"Jon! Odie's drinking out of the toilet again!"
— Garfield, Garfield
Many people keep dogs as pets. Most people have toilets. These are jokes about dogs drinking from toilets, which is a common gross-out joke about dogs.
This can be Truth in Television if the dog is tall enough to reach the bowl (though of course, not everyone will find it funny, and sometimes other animals, such as cats, do it too), and the reason is likely because the water gets oxygenated by flushing, is cooler than their bowl because of the porcelain, and dogs don't know (and probably wouldn't care if they did) what we use it for.
This is one of the stock "disobedient dog" behaviors, along with having accidents, jumping up, pulling, chasing cars/squirrels/cats/posties, chewing shoes, and scavenging/stealing food.
See Urine Trouble, Yellow Snow (do note that this can apply to other animals too) and (in the cases where they pee on them) Dogs Love Fire Hydrants for other stock toilet jokes involving dogs and Flushing-Edge Interactivity, Swirlie, Goodies in the Toilets, and Fun with Flushing for other jokes about toilets. If an animal who is not a dog drinks from the toilet, that's usually an example of All Animals Are Dogs (though some animals like cats sometimes do it too). And if the animal in question is a cat, that would avert Cats Hate Water aspect. Sub-trope of Stock Animal Behavior.
Prepare for a dog to deal with dirty sewer rats, when the plague comes.
Examples:
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Advertising
- The first promo for 100 Deeds for Eddie McDowd ends with Eddie getting an announcer to give him this after learning about him.
Comic Books
- In the Dog Man story "Tongue of Justice", Petey had brainwashed the police force with tampered air fresheners, and Dog Man was chasing him in his secret lab when he couldn't resist the urge to drink out of a nearby toilet. Petey then gloats that he hid the antidote to the brainwashing in the toilet, so Dog Man vomits up the toilet water, licks it up, and slobbers the brainwashed policemen with it.
Comic Strips
- This
◊ Far Side comic strip shows a dog TV presenter introducing a talk show segment about dogs who drink from the toilet bowl - the dogs who will be talking are seen silhouetted in the background.
- One For Better or for Worse strip has a very young April break Farley of the habit by shutting the lid on his head.
- A common joke in Garfield:
- When the toilet starts overflowing, Odie runs towards it excitedly.
- Garfield is woken up by the sound of Odie drinking out of the toilet.
- Lyman laughs when Odie licks him. Garfield thinks that Lyman wouldn't be as happy if he knew that Odie just drank out of the toilet.
- The June 1, 2023 strip has Jon buy mouthwash for Odie and ponder how he's going to get his dog to use it. Garfield gets the idea to pour the mouthwash into Jon's toilet.
- When the toilet starts overflowing, Odie runs towards it excitedly
- Mother Goose and Grimm has the dog Grimm host a poker night at Mother Goose's house. When Attila the cat wonders why the game has been set up in the bathroom, Grimm casually points to the commode and says, "Wet bar." Verily, one dog is slurping away at that moment.
- Mutts: In one strip, Ms. Lulu, the pet psychic, tells Woofie's owners that he prefers to drink toilet water.
- An early Pooch Café comic has Poncho and Chazz visit a hardware store. Poncho remarks that he's thirsty and needs a drink, only to be disappointed the display toilets have no water in them.
Fan Works
- The Bolt Chronicles: In “The Survivor,” Mittens catches her dog friend Petey drinking from the toilet.
- In The Simpsons fanfic Maggie's Toilet Training, Santa's Little Helper drinks from the toilet and Maggie copies him, then Homer copies them.
- In the My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic fanfiction Pound and Pumpkin Cake's Adventures (and Misadventures) in Potty Training, when Pumpkin Cake is staying with Applejack and her family, Winona drinks out of the toilet.
Films — Animation
- Barnyard: After the death of Ben, Otis' father, Duke the sheepdog holds an emergency meeting over who the new leader of the farm animals should be. When Duke nominates himself to be the new leader, Pig objects and tells him that he saw him drink out of a toilet once, to which Duke tells him that he only did that because his water bowl was empty.
- Bolt: One lesson Mittens the cat gives to Bolt their cross-country trek is that the toilet bowl doubles as a water dish. Bolt is aghast and mildly squicked at this news.
- DC League of Super-Pets: When Ace take a long whiz at the base of a Superman statue, Krypto asks how much he had to drink. Ace replies that he had "two toilet bowls and a bidet".
