What's the deal with dogs in stores?
Meet DJ. Cute little guy, right? He was our family dog for almost sixteen years. Fairly well behaved other than getting in the garbage and getting a popcorn bag stuck on his head.
He didn't bark much. He usually waited until he went outside to do his business. He didn't bite anyone. We even put him in a carrier for three days when we moved from California to Chicago and he only whimpered and pouted a little. Really, he was as well behaved as you would hope your children would be.
And with all that going for him, I never, ever thought to take him to a grocery store or a restaurant. EVER!!!
Is this a new thing? Did someone not tell me that this was now okay? Am I that oblivious about what's going on?
Last weekend I walked into Walgreens and there were two dogs at the checkout counter. TWO! My first thought was do you really need to bring your pet along when you're buying whiskey and cigarettes? If you really do, can't you tie up up his leash to the pole right outside the store?
Okay, so maybe you're scared someone might steal your dog and don't want to leave him outside alone for even five minutes. I do have a solution. LEAVE HIM THE FUCK AT HOME!
But dogs at Walgreens is nothing compared to the other places I've seen them at recently.
I've seen dogs inside my local Whole Foods and Mariano's grocery stores. A few days ago I saw a woman open up boxes of blueberries, touch them and then put them back. As bad as that seems, it doesn't compare to a dog sniffing the lettuce.
People....your dog doesn't belong in the produce section!
I can almost deal with all of that...almost. Then I walked into a local Chinese restaurant to pick up some fried rice. I look around and there's a small dog sitting on the lap of a customer. That's so far over the line that you can't even see the line. Maybe the owner thought the dog could be an ingredient. At least it wasn't eating the food. At least it wasn't part of the food.
I haven't been back to that restaurant since then. No one wants their fried rice doggie style.
After reading this you may not believe this but I really do love dogs. A few years ago, I got involved with some a retail dog puppy mill and here's that story.
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