After we moved onto our first little farm, we went shopping for a dog. Every farm needs a dog.

Lord Scooter of Fairfield was our pick – a registered Cocker Spaniel offered free by the breeder because he was the last one left in the litter and she needed him to go to a nice family.

You know how sirens should go off with the word free? No sirens.

We were told we could register our puppy and received the paperwork which we completed – including his name – and sent it off. The paperwork was only $25 and worth it, right?

Scooter was a sweet little brown dog and, as he meandered his way through puppyhood, we began to wonder when his long cocker spaniel coat would come in.

One of the boys on the school bus informed our daughter that, “That ain’t no cocker spaniel. He looks like a Labrador.”

Well, she sniffed when she told him that we had the paperwork to prove he was a Cocker Spaniel. AKC registration. The real deal.

And we waited for the beautiful hair to come in.

Which never happened.

We had, I am pretty sure, the only registered AKC puppy in the county who was officially a Cocker Spaniel but who looked an awful lot like a chocolate Labrador.

We learned later that the neighbor’s dog may have scaled the fence a couple of months before the puppies were born. Maybe.

Well, Scooter was free. And we were a nice family. Gullible but nice.