- Open Season 2: In Pet Paradise, a place for pets whose owners are on vacation, there is a special toilets for dogs to drink out of.
- The Secret Life of Pets: During the party at Pops' apartment, a dog is drinking from the toilet as others chant, "Chug! Chug! Chug!"
Films — Live-Action
- The opening of the fourth Beethoven movie has one scene where Beethoven drinks from a toilet — then when he finishes and leaves, he accidentally pulls the toilet seat off and gets it hung around his neck (which is where the image on the film's cover comes from). This becomes an issue when Beth tries to use the toilet immediately afterward...
- Cats & Dogs invokes this by having spy dogs in training drink from toilets to hide the fact that they are actually receiving messages from HQ.
- One of the opening shots in Clerks is a shot of Dante's dog drinking from the toilet.
- The Flintstones: One scene has Dino, the Flintstones' pet snorkasaurus, drinking from a stone toilet.
- Discussed in Homeward Bound: The Incredible Journey. While Sassy is boasting that Cats Are Superior, she says they don't drink out of the toilet. Chance can't figure out why.
- Marley & Me: When Marley is being babysat, his owners say he is not allowed to drink from the toilet and that the lid should be closed and a brick to prevent him from opening it.
- My Dog Skip: One scene features Skip drinking from the toilet.
- Discussed in Scooby-Doo. While investigating a scary ride, Scooby and Shaggy find themselves entangled on sausages with the only option being to eat their way out. After one bite, Scooby complains about it being plastic only for Shaggy to quip how Scooby drinks out of the toilet. Scooby's response to the statement is telling Shaggy that he does that too.
- The Smurfs, when Elroy the Beagle sticks his head in the toilet to look at the Smurfs who have fallen in there, his owner Grace, thinking he's trying to drink from it, says, "No, no!".
- Uncle Buck: When Cindy calls to check how things are going, the issue of providing water for the dog comes up. Buck replies that he's been leaving the toilet seats up.
Buck: Yeah. *Beat* Is that what the blue water is? It's not good for him, huh? That might account for something... *beat* Nothing, just, uh... *clears throat* an odd coloration out on the grass.
Live-Action TV
- Frasier: In “Daphne’s Room”, Frasier is hiding in Daphne’s bathroom and trying to escape before she spots him. Eddie the dog enters the bathroom and starts drinking from the toilet. Daphne (in the shower) tells him that’s disgusting and to get out, but Frasier, hiding behind the door and unaware of Eddie’s presence, thinks she is talking to him…
- Discussed in Seinfeld. Kramer comes down with a nagging cough, but due to his distrust of doctors, he refuses to go see one. When he comes across a dog named Smuckers that somehow has the same cough, he takes it to a vet so he can get a prescription for his own cough. When the vet asks if Smuckers has been drinking from the toilet, Kramer reacts with offense as if he the one implied to be doing that.
- On The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon in 2015, Fallon shared a story about Wichita Falls Texas, which was having to recycle toilet water because of just how bad the 2011-2015 drought in the area had gotten. He followed it up with "Dogs everywhere have reacted to the news by asking 'You guys are just figuring this out now!?'"
Video Game
- In The Sims 3 Pets expansion, dogs can drink out of the toilets.
Web Animation
- There is a Flash animation hosted on Newgrounds called Water out of the Toilet. It is a faux ad where two dogs discuss the merits of drinking toilet water vs faucet water. The explanation for toilet water being better tasting for dogs is that well, humans do their business in the toilet.
Web Comics
- Freefall:
- Immediately after warning Tangent not to treat Florence like a dog, Naomi mentions the potable water system and the toilet with a phrasing that makes it sound like she expects Florence to drink from the toilet. [1]
- Florence prefers to drink in private, because she thinks lapping from a bowl looks undignified, which in a restaurant means excusing herself. "Whenever I say I'm going to the bathroom to get a drink, people always get the wrong idea".
- Immediately after warning Tangent not to treat Florence like a dog, Naomi mentions the potable water system and the toilet with a phrasing that makes it sound like she expects Florence to drink from the toilet. [1]
- In Kevin & Kell there's a Running Gag that Rudy, the wolf teenager of the mixed species family, likes drinking from the toilet.
Web Original
- Neopets mentions that it's against the rules for the Neopian Times stories to feature Neopets acting in a "demeaning manner" and gives drinking from toilets as an example.
- This Dumbstruck Dog / Baffled Boxer meme.
What the hell are you doing? I drink from there!
