Gone to the Dogs

Meet Shelby, our 6-week old Vizsla puppy!

We picked her up from the breeder on Saturday, and it's been sleepless nights ever since! She is very cute, and likes to snuggle, but won't stay in a crate at night and can't be relied on to not have accidents overnight yet. So, I have been getting up with her and holding her while she sleeps at night. Bad habit, I know. I have this week off of work, and am hoping to get her into a routine quickly.

Jackson, our adopted husky is doing well with her, and we're hoping they will become fast friends.

Acclimating

Well, the boxes are finally unpacked, and AG and I are both here, in the same house! The house is much larger than the apartment we were living in, and for the most part, it's pretty empty. The sofa and armchair that made our apartment living room feel cozy and filled, doesn't even take up half of our "bonus room" upstairs. The living room and formal dining room downstairs need to be furnished in the near future, so people don't walk into a huge empty space when they first enter our house.


It was still 40 degrees and chilly the day we moved, and now we're into humidity and temps into the 100's. I am really enjoying having sunshine almost daily, and am looking forward to being able to garden again.

I have just finished orientation at the new hospital, and start work full swing next week. In the past month, AG and my roles have flipped in that I was coming out here with the anticipation of work, but hadn't heard much from my new employer. Now, the position he's spent so much time preparing for is becoming less and less guaranteed due to a few things I don't really want to discuss here. So we have flipped, to my job being the more stable of the two for the moment. Now that I am here, I am locked into my new workplace for at least a year, and having bought a home here and put a large chunk of money into fencing and landscaping our backyard, have no interest in moving for several years. I don't think AG will be relocated, no matter what happens, it's just another reminder that nothing in life is guaranteed. And, at least as of this morning, I don't think we will have any idea what he's going to be doing for several weeks yet, possibly months. Another exercise in patience, I guess.

In the meantime, we had both talked of getting a dog. Back at the apartment, with no yard, my 12-hour shifts, and his coming and going out-of-state, it didn't seem like a good idea. In the meantime, we researched breeds, and found a breeder that we liked. We are expecting a Vizsla puppy in July. Two weeks ago, a husky puppy showed up in the neighborhood. No one had claimed him, so we did a week trial with him at our house. He is actually very well-behaved, housebroken, and doesn't trigger my pet dander allergies. We have decided to go ahead and adopt him, and still get the puppy in July. Hopefully, they'll play well together, and maybe having an older dog (the vet says he's 1-2 years old, based on his teeth) around will help with training.

This is Jackson:

The Home Stretch

Next week, we are moving. Yes, it is finally time to leave the land of blizzards and taxes. I have just a few shifts left at the workplace. And, while it has had its challenges, at least I am familiar with the problems and the players here. For the most part, I like my co-workers. I have been here almost two years, and I think I have gained a lot of self confidence. Looking back, I didn't want my first job out of residency to be in a slow department. I know that over the past two years, I have become more efficient, and able to multi-task better. I have survived understaffing, angry patients, solo coverage, and relocating to a new department before it was entirely set up. And despite feeling like an over-caffeinated hamster running on a wheel to nowhere on the inside, people have told me that they like working with me because I stay calm, or at least appear that way externally.

This is the move that AG and I daydreamed about two years ago, while he was still deployed. This is the one where we hopefully build a life and home together, without having to relocate or live in separate states for several years. If all goes well, we will not be relocating for the rest of his military career. He actually moved to our new home in January when plans suddenly changed. I was still under contract here and waiting for licensing/privileges at the new place, so I was unable to immediately relocate. He has been camping out in our new house on an air mattress, and we've been continuing to fly back and forth for visits each month.

Brrrrr

This is the picture of my dashboard when I was driving home from an overnight shift the other morning. That's right, it says -16! And the sun was out! Stupid winter.

2010 in Pictures

Despite the lack of blog posts, 2010 was a great year. Here's some of what I didn't get around to posting.

January- AG returned from Afghanistan after a 13 month deployment! This was the Welcome Home ceremony that is done for each planeful of soldiers before they can greet their families.

April- AG and I got married, and headed off to the Canary Islands for our honeymoon.

We island hopped from Lanzarote to Fuerteventura to Tenerife. This was the same week that the volcanos in Iceland erupted. Luckily, it didn't interfere with our plans, but there were stranded tourists at each resort.

May- Quick trip to NYC, but half of our time was spent stuck in the hotel when AG caught a nasty case of food poisoning.

June- We loaded up the car and drove together to Arizona for AG's required training course. Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in Cleveland:

The Arch in St. Louis

We stopped in Aspen, Colorado for dinner.

The last day of the drive, we started by drive through Arches National Park in Moab, Utah.

Quick stop by the Grand Canyon before sunset.

July- I flew out to see AG and we drove to Las Vegas for the 4th of July.

September- I flew out to Arizona again and we drove out to Coronado Island near San Diego for Labor Day weekend. We had champagne and s'mores on the beach and went to Sea World. I also spent that month flying back and forth for interviews.

October- I flew to Chicago to take my oral boards. At the end of the month, I flew to Arizona and we spent a weekend in Bisbee and visited my parents in my hometown. We were supposed to drive back together, but plans changed at the last minute, so AG was not able to return until two weeks later, and was stuck driving alone.

November- Visited AG's family for Thanksgiving and spent a week at the new location house hunting.

December- Quiet Christmas with just the two of us.

2010 had so many great moments, I think that it is going to be tough to beat. There definitely are many changes for us in the next few months between relocating and starting new positions, and moving into our first home together.