Our daughter, among her pack of dogs, now much diminished -- the work of years wearing on the too-brief life of canines -- has a little Chihuahua. She named the little fellow Carmen. A tiny male, still the name seemed rather suitable in recognition of its Mexican background where Spanish is spoken, although Carmen responds to English, unsurprisingly.

The thing about Carmen is he is a little, actually tiny dog. His breed is accustomed to a warm and rather dry climate. He loves the sun. And he absolutely abhors the cold. Our little toy Poodle Riley was always very sensitive to cold temperatures. As soon as September rolled around, Riley would begin shivering non-stop until he was dressed in a little sweater.

Our daughter sewed a nice warm sweater and jacket for Carmen, but his preference was not to wear anything other than his own skin. And, above all, to avoid direct contact with the cold. When our daughter shouted out to her pack that it was time for a good vigorous romp through the snowy woods on the acreage of her rural property, they all came running. All, except Carmen. Where was Carmen? Invariably, upstairs in our daughter's bedroom, under the comforter on her bed. Unresponsive to blandishments to come on out and have a good time....

Riley was a good sport. As long as he was protected from the cold, sweater, jacket, boots, he would do his bet to jog along on snowy paths in the ravine, alongside our miniature Poodle who was much hardier. There were times when tiny Riley actually had to swim through new snow that hadn't yet been trodden down on the forest pathways, but he did it without complaint.

Yesterday when we were out in the ravine with Jackie and Jillie whose much longer legs give them that 'leg-up' even though they're small dogs, to cope with reasonable depths of snow, we came across a couple walking a very, very small Chihuahua. Jackie and Jillie had run ahead and were pestering the little dog. Some very small dogs are not intimidated at all by other dogs, large or small.

The man lifted his little dog and held it, explaining that he was upset, while we leashed Jackie and Jillie. The toy Poodle breed has an ingrained propensity to behave really poorly unlike miniature Poodles. The toys tend to be assertive, to bark and to confront other dogs. Not the most brilliant tactic for small dogs when large dogs, taking offence could easily dispatch them and sometimes do.

Well, out of this brief exchange came the observation that the tiny Chihuahua, though dressed in a little jacket, had bare paws. If Jackie and Jillie, somewhat larger than that tiny tyke cannot bear the cold of a day with -3C temperatures, wind and loose snow, then it must have been extremely difficult for this little fellow. Whom  his humans had named, strangely enough, Winter.