We brought "Baby" home in September of 1989. He stole our heart from the start, and soon he stole our house, claiming it as his "kingdom".
"Baby" was a long haired doxie who soon earned the nickname of "The King." He was nothing if not a quick learner. I love to eat popcorn and one day when he was very young, he was sitting next to me on the couch while I was munching away on my dish of popcorn. The next thing I knew, his head was in my bowl of popcorn and the kernels were flying every which way as he tried to eat as many as he could before I ordered him to his cage. He paid for his transgressions with a stomach ache and from that point on he NEVER again disturbed my popcorn bowl. He could have cared less about popcorn after that. For 16 years I ate my popcorn in peace. Then a strange thing happened. On October 26th 2005 I made another bowl of popcorn to eat while watching the World Series. He was in the kitchen and I saw his nose was up in the air, sniffing the popcorn. I remarked to my wife that he hadn't done that since the infamous dive into the bowl, 16 years ago. I thought nothing of it until the next morning. "Baby", alias "The King", passed away in his sleep.