Why I am officially not a "dog person"

I've never really been a fan of dogs. Ever since I was young (and tiny), there was always something about dogs (especially the jumpy ones) that made me uneasy. Seriously. As a kid, just the sight of a large-ish sized dog would send sheer terror through my body. And when you're terrified, what do you naturally do? You run away from said source of terror. Unfortunately, dogs don't get the whole terrified-I'm-scared-of-you-leave-me-alone vibe...so they chase after you thinking it's a fun game when, in reality, I feel like I'm being chased by a pack of rabid wolves. Dog lovers...I mean no disrespect.

...so, the (IL's) dogs woke me up with five minutes of uncontrollable barking this morning over NOTHING...seriously...nothing. I think there were two leaves blowing around in the driveway so it was decided that Teri needed to know about it, just in case they were harboring some deadly spores that were going to break the door in and kill me...thanks. Or maybe it was just that they wanted me to know they were mad at me because I was still sleeping at (gasp!) 7:30 in the morning, so they chewed up tampons (clean, thank goodness) and shredded them all over the hallway. And this, my friends, is why we don't have dogs of our own.

So, after TRYING to go back to sleep and finding no success, I got up and made myself some tea. I watched a little TV & talked to Mom, then I worked out (3x this week - go me!), & had some lunch. Then, I had the *bright* idea of taking the crazy dogs for a walk down to the end of the driveway to get the mail. I figured with two leashes, we should be in the clear...let me explain why this was a bad idea and why I need to start thinking things through a little more:
1. Taylor weighs about 100-some pounds and is as strong as an ox (cross between a Golden & a Poodle)
2. Both dogs are obsessed with chasing groundhogs which are, coincidentally, always hanging out somewhere in the vicinity of the driveway...keep in mind that I'm only 100 pounds, so picture me fighting with these leashes every time we heard the slightest movement in the bushes, which incidentally, was about every 2.97 seconds.
3. Obviously my short-term memory is not the best...if it were, I would have remembered that G's parents get unusually large amounts of mail. Besides the standard bills and junk envelopes, they average about 7 catalogs per day. Add onto that two magazines, two weekly newspapers (ours is being delivered here now, as well), plus the daily newspaper and two boxes of freebies that I received and you've got some pretty full arms...and let's not forget those two dog leashes I'm holding onto!

Note to self: no more hair-brained dog-walking schemes for me!

And this, my friends, is why we own a cat.