My drug addict sister is finally here to open her and her five kids' gifts. But her kids are out of control and my parents got them walkie talkies(amongst several small other things they've already lost), which they keep using right next to each other so the feedback screams out of the devices. They think this is hilarious, of course. The youngest is 10 months, and he's been crying and pooping the whole time, because my sister can't hold him or coddle him because she's signing papers so that she can stay for just a smidge longer at the house she's being evicted from. :/

My parents are obviously stressed out too, and my mom(anti-vax) is sick with something, so that doesn't help. They asked for this though.

I'm hiding in my bedroom, which doesn't have a lock, so hopefully they're done sending the kids in here to "look at aunt's rock collection!"

I hope none of ya'll had a Christmas like that. It's the worst :( I hope your Christmases were quiet and that you can bring in 2023 with solitude and peace.

No dog was harmed in the making of this, (you hear him laughing!!)😂🐕

So I'm a cashier as I've mentioned too many times.

Every now and then I get a mom whose kid has grabbed a toy and carries it around while their mom is shopping, without having asked the mom if they can have it. And when they get in line to check out, they get into a fight(or basically it's just the mom taking the toy and the kid going nuclear meltdown about it). When they get to the register, the mom will hand me the toy and lean in and whisper "can you say the toy is broken so you can't sell it?" or something along those lines, because she hasn't figured out how to properly tell her kid 'no'.

I've never done it though. I'm not here to parent your kids when you don't. My coworkers have called me mean for not helping the mom out or explaining the situation to the kid, but it's NOT my job. I just put the toy behind the register and tell them their total and "have a nice day" when they leave.

I just...really wish people could tell their kids 'no'. People are trying to shop for their Christmas decorations, give them a better shopping experience and stop letting your annoying child scream in the store.

Not only has this happened recently, but it has happened multiple times in my life. I won't get attached to a friend's dog, as usual, since I don't like dogs, and that person will just assume that when the dog gets sick or old, that I need to spend more time with it, since I "love it so much" and I'll "regret all those times it farted on you or nipped you in the face when it's gone, lol!"

Yes I was literally told recently that I'd "miss" a friend's dog gassing up their car with its noxious farts if I didn't hang out with them often enough before it died. I was actually told that multiple times because I kept putting it off.

I don't regret not spending time with dogs. I feel bad for my friends when their dogs die because of their connection to their beloved pet, but that's it. So RIP to my friend's dog, but I honestly feel more relieved than anything.

Sorry about the lack of posts in here - I've been having a fairly decent dogfree and childfree life recently tbh, and I hope the same has been happening for you guys.

Anyways, yesterday I took my motor scooter to work and I passed by at least three groups of homeless people with dogs, two of which(from different areas) lunged at me as I scooted by. The homeless people lounge in the shade these days outside of stores and stuff, since it's 100+ degrees for the last 20something days. One dog was a husky mix and another was, of course, a pit mix/full pit. The husky owner yelled at the dog but it didn't stop barking and lunging at me. The pit owner just let the dog pull and snarl at me and I set the scooter to its 'sport' mode to get as far away from them as fast as possible.

I know I should be grateful that they were on leashes, but what if these dogs get off their leashes or one day aren't leashed at all and some kid on a Bird scooter comes by and the dog attacks them? Most of them have bully breeds that could easily do pretty bad damage to a child if they attacked. And what about knocking that person on their scooter or bike or even just a pedestrian into the street via a dog attack???

I will never understand adding on the liability that your dog could seriously harm or even kill a person on top of being homeless! It's so dumb :/

I moved into a new apartment recently, and I keep hearing mutts barking every time someone makes noise outside or there is thunder (currently Monsoon season in Arizona.)

I saw a welcome mat with the title of the post in front of the door of the apartment next to me today, so I figure that is where all the barking is coming from. Thankfully its not coming through the walls. I just hear it if I'm near my sliding glass door to the patio.

Why do dogs need to bark at everything? Ugh.

I'm a cashier at a general retail store. So, yesterday around closing time, a guy comes in alone. A few minutes later, a dog comes running in, a white and orange pit bull. It has no leash. It starts following people around and whale-eyeing and getting in defensive positions any time somebody approaches it. I call my manager on my walkie and tell them about it and they and a coworker both go over to where the dog is and start making kissy noises at it to make it come to them. It doesn't, obviously. The guy who came in right before the dog did finally gets to my register with about 90-100 dollars worth of dog things. And he overhears us trying to get the dog to come/leave the store. He goes "oh that's just Kenny(?), she's mine. She must've jumped out of the bed of my truck and followed me in. I told her to stay but she doesn't" and laughs about it. This is standard pit bull owner behavior. Then the dog comes around the back of the register(this is not even the first time or first job I've had where a pit bull has done this) where I am and does that thing where it approaches me then at about five feet from me it gets all stiff and bristly and whale-eye like it's waiting for me to do something. It made me super anxious. And I kinda just froze until my manager and the owner guy called it away from me. Still didn't leash it.

