A Whole New Meaning of "Rat Race"

More and more companies are endorsing a work environment that nurtures situations in which you can scratch your cubiclemate’s ears and get a nice warm lick in the face in return.

No, this isn’t Bob Packwood Playland, but rather a growing trend in business to allow workers to bring their pets to work. Many companies are discovering that the more their employees work with each other, the more employees long to work with their pets.

As far as I can tell, this trend began in California about three years ago, when a software company allowed its employees to bring their pets to work. Naturally, the company established a few ground rules, such as the three-accidents-and-you’re out clause, but this wasn’t a difficult rule to accept because it also applied to the employees themselves. Other companies offer pet-sitting assistance for employees who travel on business. Specially trained employees come to your home while you’re on the road, administer Alpo, use your phone to call 1-900 numbers and get into your liquor.

A surprisingly high percentage of employees who are separated from their four-legged loved ones call their pets from the road and talk to them over their home answering machines. Of course, the callers can’t hear their pets bark or meow in response, nor can they see them shredding the furniture cushions or prancing around in their owners’ underwear, but to call them at least assuages the guilt of being away.

We lavish money as well as attention on our pets, which is why pet insurance is now on eof the top five requested employee benefits. Premiums range from about $50 to $200 per animal annually, with discounts for animals who are spayed, have good driving records and don’t smoke.

So the traditional, irrational chasm between cat and career and dog and doggedly working is narrowing, and this past June, an effort was afoot to make June 25 national Take Your Dog to Work Day. Personally, I think this event should go beyond dogs to include other pets, although I would draw the line at horses. I recently returned from a vacation, during which I took the traditional vacation horse ride. Because I am from the West, I have a belief that I should know intuitively how to ride horses. My father rode a horse to school, and his father was a farmer who used horses for work, and his father, according to a popular genealogy Web site, was a horse. But none of these genes have passed on to me, and horses can sense it.

The horse I rode on vacation kept trying to bite me, probably because I use environmentally friendly carrot-based soap. He also stopped frequently to show me exactly what he thinks of columnists. Then, despite my instructions to the contrary, he ran instead of walked, meaning that he made by buttocks feel like I’d just come out of a performance review.

Yes, a company that invites horses into the workplace is a stupid company, unless the workplace is a glue factory. But I do think it would be OK to bring rats to work. My daughter has a rat. Once you get beyond the fact that rats are disease-carrying vermin that have been the scourge of humanity since before Moses’ time and had a lot to do with the Black Death, you can begin to see their humanlike qualities and uncanny resemblance to tort lawyers.

Our rat is Gus. He like to climb from my shoulders to my head, where he will sometimes show me what he thinks of columnists. My daughter lets him run around inside her sweatshirt, which, when discovered, shocks the pediatrician. I would endorse a policy that allowed employees to bring rats and even birds to work, although obvious coordinating efforts would have to be made with cat people. As with any liberal-minded policy, someone would try to take advantage of it. Here I am thinking of rabbit owners, who are suspect anyway. I could see them calling in sick because of their pets, and i can hear their excuse now: bad hare day.

Dan Danbom remains dogless in Denver.