In the late 1980s, NBC’s Saturday Night Live introduced viewers to
Toonces. The prototypical family cat, Toonces was your everyday
domestic feline with one notable exception: Toonces the family cat
could drive the family car.

While every skit invariably saw his sojourn conclude Thelma-and- Louise
style over a cliff, it was always fun while it lasted. After all, a
driving cat? That’s almost as ludicrous as a bowling squirrel, a
knitting raccoon, or a Commodore 64-savvy dog. Each one, in 1989,
worthy of a hearty: "As if." But it’s not 1989 anymore.

Times have changed. And with them, societal norms have undergone some
jaw-dropping shifts. The big perm has given way to the straightening
iron. ("Impossible! Teased bangs are hot!" says my 1989- self.) Instant
coffee has been pushed aside by the $5 latte. ("Nonsense! I can get 42
styrofoam cups from one jar!" she says again.) And New York’s Toonces,
the fictional driving cat has been replaced by Toronto’s Annabelle, the
real-life e-networking Cockapoo. ("I just don’t get it. Now hand me a
Tab.")

Last June, with a little help from personal assistants Alexandre and
Geoffrey Roche, Annabelle launched Dogbook, an application of the
so-addictive-thereshould- be-rehab cyber-vortex of Facebook.

While the Facebook mothership links human friends with friends, and
friends of friends, and friends of friends of Kevin Bacon, the canine
offshoot links dogs with friends’ dogs, and friends of friends’ dogs.
And friends of friends of Kevin Bacon’s dog. ("Six Degrees of Kevin
Bacon’s Dog" is an oft-played drinking game at doggie daycares today.)

Whether or not the idea of your dog accumulating friends online makes
you scoff, what can’t be disputed is that likes appear to be attracting
likes. Yorkie owners unsure of how to treat an aging dog’s poor dental
health can befriend other Yorkie owners and engage in some beneficial Q
and A, for example. With what is arguably Dogbook’s most
forward-thinking feature, desperately floundering owners now have the
opportunity to post information pertaining to a missing dog‹giving
Dogbook the potential to become the canine-kid equivalent to the milk
carton.

Just how many members would even see such a posting? The numbers may
surprise. While Annabelle might have been the first dog with her furry
face on Dogbook, 10 months later, she’s certainly not the only one
engaging in virtual bum-sniffing at the Web dogpark.

Dogbook today boasts nearly a million members from doghouses dotting
the globe; from countries as expected as Canada to countries as
who-knew? as Iraq. Proving yet again, that the human/dog relationship
continues to gain international momentum.

While some might claim that all the hype is nothing more than a passing
fad brought on by a frenzy of stick-bug celebutantes toting purebred
runts the size of chandelier earrings, Geoffrey Roche disagrees.
According to this prolific adman with a knack for having his finger on
the pulse of what’s-what, "Even in the last five years, we’ve seen a
shift. We’ve got empty nesters with disposable income, and we’ve got
younger couples waiting longer to have children. In both instances, the
dog becomes a sort of child to the owner. Dogs have become full-fledged
family members."

There’s no doubt such is the case in the Roche household. Where, we’re
guessing, Annabelle got her paws on some old SNL re-runs. Realizing
that if Toonces could drive a stick, surely he could enter a URL,
Annabelle and the Roches have now initiated Catbook, which, let’s face
it, is an entirely selfless thing for a dog to do. With Catbook now
pushing the half-million member mark, Annabelle obviously knew it was
time we let cats play with the mouse.