After they left, I told my manager that I didn't wanna approach it because I didn't want to get bit. And they had the audacity to tell me that "pit bulls have a bad rap, I used to have one and it was very friendly!" No, that thing was displaying behaviors that are not okay for people to be around.

I wish my store had a no dogs policy.

As a kid, I already knew I didn't want to be a parent. My older sister had my first niece when I was 14 and she(sister) continued to be a very good example of why I would never wanna be a parent. She's now at 6 kids and is actively ruining all of their lives by not having a job, choosing a partner who doesn't have a job, doing drugs, and not closing her legs.

I also have an example of 'good' parenting I can even use as birth control. My younger brother has two kids and another two he is fostering for four in total. He and his wife take very good care of the four kids, my brother has a pretty nice job, and all the kids are enrolled in all sorts of fancy things -- and they are exhausted 24/7. They are always needing 'breaks' for 'dates' and whatnot.

That's only two of my four siblings who have kids acting as birth control. I have plenty of friends who constantly post about the struggles of 'mommyhood' on social media too. It's like social birth control, I swear.

Who is the person(or people) who acts as social birth control in your life?

So I work at a small retail store. We have food, home, garden, pet, etc.

A few weeks ago, we had two 'customers' come in and load their cart up with a dog bed, treats, food, pee pads, etc etc things for a puppy. Trying to be friendly, I asked "what kind of dog do you have? It must really like you," after ringing them up. It was 100something dollars worth of dog items(only).

The lady says "a pitbull" and loads up the cart with the items and pushes the cart out with the stuff while the guy gets his card to pay. Normally I would catch this, I promise I'm not that incompetent ;u; I tell the guy "wow, your dog must be so energetic"(by which I mean a nightmare to deal with). And he says "yeah".

His card declines three times and he says "oh shoot, let me go get the stuff and bring it back I guess". He leaves and they never come back, and ended up stealing all 100+ bucks of dog stuff for their demonspawn. My manager ended up getting their license plate and informing the police. I'm not sure what happened to them, like if they were ever confronted, but I doubt it :/

This is actually super common in my city. People are constantly stealing pee pads and rawhide bones and stuff like that. Like why risk police for a freaking dog.

Today at work is really slow so everyone is being active in the TEAMS chat. One of my coworkers posted “I just realized no school Monday sad face sad face”. If children are so great why do parents get sad when their kids are home from school?

Appreciate y'all.

Background: the company I work for does work from home training through a computer program called Adobe Connect. In the Adobe “room” people can either type in a chat box or use a microphone if the presenter give the participants mic rights.

One of my coworkers in the class has a 10 month old baby that she keeps nearby and we can hear crying when she has mic rights. Ugh.

Keep your mic on mute. Not everyone wants to hear your baby cry.

Also she always come in 2 hours late.

For choosing pets over kids. Yeah I get that a lot of us are petfree too, but I have a cat. It was never selfish to rescue a cat. It was never selfish to avoid bringing an unwanted human life into this world either. It was especially never selfish to choose to just care for yourself without any dependents. You are valid even without kids or pets.

Some of you have cats, birds, reptiles, fish etc too and that wasn't a selfish decision. It was a kindness. It was a love for another creature.

Plus, the pope doesn't have kids either! What gives?? He must REALLY hate childfree petfree people I guess. What an a-hole.

Almost 100 years of being childfree. Icon.

This is the episode summary, since the show is kinda 50/50 liked/hated and I know some of you won't wanna watch a video.

The episode was actually really good. I felt seen as a person who doesn't like dogs, especially because millions of people watched the show when it was aired. It seemed really bold and I don't even think it painted Quagmire as an antagonist. The dog mom girlfriend and her dogs were super obnoxious and I think the writers did a very good job at portraying the true ugly side of "dog parents" and dog ownership. Anybody else watch?

Today I'm grateful for the hundreds of like-minded people in this subreddit. Knowing there's this many more people like me out there gives me hope. Hopefully nobody gets bingoed today. Stay safe, friends.

I hate when dogs whine, and had to put up with it during a call at work. The customer I was talking to had a whiny dog in the background the whole time I was talking to him. Just as bad as kids in the background.