So Aidan and I were hanging out the other day, and Jack (the big brown lab) was nearby, and we were talking about him. We've been having some trouble with Jack and Neuf peeing in the house, but generally Jack is a really good dog. We proceeded to have this conversation...
Aidan - "I love Jack."
Me - "Well, that's because you don't have to clean up his pee and poop."
Aidan - "But I can't."
Me - (Incredulous snort) "And why is that?" (A lot things that Aidan doesn't want to do lately he simply attributes to "I caaaaaaaan't.")
Aidan - "Because my shirt isn't big enough."
Me - "...What? How does that have anything to do with cleaning up dog poop?"
Aidan - "My shirt's not big so it won't reach up to cover my nose like Dada's shirt does."
Classic.
My other favorite thing he said was the other day when we were in the dentist's office waiting for people to stick pointy things into my mouth. Out of the blue he says,
"Al Pal, I love you."
Awwwwwwwwwwwww! I was so touched. It wasn't the first time he'd said that he loves me, but it was so random and so sweet. Unfortunately, it was somewhat eclipsed about 30 seconds later when he put his hand out to the wall, sighed, and said,
"I love this wall."
Ok, so I'm on par with the wall at the dentist's office. Hey, at least I'm loved.
Sunday, July 24, 2011
Sunday, July 17, 2011
Ned.
Where am I? What's going on? I went from living on my own in a studio apartment in Seattle to a massive house in the Dominican Republic with two other adults, a 3 year old, and now 3, count em, t-h-r-e-e dogs. The thing is, I kinda like this new one.
This is Ned. He was found walking by the side of the road in the Samana Peninsula, covered in fleas and ticks and days, if not hours, away from death. I give full props to Dave and Joan, they were the ones who kicked into action, Joan made sad noises and Dave swung the car around to go get Ned. Me, I'm a horrible realist and could have just driven by without much thought to it. It's a harsh reality but that's the life of most of the dogs in Samana. I tried my best to save a Samana dog last year after getting too attached to her, and we all know how that turned out. I figured that Joan and Dave were just heading down a road that would only lead to a world of hurt. But we scooped Ned up (and I say "we" at this point because, although I was the most reluctant of the crew, I was the one that ended up with the flea-ridden cur in my lap) and took him back to our hotel/apartment and proceeded to painstakingly remove somewhere around 500 fleas from him. No, I'm not overestimating, I couldn't have imagined that sheer number of fleas on such a tiny dog.
About 10 baths and 5 hours later, Ned was clean and mostly flea-free. He ended up coming home to Santo Domigo with us and was given a clean bill of health from the vet. So he's been with us for a week, and each day I'm becoming more and more skeptical that he'll ever not be with us. Since I'm home more of the time and Joan and Dave already have plenty to deal with, I've become Ned's keeper and trainer, and honestly it's filling a much-needed empty spot in my life. One of the main reasons I fought so hard to get the rats to be able to come down here with me is that they fill my nurturing need. And yes, while I'm down here I get to look after Aidan, but he isn't mine, and the person he heads for when he most needs nurturing is Joan - and rightly so. So it's been good for me to have something to take care of. It's of course, stressful and icky training a puppy, but honestly, Ned seems highly intelligent and is picking up a lot of training really quickly, especially considering his age (the vet thought around 5 weeks, so he would now be about 6 weeks old). So yeah, he's pretty great... you know... for a dog.
This is Ned. He was found walking by the side of the road in the Samana Peninsula, covered in fleas and ticks and days, if not hours, away from death. I give full props to Dave and Joan, they were the ones who kicked into action, Joan made sad noises and Dave swung the car around to go get Ned. Me, I'm a horrible realist and could have just driven by without much thought to it. It's a harsh reality but that's the life of most of the dogs in Samana. I tried my best to save a Samana dog last year after getting too attached to her, and we all know how that turned out. I figured that Joan and Dave were just heading down a road that would only lead to a world of hurt. But we scooped Ned up (and I say "we" at this point because, although I was the most reluctant of the crew, I was the one that ended up with the flea-ridden cur in my lap) and took him back to our hotel/apartment and proceeded to painstakingly remove somewhere around 500 fleas from him. No, I'm not overestimating, I couldn't have imagined that sheer number of fleas on such a tiny dog.
About 10 baths and 5 hours later, Ned was clean and mostly flea-free. He ended up coming home to Santo Domigo with us and was given a clean bill of health from the vet. So he's been with us for a week, and each day I'm becoming more and more skeptical that he'll ever not be with us. Since I'm home more of the time and Joan and Dave already have plenty to deal with, I've become Ned's keeper and trainer, and honestly it's filling a much-needed empty spot in my life. One of the main reasons I fought so hard to get the rats to be able to come down here with me is that they fill my nurturing need. And yes, while I'm down here I get to look after Aidan, but he isn't mine, and the person he heads for when he most needs nurturing is Joan - and rightly so. So it's been good for me to have something to take care of. It's of course, stressful and icky training a puppy, but honestly, Ned seems highly intelligent and is picking up a lot of training really quickly, especially considering his age (the vet thought around 5 weeks, so he would now be about 6 weeks old). So yeah, he's pretty great... you know... for a dog.
