Every so often – about once a month – I get invited on to James Valentine’s Afternoons on ABC 702.Last week the topic was pets in apartments – partly because that was all anyone was talking about.So we had a couple of people ringing up with their pet questions and complaints, all of which has indirectly added to a pet-heavy Flat Chat website this week.And that was exacerbated by my response to a question about whether or not there was a guide to the best dogs for apartments.Listen Here“Oh, yes,” I blithely replied.  “You’ll find it on the website.”I wasn’t sure where but I knew it would be there … except it wasn’t. I don’t know how I managed to convince myself that I’d already done this, but I did and I hadn’t.Which is why I spent my weekend digging through and collating the opinions of half a dozen websites purporting to offer the definitive list of the best dogs for units.If you are interested, you can find that info here.  Otherwise, if you missed the session on Afternoons, sit back and enjoy our chat from last week which we hope was entertaining and informative.Transcript in fullJimmy  00:00Every so often (I won't say regularly, because it's anything but regular), but just about once a month, I get invited onto James Valentine's Afternoons on ABC 702 radio. Last week, James asked me on to talk about pets, because everybody's talking about pets. Nobody's talking about anything else except pets at the moment. I thought that would make a very good podcast. I'm Jimmy Thomson. This is the Flat Chat Wrap.[MUSIC]James  00:55Hello, Canberra, hello, Sydney, hello, Newcastle. Three of the great cities of this nation, combined together with one radio show. It's a beautiful, beautiful thing. For those in Canberra who haven't encountered Jimmy Thomson, let me set the scene for you. Jimmy Thomson (for longer than even he cares to remember and for longer than most people can), has been looking at the strata rules of largely, New South Wales and the ACT. Now, you might think to yourself, ‘wow, he sounds like an interesting fellow,’ and this is the odd thing about Jimmy Thomson… He makes it very interesting. As more and more Australians (in all those cities I'm describing), end up living in apartments and strata and townhouses and the like; more of us have got to get our head across what that means and what some of the issues are. Jimmy runs a website called www.flatchat.com.au  He's also written for the Domain and the Herald for many years on these issues. You can follow up on anything we're talking about today by going to www.flatchat.com.au  and you can look at the debates they've had and the issues that have been there. We found it very, very helpful (and many have, listening to this), to get Jimmy in to talk through changes as they're coming along. Now, we decided to have something of a Flat Chat special today, because Jimmy and I were linked in to a discussion on Twitter, about an assistant dog. Jimmy, g’day!Jimmy  02:27Good afternoon.James  02:31Good afternoon. Nice to have you have you along, as always. Look, I'm so annoyed. I can't believe that our building manager is having another go at removing Buddy from the building; Buddy being a dog. We've got the Assistant dog jacket and approval. This person has now gone to their employer and they've sent a letter, because now the building manager is saying ‘oh, the dog is overweight; the dog is over a weight limit. The dog is too big for the building.’ The building manager hates dogs, and it's making it so difficult to deal with this. This is an Assistance dog. These are these marvelous dogs that will be trained in all sorts of ways to help people with all kinds of disabilities, mental health issues, and all the rest. It is absolutely fantastic thing. If there's one dog you might want in your apartment building, it would be an assistance dog. It'll be really great; it will be well-trained and would abs..

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Recorded by Jimmy Thomson & Sue Williams; Transcribed by Otter.ai.
Find out more about Sue Williams and Jimmy Thomson on their websites.