- Appears in this "If Dogs Were Human" video, with a "human dog" getting a cup of water from the toilet, much to the horror of an ordinary human (both played by Abi Clarke).
"Dog": What? (offers cup) You want a drink?
Western Animation
- One Cartoon Network ident has the titular characters of 2 Stupid Dogs do this only to be punished when a man catches them and gives them a Swirlie.
- Beethoven: The Animated Series: Beethoven tends to do this a lot. One episode even has him teaching a younger dog how to do it.
- In one episode of Dexter's Laboratory, Dexter tries to inject himself inside a sick Dee Dee to cure her cold, but ends up in the dog instead, which he doesn't notice. At one point, the dog is seen drinking water from the toilet, which makes Dexter believe Dee Dee is infected with a dog virus.
- The Fairly OddParents!: The episode "Dog's Day Afternoon" has Timmy swap bodies with Vicky's dog, Doidle. During one moment, Doidle (in Timmy's body) starts drinking out of a school toilet. Upon witnessing this, Chester and A.J. claim Timmy to be tougher than Francis, prompting the bully to start drinking out of a toilet as well, and then they join in afterward.
- In one episode of The Garfield Show where an alien switches Garfield and Odie's bodies, Arlene tries comforting Garfield by telling him to think about how many things he can do as a dog. The first things that come to his mind are chasing his tail and drinking from the toilet, which doesn't make him feel any better.
- Hey Arnold!: In "Abner Come Home", Arnold mumbles that his pet "must be getting a drink out of the toilet again" when he wakes up in the middle of the night.
- In the Lilo & Stitch: The Series episode "Topper", Stitch's memories are scanned by Jumba's brain analyzer so Lilo and Jumba can figure out why he's been hoarding Christmas presents throughout the episode. One of these memories reveal that he once drank water out of the Pelekai ʻohana's toilet bowl like an actual dog would, even though that, considering he's only an alien disguised as a dog, there's no need for him to do that at all.
- Martha Speaks:
- In "Martha in Charge", Martha cites drinking from the toilet as a perk of doghood.
- In "Martha Runs the Store", Skits wanders into the ladies' bathroom at the mall and drinks from the toilet.
- The Mighty B! has Happy and some dog impostor mothering him do this with bendy straws.
- The Oblongs: The montage of "Narcoleptic Scottie" where Milo bonds with his new dog Scottie has one scene where Bob walks in on Milo and Scottie while they're both drinking out of the toilet.
- Road Rovers: Shag the Old English Sheepdog does this on a regular basis (it's even noted in the opening theme song's lyrics). To top it off, he also cooks with toilet water, as noted in one episode where the Rovers have supposedly been abducted by aliens (it turns out to be their archenemy Parvo again, hoping to trick them out of their secrets — all he gets is Shag's secret recipe for kung pao chicken: "Mixed with toilet water, serves ten").
- Rocko's Modern Life:
- In "Who Gives a Buck?", Rocko goes shopping at the "Just Dog Bowls" store to buy a new dog bowl for Spunky. One of the bowls the salesman sells at the store is "His Master's Bowl", which resembles a toilet. Spunky drinks out of it, and upon seeing this, the salesman says, "I hope somebody remembered to flush."
- In "Pipe Dreams", Rocko and Heffer try to unclog Rocko's toilet with a drain cleaner called Tropical Plumber. Heffer squeezes the bottle, and an anthropomorphic lemon, banana, and pineapple start singing and dancing (Tropical Plumber, Hey! Unclog your pipes today!). They get into a canoe and are about to go down into the toilet to do their thing, when Spunky goes into the bathroom to drink from the toilet. He promptly eats them, and they scream in horror.
- In the unaired Rugrats pilot episode, "Tommy Pickles and the Great White Thing", Tommy is curious about the toilet, which Phil thinks is a giant water dish, since he saw Spike drinking out of it. Near the end of the episode, Spike comes into the bathroom and drinks out of the toilet.
- Tiny Toon Adventures: Midway through "The Potty Years" (part of "Henny Youngman Day"), Byron Basset comes into Baby Plucky's bathroom and drinks out of the toilet. He then licks Baby Plucky afterwards, much to the latter's disgust.
Baby Plucky: Ewww...
- The intro to T.U.F.F. Puppy shows Dudley Puppy drinking out of the toilet. Within the series, the episode "Share-a-Lair" begins with him drinking from the toilet due to thinking it's a drinking fountain. When corrected, it is then implied that he mistook the actual drinking fountain for a toilet.
