Ok, twice a day and every day this week I've been seeing the same woman on the street. At about 8:30 in the morning and 5:10 in the afternoon she's walking on York Mills with her seeing-eye dog*, and she always looks like she's in a bit of trouble with it. Thing is, seeing-eye dogs are usually very focused. They're unflappable. They don't stop to eat things off the sidewalk or bark at people or running off to chase squirrels. Every time I see this dog, it is clearly not acting in its owner's best interests.

I told someone about this and she said, "well it can't be easy for the poor dog!" It's a seeing-eye dog's job to see for the person who walks it! Am I the only person who thinks that a) this dog should be better trained, or that b) this woman just went out and bought a black lab, thinking the ability to see for two is somehow innate?

Notes:
* seeing-eye dog: The proper nomenclature for the differently-abled and the visually impaired changes as often as my bra size, but does it affect what we call seeing-eye dogs? They're also called guide dogs, but that's a bit misleading (I think of guide dogs barking out facts about Ionic versus Hellenistic style columns in a museum somewhere). Is there a right term and a wrong term?