I read today that Texas DPS officers and local sheriff's deputies were chasing some dope smugglers along the Rio Grande. The deal ended up in a confrontation with a bunch of Mexican army regulars protecting the smugglers with heavy weapons on the Texas side of the river. Does anyone beside me consider this as an armed invasion of the United States? Shouldn't we be upset?

I confess I am not a dog person.

Most of the time my family has at least one around. I am not the type to cuddle up with a pooch, though.

I was out of town for a few days. As my wife retired for the evening at home, the wind came up. It blew hard. At about 11:30, she went to the door to see if everything was still nailed down. Reassured, she went to sleep. At midnight, our Aussie began to bark, awaking my wife. She called to him on the porch outside her room to be quiet. He refused. He barked louder and harder than ever. Exasperated, my wife went onto the porch to admonish him. It was then she saw that the wind had blown two power lines together, causing them to arc. The sparks had fallen into tinder dry bushes and trees, staring a fire. The wind howled and in seconds a wildfire was raging. The power went out, as did the phone in the house. Luckily, my wife's cell phone worked. She called 911.

It took most of the night for the fire department to put down the fire, which grew to about six acres. The fire got within feet of several homes. Because that old dog had sounded the alarm, no lives were lost.

The following week, on my wife's birthday, the dog died quietly in his sleep. It was as if he had been with us those many years to protect us. Now he was tired and his job was done.

It may be a while before we get another dog. We will search a long time before we find one as good.