A DOG'S LIFE●Graeme Hall
He’s not barking mad.
He’s just nervous
I
have always thought Xander
to be a good name for a dog.
Two strong syllables always
make for a clear, distinctive
shout-out: “Zan — dah!”
There’s no way Xander’s
getting confused with any
other dog in the park. It’s
“a bit classy” too, as my
mum might say. Certainly
no kid at our school was
ever called Xander. If they were,
they weren’t admitting to it.
I met a two-year-old vizsla
called Xander recently. By allaccounts he was as daft as
a brush with those he loved
— and who loved him. But
if a visitor was invited into
the family home it was a very
different story. He’d run to the
door, barking, baring teeth and
lunging. The onslaught was
intense — ferocious, even —
resulting in an occasion when
he’d bitten a visitor who was
nervous of dogs and had kicked
out at our Hungarian friend.
“It’s such a shame,” his
owners told me. “He’s anabsolute sweetheart with the
family but no one else sees that
side of him. He’s Jekyll and
Hyde.” (I wish I had a pound
for every time I’d heard that.
I could almost get a tank of
diesel for the Land Rover.)
When I’d walked in he
worked his way through the
usual repertoire but I could tell
I wasn’t in danger. It’s not so
hard to read the signs. Here was
a dog who was making a lot of
noise and lunging, but at the
same time keeping a couple of62 • The Sunday Times Magazine