It was a hot April afternoon when I set out to do a spot of shopping. As usual, Hotdog, my black Labrador accompanied me. I headed to a shop on Khader Nawaz Khan Road. When I alighted from the car, I instructed my driver to park in the shade; I also rolled down the windows so that there would be fresh air circulating in the car. When I returned to the car, the driver and Hotdog were standing below a tree. We got into the car and I made a quick stop at another shop for five minutes, again ensuring that the car was parked in the shade and the windows were rolled down. Post darting in and out of the shop, we headed home. It was hot despite the air-conditioning. At some point, I pulled out a face towel to wipe my sweaty face and was alarmed when I saw blood on it. I peered into the rear-view mirror but discovered I wasn’t bleeding. Then where was the blood coming from? I looked down at Hotdog who was in my lap, staring out of the window and, to my horror, I discovered that he was bleeding from the nose. To cut a long story short, I called my vet and rushed there. They suspected a heat stroke but couldn’t rule out tick fever or other conditions. They drew blood from him and he was given meds to staunch the bleeding. It took almost six hours for the bleeding to stop. I took him home, he drank lots of cold water and went off to sleep. The next morning, I was told that he had no tick fever or anything else; he had suffered a heat stroke.