How to deal with crazy.

Gabby is a crazy dog. Not in the Marley and Me sense - I would consider that simply goofy. She's crazy in the skate boarder "I just want to move as much as possible, make as much noise as possible and have no regard for my own safety in any situation" type of way.

The first thing I noticed was that Gabby loves to bark, particularly in any situation she finds exciting. The problem is that she finds most situations exciting. Again, it comes with her general love of life.

When I first got her, it didn't matter where we went, she barked. She barked at the dog park, she barked at obedience class, she barked at flyball, but she had a particular love of barking at the petstore. I'm well aware that hearing a few barks in a petstore is not uncommon. But Gabby has the high pitched bark of a dog half her size and used it twice as much at the petstore.

One day I was at Petco attempting rather pathetically to use a clicker to teach her to shut up. At that point my clicker skills and understanding were rather dismal and as expected, the results were matching my skill. I'd had a few people give me looks, and I was beginning to panic. Gabby picked up on this and began to bark worse. She's yet to understand that panic and excitement are not the same things. I tried to make a dash for the door, but to exit the place requires following a maze of cash registers and cat furniture that would make the smartest lab rat weep. And to make the situation worse there's always a dog waiting in the line of cash registers with it's owner. I decided to wait out the dog and hope that it would exit quickly so I could follow.

Didn't happen.

As I stood there attempting to hold my dog's mouth shut so the barking wouldn't be ear-piercing, an employee very politely suggested that maybe the store was too over-stimulating for my dog. Thank you Captan Obvious. How 'bout you remove some of the barriers to exiting your establishment so that I don't have to hurdle a dog or perform feline-esque mauneuvers to get through your cat furniture?

Oh how I wish I'd had the strength and stability of mind to say that to the employee, but the disappointment that my dog had just been thrown out of a petstore overwhelmed me. I picked up my 27 lb, over-excited, yappy dog and pushed my way through cat furniture while her back legs found a brace on my hip and proceeded to claw my pants down. I actually felt rather vindicated mooning Petco.

Let's just say that I now prefer Petsmart. Not because we haven't be kicked out of there, (yes, my dog has been kicked out of 2 petstores for barking) but because they have a rather clear exit. You still may face another dog at the door, but because they are walking into the building, they tend to keep walking straight ahead and knowing where the distraction is headed, makes them easier to avoid.