During the 1990’s it was our Thanksgiving tradition to have dinner with my sister and law and her family. Each year after eating and cleaning the kitchen we would all go for a walk with their family dog, whiskers. He was a very old dog of mixed breeds and small in size, slightly bigger than your average cat. His fur was messing in spots due to his age and no matter what he had been bathed with he smelled pretty bad. But this little lovable dog had been around longer than most of the children and he was very much a part of the family. The kids kept asking their “Uncle Bob” if we were going to walk Whiskers and he would give them a distracting answer not wanting to upset the little ones because Whiskers had been missing for a while and due to his age we all thought he probably had left us. When dinner was finished my daughter came running back in the house and retrieved Whiskers leash and said “lets go”. Bob was very surprised to find his smelly little dog waiting outside for all of us, but of course he was absolutely thrilled. My in laws were new to this neighborhood and had only lived here about 3 months. So we headed out on our walk. Coming down the path towards us was another afternoon walker. The man exclaimed “Scruffy! There you are boy I was out looking for you! Why do you people have my dog on a leash?” The man quickly regained his composure and apologized and of course we let him know it was OK we weren’t offended. Bob let him know his real name was whiskers. Due to this funny looking little dog that had the ability to be loved by so many human friends Bob gained a really great friend and neighbor that day.