We just boarded our flight from Chicago to San Francisco.  Clank, clank, clank.  I lean out into the aisle and see a large sheep dog trotting towards me, his name tag making a metallic sound with each step.  The 737 is a 3-row-3 and the dog and his owner, who looks like an older hippie, stop at the seats in front of me.  The window seat was empty and the other two filled with bewildered passengers.  “We’re in the window seat” the dog owner says, “Both of you?” asked the passenger in the middle. “Yep, and this is his first flight too, he will be sitting on my lap”  Everybody gets up and they squeeze in.  The dog is soon asleep and seems quite content.  His owner, however, has the look of a man who’s just realized that he’s got a very large, very hairy 50 lb dog on his lap for the next four + hours and no room to move.  I wonder if he is rethinking his plan…