CONTENTS UNDER PRESSURE: CORPORATE LIFE IS GOING TO THE DOGS (BUT NOT CATS)

At some Silicon Valley companies, employees can take their pets to the office.

The theory is that employees who don't have to worry how Fido and Fluffy are doing at home while they're away at the office are happy employees.

Happy employees are productive employees.

Provided they're not too happy. Then they're just annoying, which cuts down on their co-workers' productivity.

A lot of pet-owners consider their animals their children. A lot of pets get treated better than some children, and there's a certain logic to that.

Pets don't require a college fund. They're easier to potty-train then the average toddler.

Your pets aren't going to run off with a rock musician and get pregnant. They're not going to ask to borrow the car, or send your insurance premiums through the roof.

They're not going to get anything pierced or tattooed or dye their fur a weird color because all the other pets on the block are doing it.

And when you get old, your pets aren't going to try to stick you in a nursing home.

Of course, you can't claim the cat as a tax deduction, but no system is perfect.

Maybe after Congress finishes overhauling the IRS...

If I had a dog (now there's a thought), I think I'd like to be able to bring it to the office with me.

Of course, I'd have to make sure it was a nice, friendly dog that was good with strangers, didn't bite and had had all its shots.

Actually, that's kind of a novelty in a newsroom.

You could take the dog for short walks on your lunch hour or smoke break. It could curl up under your desk and keep your feet warm. It could provide moral support during employee evaluations.

We could celebrate "Take Your Doberman to Work" Day.

Taking a cat to work could be a problem. Cats are natural anarchists.

Take a cat to the office, and by lunchtime it would be in the break room organizing a union. Or if it's a union shop, it would be urging employees to throw the union out.

The cat would roam all over the building and sleep on strangers' desks. It would hide in file cabinets and make a nest out of all those memos you're supposed to file away forever.

It would read everyone's e-mail and send nasty messages out in return.

It would get cat hair in sensitive, expensive computer equipment.

Try explaining that to the techno-geeks upstairs who go ballistic if somebody spills coffee on their keyboard.

And there's always the problem of where to put the litter box. It's certainly not going under my desk, and while there may be a couch in the ladies' room, I think the girls at the office would object to installing a potty-box.

Actually, my cat, Melissa, would make a great newsroom cat. She's reasonably friendly, she's very curious, she types as well as most reporters do and she's black and white, so newsprint wouldn't be a problem.

Now if we could just do something about the cat hair...

Peggy O'Farrell is a staff writer for the Southeast Missourian.