them up rather than enforce the training that her son has implemented), but I gave them all a good ration of how I was fed up with losing sleep and my life being ruined because my neighbors were being allowed to let their dog be a barking nuisance...and on and on. Then, just as suddenly as it began again, this early morning barking suddenly stopped again so maybe the police or animal control sent a notice or called them or something. I don't know and, as long as the dog successfully continues on his path of barking behavior modification, I don't care.

So, since perhaps you missed it because I've rambled on and on about my barking misery, the main point of the story is, don't wait to start the process of putting an end to the barking. You'll just be more and more traumatized the longer it goes on, the neighbors will probably hate you regardless of when you let them know that you won't tolerate it, and you'll probably have better success at stopping the barking if you speak up right away.

By the way, I have nothing against Christians or people with any other religious beliefs. I do not, however, like people who are hypocrites.

The Good, the Bad, and the Absurd...

First the good news: I've purchased 500 ft. of Purr...fect Fence so my cat will have a safe enclosure from which he can't escape and so he can hunt, pee, spray, lounge...whatever he wants... outside and I don't have to worry about Mrs. Barking Sociopath trapping him and sending him to the shelter;

The bad news is: The 5 Purrfect Fence kits, plus 2 gates with 2 gate extensions so I can get the riding mower in and out costs just under $3700 which is now on the credit card, but...

More good news is: I probably won't use all 5 Purrfect Fence kits because I want all areas within the enclosure to be within my field of view from the house, but I bought that many because doing so considerably reduced the cost of each individual kit, so I can sell 1 or 2 and recoup some money, and...

Now for the absurd, or what some people might consider the funny stuff (no, unfortunately, not the green leafy kind): Actually it's frightening, not funny at all. One might even concluded that evolution has suddenly changed the definition of the fittest and has begun to allow mentally incompetent folks to thrive and survive, as my barking dog neighbors certainly seem to be doing a better job of surviving than I am even though, at my worst, I possess a much higher degree of intelligence and am in much better physical condition, even while suffering from nerve damage and who knows what all due to barking noise trauma. But anyway, these are some of the things my sociopath barking dog owner neighbors have said to me (and my comments are, of course, in blue):

• “Well, if you quit hanging around outside the dog wouldn’t be barking.” (What. Quit hanging around in my own yard?)
• “You probably let the cat out.” (It was 6:15 a.m. and actually the lucky cat had slept through the barking fit and was still on the bed. Maybe she thought I let the cat out to instigate a barking riot to wake myself up from a deep sleep so I could drag my ragged ass outside to put an end to the barking because I had nothing better to do?)
• “He’s probably barking at the cat.” (The cat was inside…again. Damn that cat. He’s never outside when he’s guilty of instigating a barking riot)
• “Where’s the cat?” (Good grief. Can’t they come up with something new?)
• “Those other dogs are barking.” (At least they are getting creative and didn’t blame the cat this time)
• “Don’t you have insulation in your house?” (Yeah, this is what I'm dealing with. This is one of those statements that kind of left me speechless and with my mouth hanging open. Did this mean that, if we didn't have insulation...cripes, I still don't know WTF to say about this one. Even knowing these idiots, this one took me completely by surprise)
• “I can’t hear any barking.” (Now I'd be really worried about that, because we can hear the barking in every room of our house, even my neighbors on the other side of me can hear it in their house, and the pastor of the church on the corner can hear it all the way at the side entrance to his church, and even the little old lady living through the woods in back who kept saying "what?" when I was talking to her can hear this same barking, not to mention people for blocks around can also hear it)
• “Dogs bark.” (Of course, the good old stand-by stupid "duh" remark. This is a very condescending remark, and when someone says this you know you are talking to a person who has a nuisance barking dog and/or who thinks that everyone just has to put up with it because, after all, it's a dog, and if the barking is ruining your life it's your own fault. Yeah, yeah, dogs bark but enough is enough)
• “Why don’t you go to the doctor for your headache?” (I have no idea where this came from. Maybe she figured that the barking must have given me a headache, which proves she knows how obnoxious the barking really is. But I didn’t have a headache when she said that to me, and even if I did how the hell would she know?) 
• "You hurt my dog. You were yelling at him." Sigh. (Actually, it was 6:15 a.m. and I was yelling at the humans to shut the dog up. an exercise in futility, to be sure. And since I complained about being awakened by the barking she threatened to trap my cat and send him to the shelter. That'll teach me.)

