I don’t like to admit it, but I’ve known for quite some time that my dog, Hershey, is as smart as, if not smarter than I am. Hershey has a good grasp of the English language while I can’t understand anything he barks at me.

If I tell Hershey to sit, he sits down. If I ask him to “Get Daddy,” he’ll jump in my arms. When I instruct Hershey to go outside in the rain for a bathroom break, he lies in front of the fire place and looks up at me as if I’m crazy. He doesn’t care for water at all.

Hershey also has his own personal internet system. It runs from one end of our block to the other. The front lawns are his keyboard. By sniffing a few blades of glass, he can find out what’s going on with the other dogs and cats in our neighborhood.

“Sniff, Sniff,” my girlfriend, Lucy, the Bichon Frise, walked by here last night about 8:30 p.m.. Wish I had been looking out the front door. She’s got nice, soft, fluffy fur.

“Sniff, Sniff,” that darn grey cat from next door was in our front yard yesterday. J.T. needs to start leaving the door opened so I can protect us from that cat. Can’t he see I’m too short to look out the windows?

“Sniff, Sniff,” the pit bull who lives at the corner house must have cut through our yard this morning. Sure am glad I was safe in the house when he came through.

The dog’s internet is more reliable than the human system. It doesn’t disconnect in the middle of an important download and it never tells them that have made a “fatal error.”

Just like humans, Hershey has his likes and dislikes. He loves to stretch out in front of the gas logs until he’s so hot I can barely touch him. He gets extremely angry when I try to kiss my wife, but he likes to lick me in the face. Preferably on my mouth—yuk. He lives for suppertime, but he’d much rather dine on our food than his own. He’s especially fond of burgers and fries. That reminds me we need to get his cholesterol checked. When we are at home, Hershey pretends like he does not care for our cat, Baxter.

However, often when we return from a night out, I’ll find Hershey snuggled next to Baxter in the recliner. I guess an old cat is suitable enough to keep him company when we’re gone, proving that loneliness can bring the worst of enemies together.

Last week, my wife pointed out to me another interesting thing about Hershey that I had never noticed. A drive-thru window is like a zoo to Hershey. He stares at the people working behind the window like we look at animals in a zoo. He sits straight up in my lap with his almond colored eyes trained on the people inside, captivated by what he sees. The only difference I’ve been able to detect between our trips to the zoo and Hershey’s ride to the drive-thru is that he expects the people working inside to hand him a treat, while we humans usually feed the animals in a zoo.

Yes, Hershey is a smart dog that lives a good life, and as long as he stays away from the pit bull down the street, he won’t have to contend with any “fatal errors.” Man, I wish we humans had it as good.