Wednesday, September 30, 2009

Don't blow in a dog's face

A girl was bitten by a dog after she continually blew in the dog's face.

The dog owner acted incredibly stupid, and I mean that in the nicest way possible.

Children do dumb things. This is because they are secretly suicidal, lack appropriate inhibition or are learning things, in this case, the hard way. Children eat crayons and paste which is evidence enough to suggest you not let them near your dog's face. Or ears. Or eyes.

One of my dogs' recent experiences with a child involved a toddler swinging a large hammer. I was about to tackle the kid before he got any closer, but then he dropped the hammer on his foot. And boy did he cry! Lesson learned - parents, do not give your 2-yr-old full-size, metal hammers. He turned out to be very dog-appropriate, letting both my dogs sniff his hand before he ever so gently touched them. He's really a good egg, so I try not to hold the hammer incident against him.

Point being, kids do stupid things to themselves and others. So even though the owner of this - according to shelter staff - normally friendly dog told the kid to stop blowing in the dog's face, nothing was done. The owner did not pull the dog back or kick the kid (I mean, gently shove the child onto the grass). S/he didn't tell the kid to bugger off or get in between her and the dog. Instead, s/he just kept telling the kid to stop acting like a douche. This is ineffective against children who think douche is just a funny way of saying "keep doing whatever it is you are doing".

Hopefully the dog won't pay the ultimate price for the stupidity of her owner. And hopefully the kid won't have horrible scars and will learn the polite way to greet a dog, nay any animal (peoples too!), is not to exhale directly into their face. It's just rude.

1 comment:

Kari in Alaska said...

There are days when I think people should be required to take a pet ownership class before being allowed to have a dog