“Leave a dog alone for very long and it’ll start going a little nuts. Cats, on the other hand, try to give you the impression that they didn’t even notice you were gone.”

Oh, were you out? they’ll say, I didn’t notice. Then they’ll raise their tails to show you their little puckered anuses and walk away.

That’s a heck of a lot more than any president, pope, prime minister, or potentate can say, and I wouldn’t switch places with any of them.

Perfume companies ought to bottle the smell of crisp bacon. Forget pheromones. I’ll bet a woman with a little spot of bacon grease behind her ears would attract every male within a five-mile radius.

That I brushed them so their coats shined, and played with them until all our hearts were beating faster. That I kissed them goodbye and left them with their tails wagging or flipping or at least raised in a happy kind of way.

I always see to the dogs first and leave the cats and the occasional birds and rabbits and hamsters for later. It isn’t that I play favorites, it’s just that dogs are needier than other pets.