I have to get this out of my head.

I had a doctor's appointment today - not with a medical doctor, which is why there was a dog in the office. Look, I don't care. I don't care. Doesn't matter to me what it wants or that it gets weird if left alone. I freaking do not care, I didn't want it in the office with me. Its presence put me on edge and I wouldn't have been able to focus or concentrate with it in the same room as me. Once it was outside, I couldn't even get myself to look at it, and I had to work to keep my attention on the point of the visit.

I think at this point, I can move it from aversion and wariness to outright phobia. Jesus, but they make me uncomfortable and wary and even thinking about it hours later gets my bile up and my body shaking.

I did my best to explain to her why I prefer most other domestic animals like cats and horses and birds - that their communication is more in body language than in their faces, how cats and horses don't use their faces very much compared to dogs and how birds effectively don't have faces.

A few weeks ago, I told someone I have more experience with horses than with dogs, which she found somewhat astonishing. I told her that I'd much rather have another rabbit, or rats, as a pet. "Quiet animals," she said.

"No!" I told her. "Prey animals! Acutely aware of the tiniest change in posture and tremendously responsive to it!"

Not an experience I get with domesticated canines. Some of the most unresponsive animals I've ever encountered.

Today the doctor tried to tell me all the dog wanted to do was love, which is fabulous for the dog, but didn't strike me as a tremendously effective thing to say to someone who was really trying to focus on a specific reason for being there.

I asked, though, and next time I'm in, she's not bringing it with her. Which: thank fuck.