Am I Dog Person?

My eyesight is better than Anna's. So whenever we go for drives or walks, I have taken over the job of pointing out meaty dogs. It could be a black lab on the other side of (I kid you not) Putah Creek in our arboretum. Or it could be someone walking a St. Bernard on the sidewalk as we drive along. Anna's response is, invariably, to coo about the virtues of the dog she has never met. One side effect of this behaviour is that I, somewhere along the way, convinced myself that I was a dog person. After two weeks of tending Nisa, and for a portion of that being the primary caregiver, I can report that I'm wouldn't use that term to describe myself. At least not yet. I liked Nisa and think big dogs in general are cute. But I still don't really trust them or myself around them.

Because mostly, I was nervous around Nisa. She would make a noise or turn up her nose at her food and I would be in contact with Anna immediately. "What does it mean when she sniffs?" I'd ask. Or maybe, "What does it mean that she has four legs?" I liked walking her, but felt utterly frantic at the times she would run in circles and try to get out of her collar. I loved watching PTI with her sitting next to me on the couch, or the way she followed me into the other room and napped next to me when I was borderline sick (which is to say, when, on the first night, I had awoken at every sound in fear it was Nisa barking or the manager tacking an eviction notice to the door). That was really nice. But when she was awake and moving, I was constantly tense. I worried she would eat chocolate, shit on the purple chair or bite a neighbor. Perhaps this is what parenthood is like.

I found as our stint went on, however, that when she did something bad I stopped feeling frightened and instead started to get frustrated. I think, actually, that counts as a progress. I adjusted from feeling out-of-control to believing as though I was just fucking up. Accepting the latter also meant that I believed I could control the situation. And that's something to build on.

I also think it's like parenthood, because most of what we did for two weeks was talk about her. Because she was sweet and smart. I'm told that when people were crying in our apartment, Nisa was right there to lick the tears away. That's an important skill for any family gathering. Also whenever we left, we'd lock her in the kennel with a bone we'd spread peanut butter inside. This is Nisa's favorite treat. But after a particularly busy day in which she had eaten too many peanut-butter bones, Nisa came out of the kennel and refused to give up the bone. She'd carry it with her, and, when I tried to grab it she'd gently pick it up and walk away it. As long as we couldn't give her any peanut-butter bones, she had clearly reasoned, we couldn't leave her alone. I love that story. But I can't imagine you're interested at all.

When I came home from work Saturday, I was relieved that Nisa had gone. What I find today is that I miss having her in the apartment. Actually, we've been walking up to each other at various times today pretending to pin our ears back and sniff inquisitively. Some people get dogs as practice for having kids. But our time with Nisa was practice for getting a dog. Anna told me Friday that she didn't think I was ready. She's probably right, although I have two points about that: 1. Maybe an 80-pound German Shepherd with Post Tramautic Stress Disorder isn't the best starter dog and 2. Who's ever ready to undertake any large responsibility?

The good news is Nisa emerged from our apartment none the worse for wear. I probably set her training back a month or two, though.

Auld Lang Syne, Yeah, Yeah, Blah, Blah

Call me a Grinch, but if you're already getting laid, what exactly is the point of New Year's Eve?

I am told that the point is partying. Partying on New Year's, as I dimly recall, means braving the cold and dodging drunk drivers and terrorist attacks, in order to turn up at a party stocked with schnapps and poison sausage and make small talk with optimistic meeskeits, or worse, married people. So far, Mike and I have bid adieu to 2006 with a day full of debauchery designed to clean out our fridge in anticipation of the clean living of January. Tonight, we will attend our first New Year's Eve party in many years. Our last party was in 2003-4, when Ryan took us to a Louvre-style mansion in Orange County, where we played Spot the Implants most of the evening. In trying to pin down this datum, we wound up having a New Year's Eve retrospective. It turns out the preponderance of our New Year's Eve celebrations have been festivals of crapulence and ill feeling.

