Marching through March; or, Oops, We Did It Again

Got me a movie

I want you to know

Slicing up eyeballs

I want you to know

Girlie so groovy

I want you to know

Don't know about you

But I am un chien andalusia

I am un chien andalusia

I am un chien andalusia

I am un chien andalusia

Wanna grow up to be

Be a debaser.

---The Pixies, "Debaser"

There's Un Chien Andalou, the Surrealist Buñuel/Dalí movie (which you can see---sliced up eyeballs and all---if you visit the Reina Sofía in Madrid), and there's "un chien andalusia," thanks to Frank Black (Black Francis?) and the Pixies, and now in Rota, Spain, there's an Andalusian dog who is living in our House of Crazy. 

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You know that feeling when you wake up early, hear your toddler calling your name, go into his or her room and find a kid with open arms and a big smile and think, Wow, this little person thinks I'm the greatest?

(Confession---both our kids ended up in our bed most nights, so this was the feeling when we woke to a little foot in our faces).

The closest to that amazing feeling is having a dog greet you after a long, stressful day at work as if to say, Oh my god! Person! You came back to me! I love you so much! Don't ever leave me again! My person is back! I love you so much! Please pet me because I missed you so much! 

I'm not a fan of people getting in my "bubble" (to quote a middle schooler: "You better move back. You are all up in her bubble, and you know she doesn't like it when you are in her bubble"). 

I don't care if little people or little (or large) dogs are in my personal space, however, and despite the mess, the noise, the FUR, the vet bills, the expenses, the inconvenience, I love dogs. LOVE them. 

We are definitely dog people. Make that Dog People in capital letters. 

I joked in grad school that I traded in a boyfriend for a dog (she ended up being more neurotic than he was). I married the Mister, we moved from Mississippi to Colorado, and we adopted a greyhound from a race track. She was a-ma-zing. When they both died from old age in Washington, we promised ourselves---we swore!---we were never let another dog into our hearts. They were our children the five years we were childless in our marriage, and I just couldn't do it again. 

But we did. And again. A move to Texas and a chocolate lab pound puppy and a possum-killing cairn terrier later, we were a dog family again. 

Then we went through another dog death (the lab) and had to leave the cairn with his Texas grandma because it was a few measly degrees too cold to transport him in our move to Cuba. He's an old man, loving the spoiled life of eating eggs and bacon for breakfast and has several health issues, so he could not come with us to Spain. 

Bottom line is this: five years is the longest the kids and I have ever lived without a dog in our lives. I have had dogs since I was 4 years old (two dachshunds in my childhood), and I'm destined to be a dog person forever, I guess. 

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Every few months since we moved to Cuba, Boy 2 would ask, "So when are we getting a new dog?" It was a near impossibility in Cuba, but he knew coming here that a dog was probably in the stars. In fact, this past Christmas he even tried to get Santa involved: 

Never mind that he doesn't really believe in Santa---what he has always believed in is that we would one day get him another dog. 

When is it the right time to get a dog? Always? Never? Who knows. One thing lead to another a few weeks ago, and we ended up at the pound on base and fell in love with yet another mutt. 

Oops, we did it again. 

We are happy to announce yet ANOTHER male in the house (I'm doomed to live in a house full of testosterone), this time by the name of Junior: 

He's a 3 1/2 year old Podenco Andaluz mix breed. He lived with a family who couldn't take care of him anymore, and they thankfully gave him to RAWL, the dog and cat rescue group on base. 

Podencos are part of the Ibizan hound group of sighthounds, originally bred to flush hares for hunting season. They hunt in tandem with galgos, or Spanish greyhounds. He has the big podenco ears and is built a lot like a greyhound (and has many of the mannerisms our greyhound had, as well). After hunting season, it is too expensive for hunters to continue to feed them, so they kill all of their hunting dogs and get more the next season. Spanish law does not protect hunting dogs, unlike pets, so they are at the mercy of rescue groups to get to them before the hunters kill them. 

Junior (we didn't name him---despite my best efforts to give him a hipster name, he likes his original name so it's stuck) was found on the street with his mom as a puppy, spent almost 4 years with a family before making it to the pound, and he was very well loved and taken care of before we adopted him. We are lucky. 

And being a dog in the Spain, he even comes with his own passport---the highly desired blue EU passport. Lucky dog! 

He is completely housebroken, follows basic commands, walks (and jogs) on a lead like a champ, and is not a barker. He sleeps at the foot of Boy 2's bed, so I guess that Christmas wish came true after all. 

Well, at least part of it. :)