This wonderful anecdote by the Brazilian architect Oscar Niemeyer describes a beloved uncle who would take him to the bar for a drink. Before leaving, he would randomly select three of his eleven dogs to accompany them. This seems to have been perceived as a treat by the dogs, who would crowd around hoping to be picked for the bar-break. Even though you would think that sitting at a bar waiting for your master to finish drinking might be a dog’s life thing to do, they seem to have loved it.

‘He often took me to the local bar for a beer. Stopping at the gate, he called out to his eleven dogs, “You, you, and you can come along,” and those selected three dogs would follow us and wait while we drank. Finally, my uncle’s friends would escort us to the bar door and the dogs would follow us back home.  How I loved this uncle of mine!’ 

Source: Oscar Niemeyer, The Curves of Time (London: Phaidon, 2010 (2000)), p. 10

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