It was a while ago, an earlier chapter in our lives and we had two adorable Schnauzers named Bartles and Jaymes.

We had a great backyard with access to the garage for Bart and Jim to explore each day while we were at work.

Even as well-behaved as our two guys were, still they did occasionally bark.
They did barkin’ when someone came to the door or rang the bell. Sometimes they barked at the mailman who delivered our mail.
And for sure they barked at all dogs who passed in front of their house.
They sat on the back of the sofa, looked out the windows and let it be known to all passer-bys that they were trespassing.

But, they were mostly quiet dogs…..we thought.

I checked with the neighbors on each side of us and behind us making sure our dogs weren’t a bother during the day when we weren’t home.
All three said no problem, they never heard them.
OK I had to take that they were telling me the truth, right?
I wasn’t there so I didn’t know.

So I didn’t think about it until one evening when the doorbell rang.
The dogs ran barking toward the door and when I opened it, an Animal Control Officer smiled, introduced herself and gave a verbal dog-barking-nuisance-warning to me; she was talking aboout MY dogs the ones that rarely bark…..them.
In their defense I told her I checked with my neighbors and they said my dogs didn’t bark so, maybe it was someone elses dog?
There were plenty in the neighborhood.
She politely smiled and just wanted to make sure we knew we needed to keep our dogs quiet.
But…..they were!

Again I approached my neighbors and they assured me the dogs were no problem and they never heard them barking.

Pacific Grove is a small town, it took us a year to be accepted as locals and I didn’t want anything to screw that up so…..
I baked a batch of my world famous browines and took them to the Police Station for the Animal Control Officer.

Just about 2 weeks later, the Animal Control Lady was at our door again.
This time she issued us a Written Warning.
I told her I was puzzled because I had again spoken with my neighbors and they denied any dog noise from our house.
She told me the complaint wasn’t from our neighbors but from someone a block over.
A block over?
How the hell could someone identify MY dogs barks from a block over?
I seriously wanted to know the answer to that.
There were dogs all over up and down the block.
Each neighbor had a dog, how did the guy the block over know it wasn’t one of them?
Animal Control Officer suggested we maybe keep them in the garage all day; said she could do nothing if the dogs barked in their garage.
Crap, I didn’t want to lock my dogs up in the garage all day, so…..
I baked another pan of brownies and delivered them.

Two weeks later, yep…..her again.
This time she handed me a ticket, a $250 fine for my dogs disturbing the peace.
She apologized, said she was just doing her job, thanked me for the brownies but asked me not to bake her any more.
She also told me I could fight the ticket in court.

Twenty Five Dollars, even fifty and maybe I would have let it go, but $250.00?
Nope, I was goin’ to court!

Our court date was three weeks later.
I had to take the day off. ($)
Court was in Salinas and I didn’t know how to get there so Lobo (my husband) had to take the day off to drive me. ( more $$)

When we got to Salinas we followed the signs and ended up in a pretty long line.
We stood in line for an hour when a woman came out and announced that for the rest of the day, they would only be taking cases that involved domestic abuse problems.
She gave us a reschedule date.

Two more days off from work and more loss $!!
I could probably have driven it alone the second time but I think Lobo was afraid I was gonna get into some sort of trouble and end up with another disturbing-the-peace fine.

Back to Salinas and another long line but we made it up to the clerk’s desk this time.
She took our ticket and found her record and then asked for copies of their Dog Licenses.
Copies?
We didn’t even have originals.
We never got them licensed because we could never figure out a license for WHAT?
Being alive?
WHAT does a dog license do?
And it had to be renewed EVERY YEAR?
Nope, we never got them.

OK she said, we couldn’t go another step further without getting them both licensed.
$30 for neutered dogs
$65 for un-neutered.
Guess what?
Yep, they were still intact and dangling.
They were young and we’d been asked to use them as mating dogs and we weren’t sure so until we decided, we left them untouched.

I wanted to know WHY an un-neutered dog was more for a license.
The clerk explained it was about keeping the dog population down.
I explained that my dogs were not gonna ever populate because they were gay.
She looked up at me with big eyeballs.
How did I know that she questioned.
Well, I told her because I was their mom and I’d seen them “intimate” in the back yard with each other…..often.
I assured her they weren’t interested in females.

The clerk was quiet, she stared off for a moment and then told me if I could obtain written proof from our Vet stating that my dogs were gay, she’d charge me $30 instead of $65.
(What a smart way to avoid conflict!!!)

At that very moment, my very patient, always-on-my-side husband looked at me with pleading eyes.
He took my arm and led me to the side of the clerk’s window.
“Please let me pay for it all, right now. This isn’t a good battle to choose.”

I knew he was right.
I gave up.

In the end, that $250 dog-barking ticket cost each of us 2 missed days of work, 2 dog licenses……$65 each and the original $250.

But it’s another one of those times when we think back to “remember when” and laugh.
Another one of our crazy times that remind us, why be normal?

I never did add it all up and even today all these years later, I still don’t want to know.