We derive immeasurable good, uncounted pleasures, enormous security, and many critical lessons about life by owning dogs.

In Egypt: Under no conditions, under threat of death could anyone kill a cat. People were exceuted for even killing a cat accidentally. And when a cat died, the whole family, and probably their closest friends, went into mourning, the measure of their personal loss signalled by their shaving off their eyebrows.

It looks like a miniature hippopotamus with badly-fitting panty hose all over.

There are only three sins - causing pain, causing fear, and causing anguish. The rest is window dressing.

It's our mortality that terrifies us, because what we're really seeking is immortality - that is, after all, a fool's errand.

It doesn't matter where you are in your own personal development, nor has it mattered where you have been culturally; dogs simply don't pass judgment on you the way all of the rest of life and all your other companions seem to.

Dogs are not our whole life, but they make our lives whole.