Happy birthday, my darling hound dog, my favorite April fool!
I know it’s his special day, but – as with all days – it makes me feel very happy to have a hound to celebrate, even if I fear we will always be forced to live apart.
The best gift of all
Is the love of a hound dog -
It gives and it gives.
My boyfriend, Joe, is in town this week visiting from Oregon, which momentarily takes my mind off the pain of a hound-less existence. But human companionship is no substitute for a faithful pup and I remain optimistic for even brighter days. (Joe is what we like to call “A Keeper,” because he is not only a dog-lover but readily admits without ever having met Rocketman that he, Rocky, is the best dog in the universe. Joe’s yellow dog is pretty sweet in his own right, but…we know where my loyalties lie first and foremost.)
Monday Joe and I went to check out some potential apartments. It seemed too good to be true (cheap, near the park, very hound-friendly, no stairs, on a bus line) and it was. I guess they just bought the building and are in the process of fixing it up, but the place was a total crap heap. Holes in the floor, holes in the walls, not a great neighborhood, way further from the park than I was led to believe. I’m glad Joe came along because he noticed all sorts of things that predict the house will eventually sink into the ground and be eaten by a monster.
The second place was similarly rundown (unintentional skylights in every room…), but I got to see a fixed-up version and it was nice enough. I sort of fell in love with the huge windows and all the evening light coming in, but it was even further from the park and far away from a bus stop, grocery store, laundromat, etc. Not ideal. Oh, and apparently the other tenant pays over $200 a month for gas. That’s roughly our gas bill for January for a four bedroom, three story house. Something fishy there. Joe was not impressed. I did really love all those windows, though.
Nothing came of our Monday outing, but it was nice to get out and see places at least. I figure the sooner I have a place to live next year, the sooner I can start highlighting all the reasons why Rocky would be better off living there.
One more interesting property that I really like. This one is actually downtown, in the heart of the theater district. Someone brilliant thought to renovate an old building in an environmentally-conscious way (they’re hoping for LEED certification) and set aside units for people (ahem ahem) who work hard but make piddling amounts of money. I think it would be fun to live downtown, but I wonder if Rocko wouldn’t miss stuff like grass and trees. Sure would be plenty of fun smells, though.
So we’ll see. I’ve still got almost five months before our current house disbands, so…plenty of time for something amazing to come along.
Must find space worthy
of this hound – only the best
For my Beagle beau!
Little known fact: I wrote almost one haiku a day for the entire three weeks I was in Ecuador. (Hey, remember that time I went to Ecuador? And you didn’t?) The other day, I was ordered to “do more” with my Ecuador photos so I thought, why not post some of my terrible haikus? With photos?
Plus it’s Friday and the last thing I want to do is think about work. I’d so much rather remember that time I went to Ecuador and you didn’t…
Day One
Foot asleep, butt sore,
Skimming the clouds way up here.
So: are we there yet?
We’d been on various planes for hours and hours by this point. I could barely feel my lower limbs, I was writing in my required journal, trying my best to have interesting things to say about the upcoming journey (things that, clearly, didn’t translate to the haiku). They get better, promise. At least one of them is decently decent.
The photo is of our hotel, Hotel Sebastian, taken from a little park across the street. The staff of el hotel were amazing, very friendly, very patient with our broken Spanish, willing to speak to us in English when really necessary. I’m glad we got to stay at a fairly small, local hotel like that one and not a big chain like a Holiday Inn or something (yes, Quito does have a Holiday Inn). Probably the best part was the music they played in the hotel restaurant: slow, piano-solo versions of popular songs from the 90’s. So good.
