I've always left my dogs either with friends or with a boarding kennel when I've gone out of town. With my cat, it was a little different. We had a friend who would check in on her once a day and feed her, clean the litter box, make sure she had enough water, and spend a little time petting and playing with her. Our neighbor told her the cat still spent a lot of time "crying", which made me sad, but... not sure what else we could do aside from having someone house sit for us.

With Ted - not sure how bad what he did was. I mean, I assume he had a neighbor or friend checking on his dog. OTOH, dogs get lonely. I wouldn't have done that to my dog. Just seems sorta callous.