JJ (the idiot) ate about a quarter-pound of kapok pillow stuffing a month ago. Kapok is not the benign fluff they fill dog-toys with. Four thousand dollars and a foot of small intestine later, though, the hound is fine, and the house once more resounds to the thunder of racing dachshunds and the crash of what my son describes as “puppy-Sumo.”

(That’s JJ standing on my lap, and Homer wallowing on the floor, in our living room in Santa Fe.)