If you’re a dog owner, and it’s 2:30 in the morning, and you simply have to let your dog out, let me give you some advice:

Open the door to let them out. Stand at the door while they’re taking care of their business, and let them back in immediately after they’re finished.

For some reason, many of the dog owners who live near my house let their dog out and then forget for up to an hour that they own a dog.

It’s like they have an arrangement with the dog: “I’m not letting you in unless you really mean it. If you can bark for at least 20 minutes, that’ll show me you’re really interested in coming inside.”

For example, my neighbor who lives behind me lets their dogs out, while they’re home, and then lets them bark at the back door for up to 30 minutes before letting them back in. I can see them from my porch, and sometimes I just watch as the dogs stand at the door barking.

My annoyance with this behavior makes many think I hate dogs. But it’s really lack of consideration that does me head in (to borrow some British phrasing). If you cared about the happiness of your neighbors, and you know you haven’t trained your dogs to not bark, you would stand at the door to let them back in, leave the door open, or at least be listening for the barking to let them in right away.

But it’s not just my neighbors behind me. There are at least four other dog owners in my neighborhood who also like to do this. However, they prefer to do it between the hours of 1am and 5am in the morning.

When I go running at 5am in the morning, I frequently pass a house who’s dogs are out and barking at me as I go by. Sometimes, I stand there letting them bark at me wondering if the owners will let the dogs in. But they just sit and watch TV as their dogs wake the neighborhood.

You have to either be really tone deaf or simply oblivious to the happiness of your neighbors to let your dog bark that early in the morning. But there we are.

And that’s why I’ve gifted the world with Friesch’s torment to describe the situation.

(I’m working on a name for why none of their immediate neighbors wake up, ring their doorbell or call the police when this happens.)