From the Styx by Peggy Tibbetts

This is Part 11 in the Crazy Bitch series about our Akbash/Lab mix Venus. She has Canine Compulsive Disorder (CCD) with aggression. Links to the previous episodes can be found at the end of this post.

Please note that the incidents described here are part of an ongoing investigation therefore some names have been changed and/or omitted.

Dog Fight

By the end of February last year the signs of stress were obvious. Zeus had a ratty coat. He was lethargic and grumpy. We didn’t know he had hypothyroidism. We now believe his hypothyroidism was caused by stress. Venus was also shedding like crazy. She was anxious and territorial. We took them cross country skiing with us at least once a week and walked them more, hoping that would help ease their stress. 

Tod and I are pretty good at stress management. We don’t take things too seriously. Maybe not seriously enough sometimes. But we have the advantage of rational thought. Dogs don’t. Dogs react to energy. As much as we had shielded them from the Bullys’ hostility, it was always there. We thought if we didn’t get stressed out, they wouldn’t get stressed out. But we weren’t the problem.

Even though we couldn’t prove it, we were certain the Bullys were provoking the dogs to bark when we weren’t home. We knew police officers had provoked them at least 4 times. Since it only happened occasionally we thought the dogs would just forget about it. Now that we have a better understanding of dog psychology from watching the Dog Whisperer we know it affected them more than we realized.

Before the March 11 mediation session we paid visits to three of our closest neighbors, the Magpies, the Doves, and Mr. Finch. We explained our situation with the Bullys and talked to them about our dogs. There were sympathetic and supportive.

“Venus is a good watch dog,” the Doves said. “She barks for a reason, then she quiets down.”

“She barks,” Mr. Finch said. “But I think my dog barks more than she does.”

“She’s a good dog,” the Magpies said. “We don’t really hear her barking that much.”

Everyone had noticed the dogs weren’t out as much and wondered if that was really good for them. They signed brief depositions and said the police could contact them.

The mediation session with the Chief and the Bullys was a total disaster.

Mr. and Mrs. Bully made it clear they did not want to be there. “Why do you hate us?” they asked.

“We don’t hate you,” Tod said. “Why are you harassing us?”

“Your dog barking constantly is harassing us,” Mrs. B said. Then she gave a big long speech about how Venus’s barking had ruined their lives.

“Is this about just the one dog?” Chief asked. “Or both dogs?”

“Just Venus,” Mr. B said. “We don’t have a problem with Zeus.”

I held up the complaint form from November. “This says both dogs.”

“I said Venus,” Mr. B snapped. “If you’re just going to sit here and argue with us, we’re leaving.”

“Okay so we’ve established that Venus is the problem. Let’s move on,” Chief said.

“I’ve logged all the incidents right here.” Mr. B handed a spiral notebook to Chief.

He looked through it. “None of these constitutes excessive barking.” He placed a copy of the barking dog ordinance on the table.

Mr. B pushed it away. “So you’re holding them to the letter of the law and not the spirit of the law.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” I asked.

Mrs. B accused me of being snide and sarcastic and threatened to leave.

Mr. B said that because Tod is a Board Member he should be held to a higher standard.

Tod jumped in. “I have been held to a higher standard. You said nothing has been done about Venus’s barking. But that’s not true.” He described all the efforts we had made to appease them.

“We keep them inside so much they don’t even have winter coats,” I added.

“That’s your problem,” said Mr. B.

I displayed the depositions from three neighbors. “I have brief statements from three close neighbors. They all said Venus does not bark excessively and they don’t have any problems with our dogs.” I said to Chief, “They also said you could contact them to discuss our dogs.”

Bully checked to see who the neighbors were then shoved the papers back at me. “These don’t mean anything because we do have a problem.”

“The problem is, no matter what we’ve done it’s never enough,” Tod said. “So that now you’re harassing us with hang-up calls.”

“I had every right to make those calls,” Mr. B said. “You were letting her bark on purpose.”

“That’s not true,” I said.

“According to state statute, placing hang-up calls does constitute harassment.” Chief placed a copy of the statute in front of Mr. B.

18-9-111. Harassment – stalking.
  (1) A person commits harassment if, with intent to harass, annoy, or alarm another person, he or she:
  (f) Makes a telephone call or causes a telephone to ring repeatedly, whether or not a conversation ensues, with no purpose of legitimate conversation;

He pushed it away. “They weren’t hang-up calls. They just didn’t answer the phone. I could see through the window. They weren’t anywhere near the phone.”

My eyes almost popped out of my head. “How could you see inside a second story window from across the street?” I asked.

Mr. B glared at me.

