Quote Originally Posted by Christmas_Hamster View Post
Ever heard of that saying..."let sleeping dogs lie"? Why would I bother a dog just to get by. My late dog, Blue, was a huge mutt. Anywhere he laid was pretty much 'in the way'. It would have been cruel to make him get up constantly.

Some of the points you have made hold some truth but I don't believe that these are all....needed.
It is funny, when I was growing up, my maternal grandfather, Bummy, would have dinner at our house once or twice a week. Our Saint Bernard, Freckles, loved sleeping in the doorway that separated the kitchen from the rest of the house. We all just stepped over her. But Bummy was elderly and literally could not pick his feet up very far. He was still quite strong and powerful physically, but walked with a cane, and was not capable of stepping over 185 pounds of sleeping dog. As soon as he got up from his chair in the kitchen, she would seemingly wake from a sound sleep, move out of the way long enough for him to pass safely through the doorway, then go right back and settle back to sleep, letting the rest of us step over.

Dogs are smarter than people often give them credit for being.