The convenience store in my office building carries - in addition to all the basic junk food - mass-market doodads designed to put some paradoxical version of individuality on corporate desks: Dilbert mugs and Beanie Babies and magnetic poetry kits and so on. I pass an aisle full of plush toys on my way to the soda case, and what do I see among the big-eyed bunnies but a mean looking three-headed dog.

Naturally, I go apeshit. Inside my head I’m hollering, "Cerberus! Here, boy! Who’s Mommy’s little hell hound? You are! Yes you are! Good dog, dog, dog!"

I grab it up and look around, hoping against the odds to find a whole Super Action Funtime Labors of Hercules toy series. They have Cerberus - maybe they have an Augean Stables play set (cattle sold separately, dung not included)!

That’s when I notice my beloved new pet is a piece of Harry Potter merchandising.

Life is so unfair.