The neighbors have a new dog, a medium-sized lab-mix. He's a beautiful dog: blond, muscular, like a college swimmer from California at the peak of his form. My kids take this dog for a walk now and then, to help the neighbor and to enjoy a dog, since we don't have one yet. My kids have asked for a dog for years, pleading, sighing heavily when they see one on the street with its owner. They've wanted a lab or something like a lab. Mild allergies have us considering those poodle-mixes, like "Labradoodles" and "Cockapoos" and "Yorkipoos" and several other ridiculous-sounding combinations. The Labradoodle seems to be the most appealing, as they have the family-dog temperament of the lab and the hyperallergenic coat of the poodle. For some time now, the kids have been dreaming about Labradoodles.

The other day the older kids and a friend took the neighbor's dog for a walk. They were taking turns with the leash, and it ended up in the hands of one of the kids who doesn't have as much upper-body strength as the others. The two others took off running, causing the dog to yank on the leash and take off a top speed, muscles rippling like an Olympic athlete, dragging my daughter behind him--across the concrete driveway!

She came in limping and weeping, and we soon discovered she had some scrapes and scratches on her hip, elbow, knee and hand. After we got her all bandaged up, she was still sniffling. I said, gently, "After this, I can't help thinking about the size of the dog we might get someday. It makes me wonder if we should consider a smaller dog than a Labradoodle."

"I was (sniff) thinking (sniff-sniff) about Yorkipoos. (Sniff) I like (snuffle, swipe, sniff) those."

Yorkipoos are about the size of a tall man's dress shoe.

There is no possible way it could yank and drag an upper-elementary aged kid across a driveway.