New 2003 was spent in New York, on our first visit back since moving from Hobbs. The first part of that evening was spent quite happily in Scott's old apartment on 110th St, and the second part more drunkenly at a large party in Carroll Gardens. New 2002 was at Sarah's ex-boyfriend's dorm in Watt Hall; the party was staffed by prostitutes from Delta Gamma. We remember mostly that Mike had diarrhea, that certain parties accused me of flirting with their boyfriends which I never do, and that one guest spent the whole night on the phone to his girlfriend who's name was, I swear, Fea. New 2001 was the time we brought Mike's sister (then 17 years old) to a party downtown and she hooked up with our host, for which Mike has absolutely not forgiven said host. New 2000 marked the end of what we have come to call Punishment December. My parents' apartment was covered in canned goods Just in Case, and we had somehow cajoled my mother's friend David into loaning us his apartment so everyone could be together when the world ended. On this particular evening, Mike's sister (who was then 16) wound up on the roof making out with one of our classmates, for which Mike has still not forgiven said classmate. It's also the night on which I introduced myself to Mike's then girlfriend, and got Mike in a lot of trouble. I finished off the evening snogging with someone I had personally helped to vomit earlier that evening, while a third party watched with a bag of Doritos.

Mike observes that we have spent every New Year since 2000 together. He was in Detroit in 1999, probably hanging out with the aforementioned girlfriend and staying away from the windows to avoid celebratory gunfire. He doesn't remember 1998, and almost every New Year prior to that was spent in New York. Usually his parents would go to the same party, and he and Lola would go to a midnight movie with Cool Aunt Ellen. There were a few in Detroit, but Proust he isn't.

I had a stomach virus on New Years of both 1999 and 1998, which was just as well, as it covered up my not having plans. Isaac had left for college by then, and I had come to count on him for New Years plans. He continued to call and leave me countdown voice mails for a few years to make it up to me. He was there in 1997 when we went down to stay with Jess in D.C., and watch The Silence of the Lambs and The Evil Dead II. In 1996 he and I walked down to Times Square from his parents' apartment on 90th and Riverside (the only year I ever did it), though we never made it farther than 53rd, I think, and wound up having milkshakes while waiting for the crowds to disperse. In 1995 I was in Helsinki, and having a tremendous time with Clíona's friends--she was two years older than I and they were two years older than she, so I spent a lot of time pretending to be more 18 than I really was. Possibly due to their proximity to the Arctic Circle, everyone in that town was shitfaced by 10:00 in the morning besides Clíona and me, thus enhancing my air of maturity.

All New Year's Eves before that have disappeared into a haze of no-plans-having-ness, except for 1990 and 1984. In 1990 I was freaking out about the approach of a new decade, and for some reason wanted to make sure I was touching everyone in my family, including the dog, at midnight. In 1984, we were spending the night in Brooklyn, and we went out into the streets to bang on metal pots with wooden spoons. Mike would like to add that he was probably in Brooklyn that night, too. Jeff, obviously, was not.

So basically, I would usually prefer to stay home and watch Sam Raimi movies with my husband, who's cute. But sometimes, I accidentally wind up making friends, or worse, Mike does. And then, there's nothing for it but to go out and party. Ugh.

A Holiday Feast

Our holiday recaps will come in waves. First, and perhaps most importantly, we'll start with the food. Here are the meals we served:

Christmas Eve
White Bean and Olive Soup
Potato Latkes
Roast Beef
Pumpkin (actually squash) Pie

Christmas Night
Baked Brie with currants and almonds
Sausage Stuffed Mushrooms
Spinach Stuffed Mushrooms
Penne Arrabbiata
Caesar Salad
Homemade Chocolate Mousse with Ellen's Blackberry Sauce

One More Tradition Sabotaged by Mixed Marriages

Andy M sent us this link to Christmas Time for the Jews.

Holiday Classics

This holiday season, I hope everyone's remembering to focus on the important things, like steering clear of dodgy roast goose (Laura has food poisoning, poor thing) not macing any relatives who might put you in their wills, and not getting pregnant atop piles of coats unless it's on purpose. Having once again attended the Holiday Party from Hell, I was reminded of this immortal passage from Bridget Jones: The Edge of Reason. Helen Fielding has her detractors, but they are wankers.

Usually, week before Christmas, am hung over and hysterical, furious with self for not escaping to tiny woodman's cottage deep in forest to sit quietly by fire; instead of waking up in huge, throbbing, mountingly hysterical city with population gnawing off entire fists at thought of work/cards/present deadlines, getting trussed up like chickens in order to sit in gridlocked streets, bellowing like bears at newly employed minicab drivers for trying to locate Soho Square using map of central Addis Ababa, then arrive at parties to be greeted by same group of people have seen for last three nights only three times more drunk and hungover, and want to shout "WILL YOU ALL JUST SOD OFF!" and go home....This attitude is both negative and wrong.