(I volunteer at a local animal shelter once per week. Since I worked part-time there last summer, the employees and I are on very good terms, so they don’t mind me offering advice to customers and getting them set up with the proper assistance. On this day, a woman I’d estimate to be about 60 comes into the shelter and stops in front of me while I’m folding laundry.)

Me: “Hi. Do you need any help?”

Customer: “Yes, I’m here to pick up Mack.”

(Mack is a very cute German Shepherd mix puppy we are accepting applications for; with puppies we tend to accept more than one applicant and then choose the best a day or two after the puppy is made available.)

Me: “Oh, um, do you mean you’d like to meet him outside the kennel?”

Customer: “No, I’m here to pick him up.”

Me: “Um… One moment, please.”

(I go and get [Employee], who runs the dog team.)

Employee: “So, I hear you’re interested in Mack?”

Woman: “Yes, I’d like to bring him home.”

Employee: “I’m sorry, but we’re not reviewing applications until tomorrow due to the high interest in him.”

Woman: “Applications?”

Employee: “Do… Do you have an application in on him?”

Woman: “Application?”

(It turned out the woman had no idea she needed to apply to adopt a dog! I later found out she had come by to try and adopt before with similar results. She didn’t get Mack, but she did fill out an application for another dog, so I guess she figured it out eventually. We all found the whole thing funny more than annoying, since she’s hardly the first one to make that mistake!)

(I’m a volunteer at an animal shelter. A woman comes in wanting to adopt a cat.)

Woman: “Do you have any fat cats?”

Me: “Excuse me?”

Woman: “You know, obese? Plump?”

Me: “Well, we try to maintain the health of the animals here, so any overweight cats are on strict diets. May I ask why you are looking for a, um, fat cat?”

Woman: “You may not.”

(She leaves the shelter. I hear her yell outside.)

Woman: “Honey, they were out of fat cats!”

(My friends and I are a bit bored, so we decide to go to our local cat adoption center to hang out with the cats. Usually the ladies there are more than happy to have people come in and keep the cats company, but today they have a new woman working. I’m speaking with one of the older workers about how I want a kitten someday in the future, and telling her about my current cat.)

Lady: “You want a cat? Well, what is your current cat like?”

Me: “Well, she’s a bit old and grumpy. She doesn’t really get along with other cats very well, but—”

Lady: “Was she raised around other cats?”

Me: “No, she was mostly raised around dogs. She doesn’t get along with other cats. That’s why—”

Lady: “Well, is she stuck in one room all the time?”

Me: “She likes to stay in one room. If we let her roam she tends to pee on carpets, especially if there are other animals in the house. So I was planning—”

Lady: “Well, she sounds very territorial. It sounds like you want this kitten for yourself, not for your cat. If you really want an application, I’ll give you one, but you shouldn’t be introducing a new cat into your house.”

(I try and get a word in, but she just shoves an application in my hands and walks away. My friends and I are all very confused, and I turn to the older worker I was speaking to previously.)

Me: “But I’m not even planning on getting another cat until after my cat is gone. I just wanted to pet the kittens.”

Worker: “Oh, don’t worry about her. She gets angry when people come in to pet the cats because she says you’re ‘getting their hopes up.’ I think it brightens their day to have people to play with!”

(I had a great time with the cats, but I won’t be back to adopt a cat while that lady is working. Hopefully she’s gone when I’m looking to adopt a cat in a few years!)

I work in an animal shelter, and I know how difficult it is to find owners for certain pets. The older a pet is, the harder it is to get them adopted.

One day, a man walked in to give up an animal, and I sighed inwardly because it was an adult female cat. They are some of the hardest to find homes for. The cat was a beautiful torbie, young and in perfect health, but absolutely terrified.

She never really calmed down around us. She did nothing but hide and freak out whenever someone got too close. We could tell that she wasn’t doing well, as she was losing weight, and her fur was getting a lot thinner.

Then, after almost two months, a girl walked in. She looked like she was about to cry; she was shaking and biting her lip and blinking rapidly. She asked to look at our cats, especially if we had any nervous females. I was surprised and confused by her very unusual request, but I immediately thought of the torbie and took the girl to see her.

As soon as the girl saw the cat, she broke down in tears. To my surprise, the cat responded by letting out a meow, the only sound I’d ever heard her make, and instead of trying to run away, she started to carefully sneak closer.

I couldn’t think of anything to do but watch silently as the girl grabbed the cage, sobbing and blubbering incoherently, and the cat pressed herself against the girls’ fingers.

It took close to twenty minutes before the girl calmed down enough to explain things to me. The cat used to be hers, but her dad gave it away, because neither the cat nor the girl got along well with the rest of the family. Apparently, the cat was a stray that had snuck into their house and stuck around, eventually growing close to the girl, but never really settling in with the rest of the family.

The father had threatened to get rid of the cat and eventually went through with it. Now, the girl had moved out and she’d been looking all over for her cat, desperately hoping she was still alive.

I was overjoyed to see the cat return to her rightful owner. By pure coincidence, I ran into the girl a few months later at a grocery store. She showed me pictures of the cat in their new home. She had adopted an older female cat who got along famously with the first one, and both cats looked like they loved their life. The girl was even buying a grilled chicken just for her cats!

I was working at an independent non-profit animal shelter. We’d gotten a few new adult dogs in that day. A man came in to visit and found a dog that he liked. He filled out the application and said he’d be back later in the day so his wife could meet the dog. This is common and usually goes fine, so mentally I figured that dog would be going home that day.

When the wife came in, they visited with the dog, but then the wife asked to visit with another dog. So, the husband was in one room with the first dog, and the wife was in another room with a different dog. They went back and forth between the two rooms. I thought that the wife must have changed his mind, and they’d be taking home the other one instead. Not a big deal, though I was starting to feel kind of sorry for the first dog. But then the couple came up to a coworker and me and asked, “Could we introduce these two dogs? We’d kind of like to take them both home.” We said we’d be happy to do it, but it was a busy dinner shift, so they’d have to wait a little bit. The couple was very patient, and spent their time visiting with the two dogs individually.

After a little while, my coworker and I were able to take the dogs to a play area and introduce them. They were immediately friendly and playful! They started running around the play area. They got along great, and the couple took two dogs home that day.