Your apartment feels awfully lonely without anybody else there. You could really use a running companion. You want someone to share your inexplicable hatred of the mailman. Whatever the reason, you’ve decided you’re in a good place to adopt a pet. For many people in the area, that’s when the hard part starts. The Washington Post has a story today about how the Washington Humane Society is overhauling their adoption requirements to make pet adoption easier. The group has “recently dropped its home-visit requirement and will now give applicants more chances to explain problems that might have landed them on a no-pet blacklist in the past, such as a loose-running pet killed in traffic or a tendency to return previously adopted animals.”

We understand the guiding principles behind stricter pet adoption guidelines. We’ve all heard the stories of the crazy pet hoarders and animal abusers. But sometimes the restrictions go a bit far. The Post’s article tells a pretty outrageous story of denial; a family on a farm, who’d had healthy, happy dogs for years, were denied because only 3 sides of their property was fenced in, and they refused to promise not to let the dog run free. One family (that did end up passing the requirements) went through a “two-month process [that] required three personal references…, assigned reading of two books, phone and home interviews, and a test session with a greyhound in her condominium.” Yikes.