Into Spring: The Dog is Crazy but the Snow is Gone

After the record-breaking snows of winter, which amounted to 57 inches at National Airport and 62 inches at Dulles, spring is welcome relief. Last weekend was in the low 70s, sunny, no humidity. So we took the family — dog and all — to Great Falls.

Coco is mostly a very sweet dog. He loves human contact, whines when we go to work, is pretty gentle except when protecting a bone. But Great Falls this weekend was dog walking central: everybody was out, and so Coco, who is none too tolerant of other dogs, simply went completely Incredible Hulk on us. Violent conniptions, trying to chew through his leash, etc. Even a proffered hot dog did not assuage him. Among those he sought to challenge were two enormous mastiffs who could have swallowed him whole without stopping to chew. For his safety and ours, we departed quickly. This is not a good augury: he hates to be home alone, but if he's going to melt down in public if other dogs are present, we can't take him on our day trips on weekends. He needs some dachshund school.

Other news: Tam is shifting jobs, still within AFA, but moving from the magazine to the membership side; we hope it will be a good move. My job has been crazy due to deadlines and staff transitions, but as we come into spring I hope to blog more.

Also: Sarah has her own computer now. The hand-me-down Windows ME computer I had given her a couple of years ago isn't good for much more than a paperweight these days, so we bought her her own Dell laptop for schoolwork and other things. Mostly she watches video on it, but that's okay if homework is done.

I really do intend to spend more time here.

Relaxed

May everyone be this relaxed.

A Thaw from The Long Winter Silence

It's been such a godawful winter — Washington broke all existing snowfall records with something like 56 or 58 inches (and that's at the airport, where the measurements are usually lower than places farther from the river), mostly in three big storms of about two feet each. Work's been stressful, we've been dealing with some (non-serious) medical issues, and the snows were horrendous. I've dropped out of sight on this blog.

Today was still chilly and breezy, but it's March, it was at least sunny, and a lot of people were on the road. I think we all are hungry for spring. Left, Coco and Mom feeling good about things at Jammin Joe's BBQ, a barbecue joint with only outdoor tables.

More soon, but we're coming back, and I don't plan to ignore this blog so much.