When I first met my wife, she asked me if I liked animals. I responded, "I like animals as much as you can like animals." And she thought, briefly, that I was dead inside.

Really, I was just raised in a household where no value was placed on pets. Which stemmed mostly from my mom, who reasoned that she shouldn't have to clean up the feces of something that, no matter how much personal investment you put into it, will never be able to cook you dinner, or at least pick up the check.

I inherited this belief, to an extent. I liked animals fine, I just didn't care. I also have a rippin' cat allergy, so the whole question of being a "cat person" has been decided by The Almighty.

For the record, cats are okay in my book, as their attitude towards humans seems to be that they like humans as much as you can like humans. I also appreciate that you can leave them in your house for a few weeks with, like, some food, $50, and the pizza delivery number, and they just sort of do their own thing.

But dogs and I have no outstanding beef either. They, as Randy Jackson says, "Do their thing, dawg." They require more care than cats, it seems. As I can barely take care of myself, I've always been nervous about having dominion over something that doesn't get that cars are bigger than them.

My wife, on the other hand, is assuredly a dog person. She could be explaining quantum mechanics to you in painstaking detail, but if somebody across the street was walking a dog, she would stop, yell, "OHMYGOD!" and make a squealing, cooing noise, jumping up and down and clapping her hands.

Her family owned dog after dog, and most of the childhood stories she tells about them end with, "And then the dog ran around and around with _____ in its mouth, and I jumped up and down and clapped my hands."

She loves dogs. LOVES them. And little by little, she has warmed my cold, dead heart to the idea of owning one. We've even watched a friend's dog a couple of times, and it was oddly pleasant.

I could see us having one of these dog dealies. They're way into you, even if you're a total jerk, which I am. And frankly, it's kind of nice having this ambulatory fuzzy thing in the house that enjoys sitting on the couch, eating, naps, and having his head scratched. I like all of those things too.

I use a toilet, however, and this is kind of the final button I'm going to need to button. See, I have this problem. I don't like shit. I hate it, in fact. And you know why I hate it? Because it's shit. I don't need a reason. It's yucky. Scene.

But it's just one thing (or rather, just #2 thing) on the "con" side, and on the "pro" side, there's my wife's undying happiness, and a new thing to tell people boring stories about, now that we don't do Atkins anymore.

As it's no longer my special week, I don't really feel like I have to wrap this up in any clever way, so instead, here's a list of dog names my wife and I have come up with for the dog we'll eventually get.

Mr. Snacks
Rex Scrappy, Dog Detective
Doleomutt
Dr. Sniffs
Crackers
Dogadelic
Chops
Randy Jackson
Lil' Joshy

That was a pretty good list. I did my thing, dawg.