I hope nothing that stupid has ever been produced by my brain and then even worse, gone beyond my lips. I'm almost positive it hasn't... but you know how you sometimes have a slight lingering doubt about a thing, which can be somewhat secretly embarrassing? Because if I ever said anything like what my barking dog owner neighbors have said to me, I'd be really embarrassed.

Peace, kiddies. Hopefully, anyway.

So much for a quiet & relaxed Sunday morning...

Sunday mornings are usually the most enjoyable time of the week because there is little traffic. During the week there is a lot of morning traffic on our street, and it often wakes me (if the dog barking has not already awakened me).

This morning I was enjoying a twilight sleep I think they call it, you know, that time when you are somewhat conscious and you could either wake up gradually or you might even fall back into a deep relaxing sleep. Then Harley began barking. When I finally found my glasses and the clock it was 7:20 a.m. He continued barking off and on until a little after 10:00 a.m.

I got up and made some coffee and fed the cats. My one cat was meowing to go out, but since the dog was already barking I told him he had to wait. The cat continued to meow and I figured he had to go to the bathroom so I began to get dressed to take him out anyway. I gathered my coffee and cell phone and began to head downstairs but didn't get very far. When I set my foot on the top step I heard a squish. The cat had already peed right at the top of the top of the stairs. So I spent the next hour soaking up as much pee as possible with paper towels, cleaning the area with cold water and soaking and respraying the area with an enzyme cleaner...and cleaning my left Birkenstock.

In defence of my cat, he usually doesn't have such problems because he's used to being allowed to go outside. He doesn't like to use the litter boxes, but in the past he's always been able to go out first thing in the morning to take care of business, then comes back in to have his breakfast. He's never out after dark, but I used to let him out peridically during the day and after dinner. When he's out I check on him often and he is usually under a shrub sleeping or watching the yard. Occasionally he wanders into a neighbors yard to check out the shurbs and rodents but if I don't see him when I look outside I go out immediately to find him and he always comes to me when I call him. I've talked to all of my neighbors on our block about my cat, they have my phone number and I've told them to let me know immediately if the cat is causing a problem and I'll collect him and repair any damages or clean up any messes. In the 8 years I've had the cat (not including the year I forced him to be an indoor only cat) none of the neighbors have called to complain about him, nor said anything about him being a problem when I've periodically asked them face to face.

However, since I've complained about their dog barking, out of revenge and hatefulness Mrs. Sociopath Barking Dog Neighbor threatened to trap my cat and send him to the shelter so I haven't been letting him out on this own, and he's only been able to go out when I take him for supervised walks in the yard. These walks, while he seems to enjoy them, are never long enough for him and he often doesn't take care of business before I'm ready to come back inside even though I try to hold out until he does. A big problem  right now is the heavy pollen in the air which bothers my eyes and sinuses, which I'm sure some of you can relate to. That is, of coure, beside the problem of having to sneak around so Harley doesn't hear or see me and start barking at me like I'm an intruder, and recently the other 2 dogs have started in on treating me like an intruder, although they don't carry on nearly as much as Harley does.

So on top of the 2+ years we've been forced to listen to Harley barking through out the whole house, day & night, and being ferociously barked at like intruders in our own yard, I have the added stress of a stressed out cat and cat pee in the house and the worry about him being harmed if he gets frisky and runs into the neighbor's yard when I take him outside. The other day he peed in the kitchen by the trash can; yesterday I found cat pee in my laundry basket and today at the top of the stairs. The cat doesn't know why he's being forced to stay inside. All he knows is that he usually gets to go outside where he does his business, in his own yard...and doesn't make any noise.

