How now Chow chow

The other day I was in the backyard looking over my neighbour's fence. Now I know what you're thinking, but I look over my neighbour's fence all the time, so I have lots of experience in these matters, and also they're hardly ever in the backyard anyway, and besides, I was looking for my cat. Who hasn't stood in their backyard looking over their neighbour's fence for their cat from time to time? Not to mention occasionally when I'm looking over the neighbour's fence for my cat I'm able to permanently borrow a lemon from the neighbour's tree. It all sounds perfectly fine to me.

Anyway, I was standing there looking over my neighbour's fence for my cat, which is a perfectly legitimate and fine activity, because you have to keep an eye on what you cat is doing, especially if your cat is in the neighbour's backyard, and I can't believe we're still talking about it, and all of a sudden I found a small dog looking back at me. It seemed as surprised as I was: two small eyes peered out of a cloud of fur. It was obviously so affronted it even forgot to bark. Even better: it was a Chow Chow.

The dog was also there when I looked over my neighbour's fence later. And the day after, when I looked over the fence again, it was still there. In fact, the presence of this canine backyard dog seemed to necessitate a lot of looking over my neighbour's fence, even when my cat was inside: it's important to assure yourself of the presence of the neighbour's dog in the neighbour's backyard, after all. For its part, the dog got over its initial bout of muteness and began to gruffly greet my presence in the familiar stentorian tones of its kind. In fact on some occasions I found that I'd just be standing around in the backyard, nowhere near the fence, which I was certainly not looking over, which I'll admit is unusual, and the dog would remind me of its presence by barking for no apparent reason.

The next logical step to take after all this is obviously to stop looking over your neighbour's fence at the neighbour's backyard, and place yourself in your neighbour's backyard instead, not by climbing over the fence, obviously, which would be rude (unless you are a cat), but by simply walking round to the neighbour's house and asking if you could see the dog, which is much more polite (unless you are a cat.) So I did. It was excellent. And the dog wasn't bad either.

I'm not sure if there's a moral to this post, but I like to think that in the process of writing it, I've become a more compassionate and understanding person and have made universal peace and harmony that much more possible. Look, basically I think what I'm saying is this: it's okay if you look over your neighbour's fence for your cat and instead of your cat you see in your neighbour's backyard your neighbour's dog, and you go round to your neighbour's house and get them to let you into the backyard to see the dog. We've all been there. Metaphorically, if not actually, because that could get quite crowded. (Not sure about my cat though. She might be over there at the moment. I'd better go and check...)