Editor’s Note: Here at Ruthless, we love our pets, especially our dogs. Of course, some are traitors, but for the most part, they are loyal and mostly trouble-free, unlike cats. Sometimes, however, intervention is required, especially when neighbors complain about barking. Here is how to not handle the situation.
So my neighbors have been complaining that my dog has been barking non-stop. Yes, my sweet baby boy. I hate the electric zapping bark collars, so I went to Walmart and purchased a humane citronella collar. When a dog barks, it shoots a blast of citronella under their nose and apparently, they don’t like it.
This morning I was getting the collar ready and filled it with the citronella liquid. And that’s where my morning should have ended. But no, it’s me, and I begin to become curious as to “how” the collars actually work. So, I’m standing by my back door “barking” at my dog’s collar.
Nothing happens.
I make sure it’s turned on, check the fill level, and go through the “getting started” check list one more time. Again, I bark. Nothing happens.Now I’m not quite sure why I had this next thought, but I did…I put the collar on. I seriously extended the band and fit the growl box against my throat and barked.
Apparently, the collar only works if it feels vibrations, because I immediately received a blast of citronella to the face. I began coughing, which only caused the collar to continue squirting bug spray over and over into my nasal cavity. I’m now on my hands and knees in my back yard, trying to breathe, and to make matters worse, the damn dog is barking. So, between coughing and yelling at him to shut up, I’ve emptied over a dozen blasts of citronella to my face.
During all of this ruckus, I’m trying to undo the clasp of the collar, which has somehow managed to weld shut during this whole fiasco. I finally got the collar off and threw, yes, I threw that inhumane thing across the yard, and lay in the grass sucking in the cool morning air. It will never be on my dog. In the middle of thinking this is probably the dumbest thing I’ve done in a while, I hear laughter. MY NEIGHBOR SAW THE WHOLE THING!
He was laughing so hard he couldn’t breathe. Between gasps, he tells me, “I was gonna come help, but every time I started to climb over the fence, you’d set it off again and then I would start laughing and couldn’t make it.”
So now, not only are my eyes red, but my face and ears are too. After checking to make sure I was ok, we parted ways and I went in to shower so I wouldn’t smell like ode de’ Tiki Torch.
Dog on way to Obedience School
Lesson learned: next time (yes, there will always be a next time with me) make sure that:
1. Don’t fill the collar before trying to set it off.
2. Remember your neighbor is not a good source of help in a comedy crisis situation.
On the plus side, I won’t have a mosquito problem for a few days! If you like my story click on my name and follow me for more brilliant ideas.
Wenda Wendy. Follow me on Facebook here
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