Old dogs.

There’s just a lot that’s gross about old dogs. I’m not talking about the aging golden retriever that still has most of its fur that just doesn’t chase after tennis balls the way he used to. I mean truly old dogs, with milky-blind eyes, terrible hearing, barely any fur, absolutely disgusting skin, and the tendency to void their bowels whenever and wherever they like. There’s nothing cute or pettable about an old dog. Their owners tend to love on them in an almost obsessive way–in my experience, even the tightest, most conservative pet owners turn into babbling mush the second the dog enters their line of sight or if one happens to (accidentally, surely) mention the dog in conversation. It’s like nuzzling on your grandma. It’s just not something you want to see, you know?

I happen to interact with such a dog almost every day. It’s hard to say what grosses me out the most about him. First and foremost, he stinks. The fact that I have almost stopped noticing the smell is an indicator of how long I’ve been around it. Second and grosser because tactile gross is way worse than olfactory gross, when you pet him, it feels like you’re stroking an untreated skin cancer patient’s arm. It’s all knobbly and icky and there’s barely any fur to cover up what I can only imagine are liver spots and…grossness. I can’t really contemplate this for much longer, it’s beginning to affect me.

Oh, and the voiding the bowels thing I mentioned above also applies to said dog, to the horror of all.

Other animals–old horses, old sheep, old goats, old ducks–do not, in my experience, become so terribly repulsive when they reach extreme old age. They get slower, they aren’t as energetic, but they definitely don’t get that disgusting quality that very old housepets get. Which is one of the reasons why I think I will resist owning an animal for as long as possible. That, and the shedding fur thing. Gross.