The Dog Days of Winter.

So across the back alley from our house, right across from where we have to park our car, there is a yard. And in that yard there is a German Shepherd. He is a four-foot-tall dog behind a four-foot-tall fence. He is always outside, always barking his fool head off.  Last summer and this fall, it was just annoying.

But now it's winter, and our neighbor has shoveled his driveway over and over and created a mound of snow that's as tall as the fence on either side. So the dog has a gently-sloping ramp over the fence. He can get out, and he's gotten out multiple times. When he does, he roams the neighborhood snarling and barking at anyone who gets within twenty feet of him. I don't know if he would attack me if I came closer because I'm not about to try.

Today, I got home from the grocery store with Ollie in the car. When I pulled up, the dog went into a barking frenzy, standing with his back paws level with the top of the fence on his side, and his front paws over the fence. So I grabbed Ollie out of the car and booked it into the house and called Animal Control. I guess you could argue that he didn't attack right then so he's not going to, but I don't buy it.

My conversation with Animal Control was yet another one of those Twilight Zone circular conversations.  By the end of it, I learned that as long as the animal is currently behind a fence, the animal's lawfully contained.  It doesn't matter that he's gotten out before under the same circumstances.  It doesn't matter that all he had to do was move his back paws slightly to be out this time. It doesn't matter that there's a four-foot-wide section where there's a gently-sloping snow pack that covers the fence entirely.  If the animal's currently inside the fence, and somewhere inside your enormous freakin' SNOW RAMP there's a fence, we're golden.

So I asked if they were just going to wait until the dog attacked someone to do something about it, and she pretty much said "yes."  I asked if they would at least tell the owners to clear the snow away from the fence, and she said "no."  As long as there's a fence, it doesn't matter that the dog can, will, and does climb over it on the handy snow mound provided for him.

It's a shame, because I don't blame the dog. I know it's his owners who leave him outside day and night, and I know it's in his nature to be territorial.  But I don't like being scared for the safety of me and my family every time I park my car, and I don't think it's unreasonable for me to be scared of a big dog baring his teeth at my kid.

I almost wish the dog would just go ahead and bite me, so he could be taken away, and I could sue the city for negligence.  But  I definitely wish they would just remove the dog and put him up for adoption to a good home with a taller fence, so he can be someone's beloved pet instead of a half-feral, neglected animal.