So now I'm looking into putting up a cat proof enclosure around a small area off the back of the house, because I can't afford to fence in the whole yard. This cat proof fencing, called Purr...fect Fence ( http://www.purrfectfence.com/ ) is still costly for me, at almost $900 for 1 kit which covers 100 feet, and with the increased summer utilitiy bills and all the money I've spent so far on trying to relieve the neck pain caused by the tension caused by the barking, not to mention other barking related expenses I've incurred because my neighbors won't train or supervise their barking dog, I'm tapped out and so I will have to use my credit card to pay for the fence. But, according to the installation instructions I should be able to put the thing up by myself so at least I won't have to pay anyone to help me put it up.

Of course, the installation of this cat enclosure will cause more problems with my bully barking dog neighbors. Our driveway is U-shaped and travels up from the street on both sides of our property around the back of our house, and our neighbors on both sides use part of our driveways to pull into their own parking areas rather than use their own driveways. Both neighbors have a lot more traffic going in and out than we do (we just have one car and few visitors) but we we've maintained the whole driveway ourselves, all the way around. To keep the peace we've never complained about this. Prior to all this mind shattering dog barking, we tolerated a lot to keep the peace around here but that barking became intolerable.

But anyway, the best way for me to set up the Purr...fect Fence is to run it (on the side of the house opposite the barking dog) from the back end of the front porch which wraps around the sides of the house to the corner of the house on the other side of the back door as this will give my cat some shady garden area to hang out in at the side of the house where he can't bee seen by the dog, and some sunny areas at the back of the house, and I can let him right out of the back door (or maybe even install a cat door for him in the window at the side of the house). This will not block the front portion of the drives so the neighbors (including the barking sociopaths) can continue to use them, but fencing will have to come out in back toward the edge of the driveway and will sufficiently block enough of the space between the house and another building on our property to make it impossible for the Sociopath Family to pull their camper/RV around our drive so they can back it into their parking space, which they've been doing for years because they can't seem to get it in any other way. I didn't really like them doing this as it would tear up a tree and vines on one side of the curve, but to keep the peace I just let it go. There is no other way to attach this fencing to the back of our house without cutting off the space they require to get their RV around, but at this point in time we don't feel compelled to accommodate their needs any longer, as they thoughtlessly forced us to listen to their shrill barking dog day and night for over 2 years, they continue to awaken me very early in the morning by allowing their dog to bark between 6-6:30 a.m., they've already ruined our neighborly relationship, and they have made us absolutely miserable in our own home with absolutely zero regard for our well-being or comfort. In the past, to be neighborly we've tolerated a lot of crap and did a lot of favors for them, but we owe them nothing so if they are inconvenienced, boo-fucking-hoo.

FYI - I'm not doing this in retaliation because they've ruined my life with their barking dog or for threatening my cat; I really can't afford this cat enclosure and I don't want to be terrorized by these people any more than I already have been because it's too stressful and it's killing me. I can't make that dog stop barking and I can't change his ignorant owners, but I can give my cat a safe enclosure so he can go outside. I just need to be able to let my cat run out of the door and know that my cat is safe while he is outside on his own, like he needs to be. That will be a big weight off my shoulders and reducing my stress is at the top of my list.

P.S. The barking dog owning neighbors should be glad that I can't afford to put up a wooden privacy fence because if I could afford to do it, that fencing would go from either side of the front porch, over to the property line on both sides, which would totally cut off their side of our driveway, and all the way around the whole back yard. That way I could work in the gardens at the side of the house and in the back yard without being barked at, and the cat would have the whole back yard as his safe territory. However, the estimate for the wooden fencing alone is just under $9500 (large yard) and the Purr...fect Fence cat proofing attachment for an existing fence would run about $2360. If I put up the wooden privacy fence with cat proofing around only half the yard it would still run a good $5930 and I can't put that much on my credit card.


So much for a peaceful Sunday.

