Dogs are wonderful. I really like dogs. I want to say that before you read the rest of this and maybe get the wrong idea. I'm also going to say that this has almost nothing to do with dogs, but their owners.

My family doesn't own a dog and for good reason. My kids would love one, especially my youngest son who has a bunch of stuffed surrogates, but his older brother is allergic and his eyes swell shut every time he's around one (that is if we forget the Claritin).

My wife also grew up on a farm where the philosophy was "animals live outside the house" and if one came to live with us she would move out. I didn't grow up with a dog so I am apathetic to this philosophy. I'm also not insensitive to those who disagree, but I like my wife a lot more than any dog and that won't change.

If you're a dog owner and automatically offended please don't be. The target demographic of this post is fairly narrow: anyone who puts on their workout clothes, rolls around with their dog, or lets their dog sleep in their gym bag, and then discards the dog hair everywhere at the gym.

This isn't a new phenomenon. It's been going on for a while where I work out and probably a lot of other fitness centers as well. I posted a pic on Instagram back on December 1 but I've seen it for much longer.

I will usually notice it when I am working out at the benches in front of the dumbbells,  doing a bent-over row and staring at the floor, and there it will be. A bright white dog hair contrasted with the black floor. Then I'll see another, and another, and another.

Today I discovered a huge one, pictured above, as I was just walking over to get the dumbbells. Then, when I was bent over performing the exercise, I exhaled hard as I was getting to the end of the set and I saw a bunch of previously unnoticed smaller dog hairs all fly away from the center of where I blew out my breath. It was kind of gross.

I don't blame the gym for this at all. It is kept very clean, aside from this dog hair thing. I have a feeling it is coming from someone who was there just hours or even minutes before I arrived in the late morning, well after the final sweeping and cleaning the night before.

If you love your dog, fur baby, puppy muffin, whatever you call it, it's a wonderful thing to have such a companion. But from now on could you take your gym clothes out of the dryer and immediately put them into a Ziplock bag, leftover food container, or even military ammo can so that the floor isn't covered with dog hair where lots of other people work out?  Thanks!

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