IT was a lazy Saturday morning. The winter sun was throwing a pallid wash through the lounge-room window. I needed to go to the market, but breakfast, first: the steam curling upwards from the porridge, dampening my face; the newspaper stiff in its tight roll. I scratched for the edge of the plastic, found it and peeled back the thin film, relished its sticky roar.

When the paper fell free I smoothed and bent its pages out of their rigid waves and extracted my favourite liftout. Flipped through the pages, blowing on spoonfuls of porridge. Stopped. A picture of a kelpie from –skimming, skimming – a ‘family movie…opening this week’, one that was called – yes, here it was, here was the proof to spite the incredulous surely not! mantra pulsing through me – called Red Dog.