City of Monroe Code Enforcement

You can allow your dog to bark day and night but if you let your grass get too high and you'll get a citation. Too bizarre.

A couple of weeks ago my neighbor (the good neighbor, not the sociopathic barking dog owner) put some yard waste out to be picked up, but apparently she was supposed to bag it and a city official came out to her house to give her a warning. Apparently the rules have changed since last year, because in previous years they've picked it up this same stuff, unbagged.

Last week I cut back some large over grown shrubs that were encroaching on our property and put the cuttings out for collection. Apparently, limbs are supposed to be cut to 4 feet lengths, and mine were longer so the trash guys wouldn't take them away, and the city sent me a letter that same day. I have not received the letter yet. I called them on trash collection day because they did not pick up my limbs and the lady I spoke with told me they'd already sent a letter telling me to remedy the situation.

The last time I mowed the grass in my yard I left a big section of uncut grass with a path cut through it so my cat (and the bunnies) can walk around in his yard hidden from the view of the nuisance barker so he wouldn't be guilty of instigating a barking riot (the cat is always the guilty party, not the negligent barking dog owners, even when the cat is in the house). I guess I better mow that grass down or I'll get a citation.

Both the police and animal control have heard my barking neighbor yacking his head off, I mean we're talking some seriously long and loud barking fits, the kind that made me wonder why the dog didn't drop dead from the force and duration of his barking...we're talking way more than just a few woof woofs here...yet my negligent barking dog owner neighbors have not received a citation nor a written warning. Many people would think that habitual, shrill and frequent dog barking at all hours is much more unattractive and harmful to the health of humans than tall grass, long shrub cuttings and other yard waste, but I guess the City of Monroe thinks otherwise.

Isn't there something seriously wrong with priorities when you can severly disrupt your neighbors' lives and endanger their health by allowing your shrill dog to bark like a psycho at all hours, and pollute the environment with so much dog feces that it makes you gag and you can't open your windows or it will smell like dog crap in your house, yet if you let your grass get too tall you'll get a warning, a subsequent citation and fine, and then charged for the cost of the city having it mowed down if you fail to do it?

Isn't it just so bizarre that my neighbors can trap my cat and send him to the shelter if he wanders onto their property, and then I have to pay a fee to get him out...if I even find out he's been arrested in time and he doesn't get killed in the gas chamber first..., yet they can let their dog's loud shrill barking invade all corners of my house and property, for hours, day and night, and get away with it? Why can't I send the dog to the shelter for invading my property with his extremely unpleasant voice and odors?

I'm going to put up a cat proof fence to keep my cat from invading my neighbor's property, but will they then stop their dog's barking from invading mine?

Personally, I'd rather live next door to tall grass than a barking freaking stinky dog.

And to those of you who are going to get their panties in a bunch because I'm desparaging the dog, I know it's not the dog's fault; he's a dog and he barks and shits and doesn't have opposable thumbs with which to pick up his turds. It's the negligent dog owners fault for allowing their dog to be a nuisance. Too bad we can't send the negligent humans to the shelter and find the dog a new home with people who will train him to be a decent citizen & good neighbor, and let him come inside to join the family.

Shock & Horror

I just have to say, that I have never lived in a place like this before. I've never lived next to such horrible neighbors, and I swear I never knew that people let their dogs bark for hours and hours, at all hours, or that they so inhumanely tied their dogs up in their yards and ignored them...until I moved here to Monroe, NC. I've known some wackos, but I swear I've never personally known so many mean and hateful people at one time as I have here, ever, and I never knew the law would allow such things.

But I don't know what the hell I was thinking because I know our own political leaders indulge in things like torture, lies, and murder, and such... so why should my neighbors be humane...

That's all I really have to say today because I feel very ill right now from all this venom, ignorance, inhumanity and barking that I'm surrounded by. I know, you are as shocked by my speechlessness, as I am shocked by what people are allowed to do to their dogs and to their neighbors.

Sometimes I wish I took drugs or drank, because I'd be blasted or passed out right now.

Will I ever have any peace again before I die?