Tuesdays with Bella

Tuesdays in recent months I have been dog-sitting a wonderful retriever cross who belongs to a close friend of mine. He (the friend) has to cope with a full time job - a 50% child care arangement and looking after an old but active hunting dog. Taking Bella under my wing on Tuesdays was no problem - indeed even a pleasure. On fine days I would pick her up from W's house in the morning, drive to the arboretum, walk her through the woods and along the dyke into town, give her a walk or ball throwing session at lunchtime and then walk her back to the car in the evening. Both she and I got lots of exercise.
This pattern changed about a month ago when the manager of the business centre where I rent an ofice in pointed out to me that having dogs on the premises was against the contract (which is in Dutch so I never really checked the very fine print). I felt a bit pissed off. Bella sat in my office for a few hours a day - didn't cause any problems and several other leasers of offices and centre employees had been bringing in their dogs into the centre on an occasional basis without any problem. A month after this petit contretremps I am still trying to walk Bella on Tuesdays - but it requires a lot more forethought, planning and petrol consumption. And it has led me to at reconsider my future office leasing options, largely on principle as I have always rebelled against people and systems that seek to impose petty rules. As an independent agent I find it increasingly difficult to accept arbitary rules and regulations (more about this on unilateral and universal smoking bans later) that do not have a logical justification.