which would brings us closer to japanese.. japanese pronouns are gender neutral. and just as japanese speaking english tend to say fright for flight they also tend to say "the man went shopping and she bought a new suit" She is close to sho-- which is an honorable term for a man, (as in Sho gun) and Sho can also be a mans name.
the problems doesn't come in japanese, because they use one pronoun-- for men, women and dogs..

and teresa, when the dog starts carrying a credit card, i will start to wonder who it was that was buying the the knickers, but i realize it could be confusing. my sister has to pay strict attention in conversational japanese to keep track of who is it in any given conversation!