Someone, a girl actually, chose to describe me as "a perfect capybara," which -- none of us but her ever having seen one -- left me undisturbed until the following morning when I looked it up in the single volume of the World Book Encyclopedia I owned, unfortunately the letter C. . . . I took a good look in the mirror. The girl had been right. What woman would ever want to date a capybara? But the bright side of that experience was that the research I did that morning began a lifelong interest in animals -- not a bad thing for someone who spends most of his time alone.

from " Toward You" by Jim Krusoe.