We had a dog like that once. Rex (that was the dog's name) never made noise and never had to go "out". Rex protected the house and all of our possessions and us, too. Once, I remember, some bullies had chased us home from school and ol' Rex gave us protection and comfort when he hid with us under the bed. Then there was the time at the old swimming hole when my little brother went swimming immediately after eating a big plate of baked beans; he got his foot caught under an underwater log and would have drowned except for Rex, who napping in the house five or six miles away so I rescued my brother and gave the credit to Rex, who needed it.

As he got older, Rex got bigger and bigger. You would too if you never went "out". One day the city required that all dogs get a rabies immunization. Mom loaded old Rex onto the neighbor's flatbed truck and took him to the vet. The vet stuck the needle in and Rex exploded. Poor old Rex! The small town never has recovered from that disaster. Half the downtown -- six buildings, one two stories tall -- was destroyed. The town's entire street cleaning department immediately resigned; he said he didn't take the job to clean things up.

For months the residue lay around, and the hot summer sun didn't help matters. Finally the State environmental people declared a disaster area Superfund Site and the entire fiasco was loading into plastic bags, buried, and left for the future to deal with.