People are funny, but so are the animals we love-and our day-to-day relationships with them can be even more entertaining. Dogs and cats obviously rule the comedic roost, but parrots, parakeets, and other talking birds are often an endless source of amusement as well. Even our connection to bunnies, hamsters, and the occasional white rat can evoke a good laugh.

The 500-plus pet anecdotes, cartoons, and quotes in Laughter Is The Best Medicine: Those Lovable Pets have been collected from more than eight decades' worth of Reader's Digest magazines and are guaranteed to cheer up your day. You'll meet the woman whose dog trembled at the "Beware of Dog" sign in their front yard until she told him, "Relax! It's you!"; the vet whose advice to a woman whose cat had swallowed lots of unpopped popcorn was, "first, keep him out of the sun"; the mother-in-law who concealed her way-too-plump piglet's weight loss pills in ice cream; and much more.

Our furry or fine feathered friends not only warm our hearts but also amuse us (and our joke writers, too) with their antics-one reason, no doubt, the market for this book is so vast: At the minimum, 40 percent of American households own at least one pet.