I simply love dogs -- have had one on and off as long as I can remember. The first I remember was a springer that appeared in my lap at breakfast om my first day of kindergarden. He was followed closely by a stray -- a cocker who wandered into our yard pregnant and stayed. Then Dad was sent from Texas to Alaska and we gave our dogs to a loving home and wound up with a malamute pup and then a full grown malamute. The pup was hit by a car and while we loved the adult, he stayed in Alaska when we left -- I think he was my favorite since he went everywhere with me.
Since then I have had a real variety of dogs -- both papered and not and they were all loves. We just put our girl down (that's her in my avatar) -- she was was a handful and all love. It gets harder to say goodbye as we get older. We may look for a new one soon -- we had talked about getting an adult shelter dog, but a friend just got a chocolate lab pup that was hard to give back to her when we left.