Word: fred
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...Fred has been sulking ever since the report appeared. Freddie is a hound of many moods. Now he flattens himself with his jowl-flaps splayed on his little Aladdin's mat under the kitchen table. He will not rouse himself even when a horde of crows appears like Visigoths on the grass outside, an outrage that usually stirs him to a storm of indignant imprecation...
...Feelings? Fred is as moody as Rudolph Valentino. His life has the exaggerated theatrical emotionalism of a silent movie...
...Some animal behaviorists believe that a character like Fred is motivated only by the hope of the next snack. This is unjust. When I return home, particularly after an absence of more than a day, Fred levitates with chaotic excitement and happiness. He springs into the air on all four legs at once, his tail thrashing, his body performing twists like a high-diver's - an astonishing sight, a mid-air electricity of vibrating honey-colored fur. When he comes to earth, he trombones his neck and howls out a conversational WOOO-WOOOO-WOOOO! There is no cynical quid...
...Well, not everyone. Goofball or not, Fred is a discerning judge of people and will not warm to some. Fred has his expertise and his elaborate instruments. He knows the sound of my car half a mile down the road. That much is easy. He also possesses the mysterious dog's foreknowledge of when I will be back, even an hour or two before I arrive...
...would not call Fred a rational dog. What he possesses, and lives by, are precisely feelings. He inhabits a universe of polychromatic drama filled with absolutely nothing, as far as I can tell, except emotions (ecstasies, disappoinments, depressions, moments of astonishing solicitude and tenderness if the humans are feeling low). And, of course, smells...