Monday, July 4, 2011
Wet, White and Blue
Wettest... 4th of July... ever. No, seriously. EVER. Did it rain on your 4th of July? I can assure you, it rained more here. In fact it didn't stop raining. EVER. The whole day. I'm not embellishing. It's still raining.
That being said though, my, my I had a good time. The biggest party of the year at the Embassy is the 4th of July party, and though the estimates were somewhere around 500-600 of the possible 1000-1100 people expected to show up, that was actually ok since there was precious little space to stand and still manage to stay dry anyway. It's a bit of a pity, as the Embassy has pretty nice grounds, and there were all these little tables set up on the lawn that would have been lovely in nice weather, but Mother Nature had other nefarious soggy plans.
I got to play pretend diplomat and help out by corralling the VIPs through the entryway, as they walked through I greeted them in my few words of Spanish; "welcome! Good evening." and gesture them into the next room, hoping they wouldn't try to talk to me. If they did, I nodded with wide eyes until I could smile and inform them that my Spanish was "no mucho, lo siento." I shook hands and kissed cheeks of people in high, high places... and I have no idea who any of them were.
One of the highlights of the evening was hearing the National Anthem being sung as peals of thunder rumbled in the skies and rain poured down in buckets - BUCKETS! By the time I got to the buffet line (which was under a tent but on the lawn) it was a mud runway.
Much to our surprise, in spite of the rain there were fireworks that burst in all their color and glory and no doubt scared the shit out of Dominicans who weren't aware it was the US Independence Day. It was pretty cool though, standing in mud on the lawn of the US Embassy in Santo Domingo holding a whiskey and soda, watching pyrotechnics and thinking about how damn lucky I am to be me.
That being said though, my, my I had a good time. The biggest party of the year at the Embassy is the 4th of July party, and though the estimates were somewhere around 500-600 of the possible 1000-1100 people expected to show up, that was actually ok since there was precious little space to stand and still manage to stay dry anyway. It's a bit of a pity, as the Embassy has pretty nice grounds, and there were all these little tables set up on the lawn that would have been lovely in nice weather, but Mother Nature had other nefarious soggy plans.
I got to play pretend diplomat and help out by corralling the VIPs through the entryway, as they walked through I greeted them in my few words of Spanish; "welcome! Good evening." and gesture them into the next room, hoping they wouldn't try to talk to me. If they did, I nodded with wide eyes until I could smile and inform them that my Spanish was "no mucho, lo siento." I shook hands and kissed cheeks of people in high, high places... and I have no idea who any of them were.
One of the highlights of the evening was hearing the National Anthem being sung as peals of thunder rumbled in the skies and rain poured down in buckets - BUCKETS! By the time I got to the buffet line (which was under a tent but on the lawn) it was a mud runway.
Much to our surprise, in spite of the rain there were fireworks that burst in all their color and glory and no doubt scared the shit out of Dominicans who weren't aware it was the US Independence Day. It was pretty cool though, standing in mud on the lawn of the US Embassy in Santo Domingo holding a whiskey and soda, watching pyrotechnics and thinking about how damn lucky I am to be me.
Good influence... Me?
I'm happy to report that apparently I'm a good influence on this household. I'm getting the family to eat more vegetables, and the other day Joan and I finally went about turning the extra bedroom into an exercise room. I even got Aidan to eat two pieces of broccoli the other day! This is a major achievement, let me tell you. The entire time I was here last year, and the time that I've been here so far this year, I had never, EVER seen Aidan eat a vegetable. The closest thing to a vegetable I'd ever seen him eat was a piece of an apple that had sat next to some green beans in the refrigerator. He wanted a banana muffin (acceptable) with frosting and sprinkles (only as a special treat). So I asked him what he was going to do for that frosting and sprinkles. I was eating lunch at the time and I put two pieces of broccoli in front of him and told him to eat it. I figures there was NO WAY he'd actually do it... but he did! We talked about the tongue doesn't like broccoli so much, but the body does. So you just gotta chew through the eeew and swallow, and that makes the body very happy! Then, of course, you chase it down with frosting and sprinkles.
Adorable Adian Adult Quote of the Day - "Sigh... I'm really stressed out, I need to do some yoga."
Adorable Adian Adult Quote of the Day - "Sigh... I'm really stressed out, I need to do some yoga."
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