Without wanting my blog to become an obituary for small animals, my elder sister asked me to write a blog for the latest dog recently dispatched to pet cemetery or wherever it is that dogs go to when they die.

Sally was 10 years old before the long, cold fingers of cancer finally got hold of her. My sister picked-up this pavement special from an animal shelter called Tears after her previous owners tossed her out of a moving car. After a lot of coaxing with cookies and biscuits, Sally became very affectionate and was a much-loved dog. She is the third dog to die in 18 months and everyone has been a little bruised by the experience. That’s the thing with pets, you love ‘em & then they die.

Personally, I thought Sally was a little skittish and I used to watch her run up and down the garden chasing cars from behind the fence. Very weird. One day I watched a show with Hollywood’s top pet psychologist and she diagnosed this kind of behaviour as Obsessive Compulsive Disorder. Very interesting. It seems that dogs are as messed up as we are. Despite my best efforts, Sally refused to go for counselling sessions with a top dollar pet psychologist I found in the yellow pages.

On the upside my sister has two new dogs, Luca (a Bernese Mountain dog) & Molly (a Shar-Pei). They are going to training school at the moment in order to learn to stop weeing in the house. My sister’s house smells like a urinal.