Ever since I taught my younger brother to play chess I have been avoiding this day — the day of face-to-face competition. Now you\’re going to see why I hid the chess pieces.

The first thing I noticed about my dear brother\’s piece is that except for our own canines, every other dog he mentioned was fictitious. Why is this pertinent? Well, I submit that my esteemed opponent lives in La-La Land with those fake doggies. Here\’s what happens in the real world, Dave.

Thanksgiving ’98: I run home for a stick of butter I left on my kitchen counter. As I enter, I encounter a strange smell that could only be described as “fouler than death,” and the butter is missing. When I call my dog, she slinks over to me. Suddenly, I see why: there is butter-induced dog puke all over my kitchen — and my living room. But we weren’t finished! To top it off, she left a cow liver in the hallway!

That’s not all! A year earlier, when she had puppies, she broke out of her carefully constructed kitchen kennel, and had a puppy in every room before we got home! So point 1 is this: cats make cat-sized messes. When a dog makes a mess, it can change your family vocabulary forever: “Life is rough, and then your dog eats butter.” Check.

Point 2: The worst thing a cat will do to a visitor is ignore her. But when visiting dog-occupied homes, I’ve experienced a number of horrific scenarios — the large dog that hates me and wants to kill me, the large dog that loves me and want to slobber all over me. Or the VEEERRRY large dog who thinks I smell reeeally greeeaat, and would love to smell me more, forcing me to push its huge face (where the teeth are) away, at risk of great physical harm. Finally, there’s the small dog who sees me as a threat and barks loudly and constantly, threatening to bite if I so much as move.

Yip yip yip, yip yip! Yip, yip, yip, yip yip! Yip yip!!

Yip!

Check.

Why do I like cats? Because they know how to shut up!! Plus, they\’re soft and cuddly, don\’t need a lot of attention, and can be left alone for a weekend with a bowl of Special Kitty and a dripping faucet. A cat is like a stuffed animal with a personality! We get ours fixed and train them to go to the bathroom outdoors, then sit back and enjoy the benefits — which include killing massive numbers of rodents (ridding the world of potential epidemics), with no thanks asked in return. A recent study says that cats can even prevent heart attacks! Maybe it’s the calming effect of not having to clean up butter puke and roadkill.

By the way, Dave, your rook\’s in the hall closet. Love you, bro — checkmate.

Wallace P. MacSweet. Liberty Diefenbaker Proton Fay. Lady and the Tramp. Rin-Tin-Tin, Lassie and Ol’ Yeller. Benji, Air Bud, Underdog, Chance, and Shadow, to mention but a few. Time fails me to tell of all the shining examples of dogs who have distinguished themselves in the annals of human history through their loyalty, bravery and undying devotion.

When the Phantom needs a sidekick, does he turn to anyone but Devil to watch his back? Where would Charlie Brown be without Snoopy? And speaking of Snoopy, does he content himself to lie around eating up the family food budget, producing nothing but fertilizer? No. He is a certified war hero and flying ace, an attorney, and a hockey player to boot.

What does the cat world have to set against this? A lazy, fat, lasagna-eating, hairball-hacking fleabag that takes every opportunity he can find to embarrass and humiliate his owner?

And which side was Catwoman on in the epic battle of good and evil in Gotham City?

The dog has always been regarded as man’s best friend. Whether it’s for companionship, protection, or a hot meal in a pinch, dogs have always been the one animal on this planet that man could turn to in a time of need.

Imagine running the Iditarod across the frozen tundra, temperatures hovering near 50 below, and your life depending on a pack of . . . felines. If you ever even got a cat into Alaska, you certainly could never get it to leave the house in those sub-zero temperatures.

Dogs are domesticated friends, fellow laborers in all our troubles. Cats are parasites, who somehow attached themselves to the human race long ago, finding a soft place to sleep and free food.

Dogs are working animals. Blind people use seeing-eye dogs to navigate the world, and policemen use specially trained dogs to search for drugs, firearms, and explosives. Dogs control crowds; they find escaped criminals and lost Boy Scouts. Ranchers use dogs to round up sheep and cattle — nursing homes use them to improve the mental and physical health of the elderly. What do cats do, again? Oh yes, nothing.

I read that the essential difference between cats and dogs is this: When you come home after work, feed your dog, and pet him, he looks at you with devotion and wonder, thinking, “Wow, he must be a god!”

But when you do the same to a cat, it looks at you with contempt and annoyance, and thinks, “I must be a god.”