# Ways to distinguish between pet owners and non-pet owners

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ways-to-distinguish-between-pet-owners-and-non-pet-owners/420391>\
**Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\
**Created:** [September 25, 2007, 4:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ways-to-distinguish-between-pet-owners-and-non-pet-owners/420391 "2007-09-25T04:08:28Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 2\
**Page:** 4

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**Author:** ![Nava](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/da6949/32.png) [@Nava](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nava)\
**Post date:** [September 27, 2007, 12:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ways-to-distinguish-between-pet-owners-and-non-pet-owners/420391/61 "2007-09-27T12:55:43Z")

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[QUOTE=norinew]  
Or the mother of a young, _very_ friendly kid! 😉  
My oldest is 20, and my youngest is 7; I never did get to go to the bathroom without an audience until my youngest started school a couple of years ago.  
[/QUOTE]

I jokingly said for years that I had two pets: my brothers.

A lot of the things listed here reinforce the notion that having much-younger brothers is very much like having pets. Open the street door in a way that ensures they can’t escape? Check. Raising from the table with a warning of “don’t even think about touching my food”? Check. Being woken up in the middle of the night because “there’s something you have to see!”? Check…

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**Author:** ![NoOrdinaryRabbit](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/eada6e/32.png) [@NoOrdinaryRabbit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/NoOrdinaryRabbit)\
**Post date:** [September 27, 2007, 1:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ways-to-distinguish-between-pet-owners-and-non-pet-owners/420391/62 "2007-09-27T13:46:18Z")

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If your Christmas tree has no tinsel, and no ornaments on the lower tiers(and you have no breakable ornaments left…), you probably are a pet owner.

(And it’s not just the cats. Small dogs can climb trees too!)

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