“Let’s get back to why we’re here tonight,” Chief said. “We need to find a way to resolve this.”

“Let me explain something,” I said. “I’m hearing impaired. I don’t let Venus bark. Sometimes I can’t hear her barking.”

“What do you mean you’re hearing impaired?” Mr. B demanded.

“I’m deaf in my left ear. If the TV is on or I’m in the shower I can’t hear,” I said.

“Huh!” Mr. B snorted. “A likely excuse. Why are we just finding out about this now?”

“The point is, Mrs. Tibbetts can’t always hear the dog barking,” Chief said.

“Other dogs in the neighborhood bark,” Tod said. “Not just Venus. In fact I’ve reacted to another dog barking, thinking it was Venus, only to find her in the house.”

Mr. B glared at him. “We’re not talking about other dogs. We’re talking about your dog.”

“We’ve already established that,” said Chief.

Tod brought up the boot tracks in the snow outside the fence on the Sunday Bully complained to Officer Whittle.

“Her barking was driving us crazy so I went over to see if I could get her to shut up,” Mr. B said to Chief.

“That’s not the best way to deal with a barking dog. It only makes the situation worse,” Chief said. “Besides, you need to keep off the Tibbetts’ property when they’re not home.”

“The police have also provoked our dogs to bark,” Tod said.

“I’m aware of those incidents and I’ll put a stop to that,” Chief said. “We have other ways of determining whether your dogs are barking. Let’s get back to finding a way to resolve this. I’m open for suggestions.”

“It’s very simple,” Mr. B said. “We don’t want Venus to bark at all.”

“Well that’s not possible,” Chief said. “She’s a dog and dogs bark.”

Mrs. B pulled out a sheet of paper. “In that case we’ve made a schedule. Their dogs can’t be outside from 8:00 pm to 6:45 am.”

I laughed. “You can’t be serious. And what part of your lives do we get to control?”

Mrs. B nearly jumped across the table at me. “You already control our lives by letting your dog bark constantly.”

A shouting match erupted.

“Everybody calm down,” Chief said. “You can’t expect the Tibbetts to keep the dogs inside for that long. They have to relieve themselves.”

“Then they will have to have to be outside with them and keep them quiet,” Mrs. B said.

Chief looked at Tod and me. “Are you willing to do that?”

“Do we have any choice?” Tod asked.

Mrs. B sniped at him.

From then on it was a train wreck.

“Okay in return for us following your schedule we can leave the dogs out when we’re gone one night a week and on Sundays,” Tod said. “And we’ll put the bark collar on Venus.”

“As long as you’re home by 8:00 and the dogs don’t bark,” Mrs. B said.

“Unbelievable,” I muttered.

Mr. B glared at me. “And you have to get a citronella bark collar because the shock collar doesn’t work.

The session lasted an hour. It seemed like forever. I covered just about everything Tod and I were allowed to say. Bullys did most of the talking and interrupted us when we spoke. The recurring theme was that they were very unhappy and it was all Venus’s, and thus our fault. They clamped down on their accusation that we were letting Venus bark, even encouraging her to bark as a means of harassing them, and they chewed it to death.

Finally they insisted we hire a dog trainer to train Venus not to bark.

“I’ve trained quite a few dogs myself,” Chief said. “You can’t train a dog not to bark.”

“You can train a dog to do anything,” Mr. B said.

Because we apparently hadn’t endured enough abuse, Chief said we had to meet again in 3 weeks to check on our progress. He said to Bullys, “If you have any complaints, do not call the Tibbetts. You have my cell number so call me instead.”

On the way home Tod said, “That was some mediation session. They attacked us and imposed a curfew on our dogs. And Bully’s own logs proved Venus was never barking excessively. Pretty outrageous.”

I ungritted my teeth. “Well let’s look at the positive side. They were so breathtakingly unreasonable and they had no evidence of Venus barking excessively the Chief must have seen through it.”

“He did acknowledge that the police have provoked the dogs and said he’d deal with it,” Tod said.

“I think we cleared the air about one thing,” I added. “This isn’t about Venus barking, this is all about us.”

“Right. And we got slapped with a curfew,” Tod said.

Staying positive wasn’t all that easy so we made fun of them the rest of the evening until we laughed ourselves and the dogs silly.

The next day I ordered privacy shades to replace the blinds on our windows. Mr. B had admitted to looking in our windows. He must’ve used binoculars. We were totally creeped out.

We should have pressed charges.

Stay tuned for Part 12

Part 1

Part 2

Part 3

Part 4

Part 5

Part 6

Part 7

Part 8

Part 9

Part 10

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