You may recognise this from one of Lauren Child’s books, where Trixie Twinkle Toes Trot Alot Delight is a pampered pooch living in a fashionable apartment in the lap of luxury with her owner Mademoiselle Verity Brulee. Think it’s fiction? Think again. They live right here in New York City. There’s the white ball of fluff in a pink jacket, treated like a child. The glamorous maltese in matching purple coat and bootees (I kid you not) whose owner loves the attention we give her dog as we admire her dog’s attire (I am incredulous, E is in raptures). And my favourite so far (there will be more no doubt given the obsession with dogs around here – no change from NW3 there) another ball of white fluff, so small it was in the owner’s pocket wearing hair clips on the fur on her ears!! I am lost for words. Trixie, by the way, didn’t like her life, she wanted to get muddy and splash in puddles in the rain but most of all she did not like her name, she wanted to be called growler or gripper. I’m sure her NY peers would agree.