If the dream is big enough the facts don't matter.

-- Dexter Yager

My little dog woke up the other night while he was dreaming.

He was lying there at the foot of the bed, when suddenly he began a muffled barking.

He was moving his little legs, too, sort of like he was running after something. All this while stretched out prone with his eyes shut.

At first my wife and I were startled, but then we thought it was funny.

We shook him awake. And he kind of looked at us for a moment, perhaps a bit cross, then curled up and went back to sleep.

"Wonder what he was dreaming about?" my wife asked the next morning when she came down to breakfast.

"Probably something fun," I said. "Most mammals dream because their brains need to process data, just like ours. However, some studies have shown that dogs generally have to be happy to dream. Abused or neglected dogs don't seem to dream, perhaps because the memories are painful."

She looked at me oddly, and said, "How do you know all that?"

"Stayed awake during college," I said confidently. "No dreaming for me then."

She didn't say anything, but I think she knows I looked it up on the Internet before she came in.

-

RIDDLE: Here's one I asked last week but forgot to answer. Sandy celebrated her birthday. Two days later her older twin brother, Andy, celebrated his birthday. How is that possible? (Answer below.)

-

CAR COLORS: Do you believe it? Silver (or its gray variations) is the most popular choice for car or truck color.

Pittsburgh-based PPG Industries Inc. said silver has been the No. 1 color for nine straight years, accounting for 25 percent of vehicle paint choices in the U.S., 35 percent in Europe and 34 percent in the Asia-Pacific region.

White is No. 2 at 18 percent; black is No. 3 at 16 percent. Red is fourth.

-

WHICH REMINDS ME: I had a silver car once. Two years into ownership, the salesman -- looking for some new business -- called me at home one night about dinner time and asked in his most upbeat voice, "Say, how do you like that car you bought here a few years back?"

"You tell me," I said firmly. "It's been in your service department for a week getting a new engine."

He thanked me for my time.

-

RIDDLE ANSWER: (Sandy was not her brother's twin. Another sibling was.)

-

TODAY'S JOKE: A husband took his young daughter to the grocery store to help him buy groceries. In addition to the healthy items on his wife's carefully prepared list, the two of them returned home with a package of sugar-filled cookies.

"Why in the world did you buy those?" his wife asked. "You know they aren't good for you!"

"Oh, but don't worry, honey, these cookies have one-third less calories than usual in them," the husband replied.

The wife looked all over the package but couldn't find any claim to that fact, so she asked, "What makes you think that?"

"Well," he said, "we ate about a third of the box on the way home."