Large Small Dog

Boy with Appropriately Sized Small Dog:
(Could it be "Small Dog Syndrome"?)

My younger son desperately wants a dog. I might have mentioned this a few dozen times before. I do feel myself weakening on this issue, but his slightly dog-allergic father is firm.

But our son and I discuss the hypothetical dog that we might have if Dad relents....well...pretty much every time we pass a dog on the street.

And since we live in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, where there might be at least two dogs for every human, that means dog discussion is a constant.

My catchphrase for dog criteria is basically "small, quiet and washable." My son is not very convinced that smallness and washability are desirable characteristics. Mostly what he wants is something big and furry...Or a Pug.

Every time we pass a dog, he asks me to assess that particular dog's viability...Is it too large? Too hairy? Too poorly behaved?

The fact that I might have just told him that a beagle we recently passed was too large will not stop him from asking me about a much larger, furrier Husky one block later.
I'll admit that I often feel myself running out of patience for this hypothetical dog conversation, particularly as he is always lobbying for more size and more fur on this animal that we can't have anyway.

I suppose I should be grateful that the tone of the conversation is mostly civil. He and his brother have been fighting loudly and bitterly about a hypothetical PlayStation for months. Who will get to play what game and when on this device that we don't own...

And Dad might prove to be allergic to the PlayStation also....

(The dog on the napkin is a "Chug" a combination of a Pug and a Chihuahua...a dog that might be small enough...but still be a pug, sort of.)