“One medium cappuccino, one medium vanilla latte!” the barista sings, sliding two cups towards me.

I step forward. Martin’s cappuccino has froth towering above the cup’s rim. Grabbing a lid, the barista expertly snaps it onto the cup, and a spray of milky foam squirts out through the drinking slot. The jet shoots into the air, then lands in a bubbly pool on the lid.

The barista grins, mopping up the excess foam with a towel. “I knew that would happen,” he says, gallantly wiping the lid.

I carefully snap the lid onto my vanilla latte without incident. No surprises, no squirting foam. I take a sip. Ah yes, such sweet goodness! I love vanilla lattes.

I carry the two cups to the truck, placing them gingerly into the cup holders between the front seats. I slide into the driver’s seat; Martin appears with thick sandwiches from Togo’s. We are starving after a day of hiking, and still have a long drive home.

Martin unwraps the sandwiches as I merge onto the freeway. Our golden retrievers Jasper and Eddy hear the crinkle of paper, sniff the air and rise from the back seat, watching the proceedings with great interest. Food? Is that food? That looks like food! Both dogs inch forward, jostling each other to place their front paws on the center console. They look back and forth at us, Jasper drooling copiously as we take big bites of thick sandwiches piled high with meat and cheese.

I always give them the last bite. When I am done, I offer a final morsel to each dog. Eddy accepts his politely and delicately, a perfect gentleman; Jasper practically removes a couple of my fingers as he snatches it from me, greedily swallowing it whole. My hand comes away wet with slobber.

I wipe it on my pant leg.

Reaching down, I pick up my vanilla latte and am surprised to see a foamy pool on its lid, like Martin’s in the coffee shop. Huh, that’s odd. Had the cup been jostled? What caused the coffee to be ejected through the drinking slot?

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Poncho had done it again.

My friend Carol had taken her two chocolate labs, Poncho and Lefty, on their daily river walk, and Poncho had pulled one of his classic disappearing acts near a campsite full of trash. He was slow to return when Carol called him; when he finally trotted up, he looked very smug.

Very pleased with himself.

Carol glared at him. Poncho had likely stolen some food from the campsite, which wasn’t polite. On the other hand, the guy was camping illegally and trashing up the place, so maybe it served him right to have his food eaten by a dog. Clean up your campsite!

Carol, Poncho and Lefty all happily swam in the river, chased tennis balls, romped around the beach, and returned home, tired and satisfied with their summer day.

But that night, Poncho became very subdued.

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It was mid-morning. Martin was changing into his work clothes when he glimpsed our puppy Eddy emerging furtively from the room that contained the cat’s litter box.

Eddy froze near the top of the stairs. His guilty expression, firmly clamped mouth, and bulging cheeks said it all.

Bonanza! He’d scored a mouthful of cat poop.

We yell at him every time. He knows he’s not supposed to eat cat poop. But apparently it’s just too yummy to resist.

Martin and Eddy stared at each other for a long moment, motionless, sizing up the situation and their relative positions. Then they both sprang into action.

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I was in my backyard the other day, and the neighbor’s dog, a big blockheaded yellow lab, starting barking at me.

He learned to bark from my dogs. Before the neighbors had a dog, my dogs would bark at them as they collected blackberries along the back fence. I’d hear the wife hiss, “Shush! Quiet! Go away! Git!”

Not particularly friendly, but then again, my dogs were barking at her.

Then one day they came home with a puppy. We’d hear them: “Bubba, no! Bubba, stop! Bubba, sit! Bubba, come!”

Bubba? Seriously, they named their dog Bubba?

My apologies to all you Bubbas out there – you  are all undoubtedly great, smart people – but why would anyone name their dog Bubba?

It just seems…  disrespectful to the dog, somehow.

No offense intended, of course.

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