Great idea - a Friday afternoon tavern story - especially since it's a lousy market day & there's not much to do.

While we're on a dog theme, I'll tell Miss Maxie's story (since she's now my avatar). I've never had a dog, and had no ambition of getting one. One day an aquaintance came to my house and asked if I could temporarily take care of a couple of puppies. The puppies were owned by a guy (Hamid) in her building who was being evicted. They were just beautiful border collie cross littermates - I just couldn't say no. We carried them to my house in their cage, one of them pooped just before we got inside. It was quite a task cleaning the puppies and the cage, expecially since they were not yet housetrained. You can't clean the cage, without releasing the hounds, well you get the picture....

A few days later, Hamid came to visit Murphy & Maxie. As soon as Maxie saw Hamid, she ran back into her cage and put her paws in front of her eyes. She refused to come out of the cage until he left. A week later, a repeat performance. Turns out Hamid only bought Maxie to keep Murphy company. He really did not want her - and she did not want him.

When he finally got resettled and came to pick up the puppies, he asked if I wanted to keep Maxie. Yes, Yes, Yes, Yes, Yes! She's been a fantastic dog ever since - incredibly good, incredibly smart. Now she's 10, and slowing down a bit, but then so am I.........