dear "doctor" coren, if you really are a doctor...

So, sidelined a bit by the Michael Vick story, last week there was a news report about the recent study results revealing how dogs are smarter than human two year olds. This has raised the fur on the necks of human and dog parents everywhere. Everyone is comparing and contrasting their kids with their dogs and - let's face it - passively and subconsciously logging how incredibly intelligent their child/critter is over the rest of the cretinous populace.

The article basically goes on ad naseum about the study profile then at the end points out the thing people are really looking for: the list of the smartypants dogs and the dunces, noting that hounds were at the "bottom of the intelligence barrel". Ouch.

(memo to self: create bumper sticker with graphic of basset hound that reads, "it's settled! my dog reached the bottom of the barrel!" get it? "settled" to the bottom? it's a little play on wor.....*sigh*....no, you're right: it sucks. Back to work.)

I found one basset hound blogger so irate about this that she signed off saying she was in tears over it. Uh.... ok. I think they make pills for that.

So, I'm the first to admit that Molly, if human, would be the kid wearing the paper hat asking you if you wanna supersize that?. She purty, but she dumb. Toula, on the other hand, would be the Starbucks employee in the black apron, not the green one, as she is smart enough to open zippered bags, enter wallets and pull out dollar bills to chew just the money, eat only the most expensive lipsticks, guage what day of the week the gardener is coming, and use her nose to negotiate drawers and tools.

So, perhaps it really comes down to the dog, Dr. Coren, not so much the breed. Because you may think bassets are obtuse but my bassset Toula falls over dead when I make my fingers look like a gun and I yell, "Bang!"...most of the time. Stick that in your story and smoke it.