I delivered the afternoon Phoenix Gazette for a couple of years in the early 70's. On Sundays mornings we delivered the Arizona Republic. Can't remember the bike, might have been my sister's Raleigh with the bags wound around the handlebars and wire baskets in the back. The Gazette wasn't very big but the Sunday paper was bigger and I had to get to the paper drop in the 4:30ish AM to do the advertising insert. The bike was also pretty awkward to handle with the weight of papers in the front, you had to be careful not to lean too far if you stopped to toss the paper on someone's porch or had to do a u-turn on a driveway. The good part about the morning was you could ride down the middle of the major streets due to the lack of cars. Besides delivery we had to collect from subscribers they gave you a book with a page for each person with tear-off tabs for the months they'd paid. Sometimes they'd be a few months in arrears and the route manager would get after you to get after them or we'd have to drop them and nobody wanted that.
No dogs but I remember one house spray painted their yard green in the winter in Phoenix when the Bermuda grass goes dormant and turns tan.