I was thinking the other day about the dogs and the shared custody agreement we have with my mom. Basically, the dogs get shuttled back and forth between our house in Minneapolis, and my mom's house in Saint Paul. Every three or four days, she'll come pick them up if she's in the neighborhood, or we'll drop them off on our way to an event on the othe side of the river.This arrangement works wonders for us, since it gives us some flexibility in our schedules. If we've got a softball game after work and can't make it home until later in the evening, usually my mom can help us out with the dogs, so they aren't home alone too long. She'll bring them over to her house, and they'll sleep over there for a couple of days, until the next time we're in her neighborhood and can pick them up.
We never last too long without the dogs, and they usually stay with grandma for two days max., if we can help it. By that time we're missing them so much that we need an immediate puppy love transfusion. The dogs seem to enjoy these weekly visits to grandma's house, where they get walked 6 or 7 times a day and get fed lots of treats. When they come back to us they're always dog tired, and happy for the four or five days they get off from their workout.
I asked Dan on Saturday if he thought it would be possible to create some sort of Puppy Pool adoption center, where families adopt dogs and sign a dual custody aggreement. Would more people be willing to adopt a puppy if they could share him? I know so many people who won't adopt a dog only because they wouldn't know what to do him if they had to go out of town or on vacation. Bording kennels and petsitters can be expensive, and so are dog walkers, veterinarians, and groomers. If two families could share these expenses, schedule their vacations around one another, and shuttle their pets back and forth, would it work?
I love this poster from Linnea Designs. With gas prices as high as they are, and getting higher, Dan and I are biking and busing a lot more than we ever have. It would be wonderful if we could take our dogs on the bus or lightrail when we're shuttling the dogs around town.
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Hi, I just came across your post while wandering around on Curbly. Something like that was actually in the works with a company that wanted to come to Boston recently -- called Flex Petz. However, there was a major uproar from the local government and citizens who thought that the service was unfair to the dogs and could cause psychological trauma due to the shuttling between several different people. Obviously, it's different in your situation, where it's just between two locations and is consistent, but a lot of people had a problem with the idea on a larger scale. Looks like they have it in London, New York, and L.A., though.
http://www.flexpetz.com/location.html
Just thought you might be interested.
thanks for your comment!
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