She also understands that if I am packing a suitcase it means I will be gone for a long time... she becomes frantically upset... it really is heartbreaking as she tries to convince me to not do such a terrible thing.

But her celebration ritual when I return makes up for it...

People that claim it is simply human projection to read human emotions into a dog's behavior have obviously never had a dog.

Our dog grins, laughs- has a sense of humor (admittedly a low-brow, slapstick humor), loves different people in different ways, and communicates in a spookily clear way... understands much of what we say, understands how to communicate to us what she wants, and in some cases has taught us how to communicate to her in her language a bit better...

I once tried to figure out what her english vocabulary must be.... its probably over a dozen words and some syntax... "UP" means many different things depending on the other words used with it and other context.

There have been quite a few incidents where she has genuinely creeped me out with her level of intelligence.

It's like living with an unusually pleasant and well behaved toddler. And the odd thing is we never really had to work at training her to be so well behaved- she just knows. She knows what Items are hers to chew on and tear up, and what items are ours- our items she treats with care and respect... even when she was a puppy. All her favorite treats are in bags within her reach- she will establish eye contact and point to them with her nose when she wants one, but would NEVER help herself to the bag. We never had to scold her to teach her that... same with the trash can...