Sorry PETA, I just don't get it

GeoTagged, [N38.93424, E92.38938]

So, Peyton and I are in the Westlake Hardware store picking up some mulch, when we are transported through the looking glass into an upside-down world. Normally, any store experience is like a baby show without all the rouge and dysfunctional stage moms. "Oh isn't he precious!" "My grandson is about the same age--isn't this a fun time?" "What a charmer! What a doll!" And so on. (You get used to it.) So imagine my surprise when the cashier at Westlakes simply takes my money and hands me back my change while avoiding eye contact like I was there all by myself . . . I'm all "Really? No one sees the adorable baby with the cute hat? Sitting right here? Being . . . adorable and such?"

It was true. No one was looking at Peyton. That's bizarre enough to end the story right there. But then, as if this wasn't Twilight Zone-y enough, a guy comes in, and at the end of his leash was something best described as the result of breeding a large black dog with a small, even blacker, horse. Do the employees scream and run for cover? Do they ask the animal what it wants and beg it not to hurt anybody? NO! The cashiers go ga-ga! Nuts! Completely bonkers over this canine giant. "Oh my goodness, what a sweet baby! She is beautiful, what is her name! Raven? Oh how precious!!!" Blah blah blah. I mean, this hellhound looking beast didn't really evoke 'sweet' so much as bone-chilling fright, like the kind of dog you'd find guarding the gates of Hades (although, to be fair, the scary dog-horse was very well behaved). And these grandmotherly cashiers are overtly fawning, and Peyton can't get a "Hello there" to save his life. What sort of freak show mixed up world are we living in anyway? :) I'm going to stay in my house until things right themselves again.