Friday, July 25, 2014

Do you ever look at your family and just SMH?

I know at this point in my life that I should fully acknowledge the fact that there are times my family will still be able to amaze me, usually in their stupidity or unfeeling nature, and leave me to ponder whether I am indeed related to them.  Kind of like the other day when my liberal yet Jewish Uncle was trying to make Obamas stance on the Israeli Hamas conflict have a positive spin.  I am surprised that another family member has managed to land such a lob so quickly.  Man, we're talking twice in one week here folks!  Damn- I got off my antidepressants and anxiety meds why?  When I have to deal with this people on a regular basis.  WTF was I thinking?  OK, maybe someone should pass a bottle of wine.

So what exactly is triggering this response?  My mom came home from my sisters tonight and let me know that Bailey, my sisters puppy, is now wearing a shock collar.  Now the back story on this one if you really need to have back story at all other than its freaking inhumane is that many moons ago when my parents adopted Spot, our Dalmatian, (ok not an original name but she was deaf so the name wasn't used often anyway) she had a band around her neck that was open red raw oozing sores from where she'd been shocked repeated with a shock collar.  Oh yeah, its just a little buzz and won't hurt them.  BULLSHIT!  Now I'll be the first to say that Spot was a very stubborn and not well socialized dog when we got her.  Her bark was also piercing.  I admit all those things were problematic.  Don't you think that her previous owners could have clued into the collar not working before the dogs neck was a mess of sores?  So even if I'd been remotely on the fence about shock collars up until that point in time I was dead set against them after that.

Now my sister and her family adopted a pure bred yellow Lab that was born the day before Valentine's Day.  So for all intents and purposes this dog is still a baby.  My parents and I have been pretty against the way that my sister and brother in law have been handling the whole new puppy in the house routine.  They hired a "dog whisperer" who came in and helped with training.  Then about a month ago Bailey was dispatched to live at the dog whisperers house for a month of intense training.  Seriously??!!!??  Who in the bloody fu$% sends off a 5 month old puppy for intense training?  Yes my sister.  Whatever happened to schlepping your dog to obedience 101 and 201 and have a pretty well behaved dog?  Anyhoo- back to Bailey's story.  Bailey returned from the dog whisperer on Sunday.  Guess what?  Bailey is still a very hyper, active and extremely athletic puppy and my sister and brother in law are about to lose it.  HELLO!!!!  You picked a pure bred lab.  They stay puppies for a damn long time.  Certainly at 5 months old you can't expect otherwise.  Except that my sister does.  The first few days Bailey was back were a clusterfu$% in my sisters mind.  The dog whisperer was scheduled for training yesterday.  He spent some time there.  He was there again today.  Bailey is now wearing a shock collar. 

Um, I'm pretty sure this puppy whisperer sucks at his job.  I'm very sure that once again my sister had her expectations way too high and completely unrealistic.  I'm also very sure if my sister thinks that I'm going to use the shock collar while I'm baby and dog sitting she has another thing coming.  I'm also beginning to think that Bailey might be coming to live with us since she is obviously too much for my sister to deal with.  I'm very sure it pisses me off that my sister picked a certain kind of dog and can't deal with it.

So here we are and I'm shaking my damn head wondering how in the heck I'm related to these people. 

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