I am all for a bit of feeble-minded fun. But why won’t my

When he was a puppy, it was sweet and funny to hear him growl every time I held a broom. Four years later, I’m no longer laughing

My dog disappoints me. I don’t feel good about this. I am disappointed in myself for being disappointed in him. But I can’t help feeling that he should have wised up a bit by now. He is nearly four, after all, which in human years puts him in his mid-20s. I expect more from him.

An example: he growls at brooms. He has been growling at brooms ever since I first wielded one in his presence when he was a puppy. It was sweet then; how I laughed. Well, I am not laughing now. Because, having seen the broom in action most days of his life, and never once having been harmed by it, he ought to have cottoned on to the fact that brooms are fine. As are, among other things, vacuum cleaners, wheelbarrows and blokes wearing turbans – growls towards those in the third category being particularly embarrassing.