I was having this discussion with That Guy in his bed one evening shortly after the New Year. I asked him if he'd made any resolutions, and he said that he had resolved to live his life more fully and to have increased financial discipline in 2012. I pointed out that his resolutions were a) helplessly vague, and b) self-contradictory, and he didn't really appreciate that. When he asked me what my resolutions were, I said, "I'm going to moisturize this year." He didn't really appreciate that, either, but I figure moisturizing is a) specific, b) useful, and c) achievable. At which point, he said "Kiss My Face," which turned out to be a brand recommendation rather than an invitation to anything amorous. For what it's worth, I'm sticking with Aveeno. That's pretty much the entirety of my skin care regimen, except that I mostly remember to shave in the morning.
As it happens, I broke things off with That Guy this past weekend. There isn't any point in going into details. If you complain about boyfriends or ex-boyfriends, either you sound petty, or you invite people to wonder why you put up with him for as long as you did. I'll just say that over the course of the year-plus that I dated him, I learned a number of valuable lessons, and my tolerance for spicy foods increased by a factor of maybe three. You should really try my chocolate pots-de-creme with cayenne and cinnamon. My only real regret is that I ordered his Valentine's Day gift before the split, but I'm happy to have it over before tax season gets grueling. Live and learn.
Anyway, the big news of the past few months has nothing to do with departures. We have added a new member to the household. After an application process that was probably only slightly less involved than getting a high-level security clearance, we adopted a rescue greyhound.
We picked Luna up from her foster home the day after Thanksgiving. And, well, let me just say that I love having a dog, and I especially love having this dog. She is perhaps not overly bright, and she's kind of clumsy, but she's incredibly sweet and very pretty. I don't have any really good pictures of her because she is, apparently, genetically programmed to move quickly whenever a camera is trained on her.
For years I've wanted a dog, but I'd held out because of my schedule. But with EFU living with me while she gets her master's (and then, the plan is, during her first year of teaching), it works out pretty well. EFU feeds and walks Luna in the morning, and I feed and walk her in the evening. When tax season gets hairy, EFU will likely take over more of the duties. Also, when EFU moves out in another eighteen or so months, she may take Luna with her. At that point, I might volunteer for foster care during the slower months of the year.
The adoption organization (which, believe me, is an incredibly thorough group of greyhound lovers) requires us to take Luna to obedience training, and we're starting that this coming Saturday. I found a beginning class on Saturday afternoons at 4, so I should be able to make that even when the returns are coming fast and furious.
Greyhounds are pretty great dogs, and they work really well with my lifestyle because they're very active for about fifteen minutes twice a day, and then they mostly turn into couch potatoes. (Because we had her, we drove to Florida right after Christmas this year to visit my mother and some of the rest of my family, and Luna was a champ all the way down and back.) Also, their racing background means that they're crate trained and they actually feel very comfortable staying in their crate, so I can just give Luna a treat and latch the crate door when a gentleman caller shows up.
Some of their other quirks include their leanness and their short hair which combine to make them need a coat when the weather turns cold. I've made a couple of coats for Luna. This is not one of them:
That's actually Luna in the pajamas that my mother sent to EFU for Christmas. They are not so appropriate for a twenty-two-year-old with a fear of synthetic fibers, but EFU had a lot of fun making Luna wear them. Luna tried her best to ignore the rather obvious affront to her dignity (as well as the poor fit). She's good at that.
Anyway, having a greyhound is great, and I highly recommend it, especially to anyone with a high tolerance for having his face licked. And the ones that don't get adopted get shot, so there's that, too.
There's not a lot of other stuff going on. The holidays were very pleasant, despite the $244 speeding ticket I got in Waldo, Florida (apparently, I'm the only person in the continental U.S. who doesn't know there's a speed trap there) while driving down for the holidays. In general, I don't recommend twenty-hour car rides, but with such pleasant company, we managed to have a wonderful time, our encounter with Officer Friendly notwithstanding. I and the girls (two daughters, one dog) ended up spending New Year's Eve in a motel room in Greenville, North Carolina, where we ate substandard Chinese takeout, played card games, and watched a marathon of The Big Bang Theory. It was not, perhaps, fabulous, but it was great.
