I’m enjoying the Small Dog Experience, begun with Gus and continued with Bud. He is a mix of domineering hunter and lamb-like stuffed animal. He can challenge every other animal in the place with one long run, and slither up the bedsheets to get between us for warmth and attention.

I am beginning to grasp why the Big Men In Trucks love them so much, they are loyal, independent and generally fearless. They have ugly faces with enormous amounts of personality.

But shadows me whenever he can, looking either for treats and attention. When I nap, he is snoring in my lap. When we ride every morning to the bank drive-through, he waits calmly and patiently for the biscuit the tellers slip into the pneumatic tube.

When I write, he is usually curled up next to me on the floor. At night, when it gets chilly, he migrates to the living room sofa, on which he is never allowed, but can be found nightly.

He has a larger than life personality and loves everything with the boundaries of our family. He loves sneaking up on the donkeys and startling them by charging and barking when they aren’t expecting it.

Bud, the Little King, is a character. He makes me laugh a half dozen times a day, and that is no small thing in our stressed and distracted world. Every morning, he hops up into my lap the second I’ve finished breakfast and waits for his daily scratching

The above photo was taken in the morning, just after I woke up