It was the third consecutive landslide for Sam, a hairless, blind, dermatologically challenged fellow who bears more than a passing resemblance to Yoda, or maybe the Cryptkeeper. (The first year Sam won, Japanese television producers – struck by his resemblance to one of their more successful imports, Godzilla – hurriedly dispatched a camera crew.)

“Every year the photo gets worse” – or, depending on how you look at it, better – says Sam’s owner, Susie Lockheed, who affectionately describes Sam as a “mutant.” “He has a big hernia bulge, extra-long nails, a lipoma lump in the middle of his chest, and a little line of moles and warts that march down his snout like a stegosaurus.”