We bought a new home last fall, and while I love our new house, there is one weird element I want to get rid of... the dead dog's headstone in my garden. We have a lovely porch that looks out over the backyard, and off that porch is a small garden. And in that garden is a headstone for one of the previous owner's dogs that died in 1982.

I really don't care that there is a dog carcass in my garden. By this point, I'm sure there is not much left of it (please, oh please, don't let them have buried that dog in a casket). At our old house, we had buried a couple of our pets when they passed in the yard. There aren't any headstones, but we did plant bushes on their graves.

My family agrees that the headstone is kind of weird and a little creepy. I want to get rid of it so I can plant hydrangeas in that area. But what the heck do I do with a headstone? If it was a person, there is a whole list of things I would need to do (and let's be honest, I wouldn't have purchased property with a grave on it), but for a dog?

I've checked with the police department in my area, and as far as they are concerned, it is my decision what to do with the headstone since it isn't a human grave.

Any thoughts? I want the headstone gone. But I would really prefer not to have bad karma for getting rid of it.