title: MySql count(*) without group by
body: <p>I have the following table <code>pet</code>:</p>
  
  <pre><code>+----------+--------+---------+------+------------+------------+
  | name     | owner  | species | sex  | birth      | death      |
  +----------+--------+---------+------+------------+------------+
  | Fluffy   | Harold | cat     | f    | 1993-02-04 | NULL       |
  | Claws    | Gwen   | cat     | m    | 1994-03-17 | NULL       |
  | Buffy    | Harold | dog     | f    | 1989-05-13 | NULL       |
  | Fang     | Benny  | dog     | m    | 1990-08-27 | NULL       |
  | Bowser   | Diane  | dog     | m    | 1989-03-31 | 1995-07-29 |
  | Chirpy   | Gwen   | bird    | f    | 1998-09-11 | NULL       |
  | Whistler | Gwen   | bird    | NULL | 1997-12-09 | NULL       |
  | Slim     | Benny  | snake   | m    | 1996-04-29 | NULL       |
  | Puffball | Diane  | hamster | f    | 1999-03-30 | NULL       |
  | Jenny    | Robert | dog     | f    | 2004-01-01 | 2014-05-04 |
  +----------+--------+---------+------+------------+------------+
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>I decided to run a query without a <code>GROUP BY</code> clause as follows:</p>
  
  <p><code>SELECT owner, COUNT(*) FROM pet;</code></p>
  
  <p>Got the following:</p>
  
  <pre><code>+--------+----------+
  | owner  | count(*) |
  +--------+----------+
  | Harold |       10 |
  +--------+----------+
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>I would've thought that <code>Robert</code> would've been in the <code>owner</code> column since alphabetically it's the last one. Any idea why I got this output?</p>