Buen Viaje

So after a good six weeks or so of working on my comprehensive every night until I passed out on my keyboard from sheer exhaustion (maybe a bit from boredom too...) only to jolt awake moments later and immediately resume frantically working, they are finally over.

They went as well as they could have, and I am now an official doctoral candidate and I received my masters in passing, so... sweet!  But it was a huge endeavor, not only on my part, but also on Bahb's part.  He was there every step of the way to bring me food to the lab or proofread my paper and he was even the only other person in the room besides my committee members when I took the examination. So first off, let's hear it for that guy (he best guy, you see) whose support makes all the difference in the world to me.  Second, this whole comprehensive thing, needless to say, really put a cramp in our babby hang out time, so the light at the end of the tunnel for us?  A weekend in Mexico on the beach, just the two of us, and Rosie, of course!

To say it was a relaxing weekend is an egregious understatement.  There was not a single moment of cell reception or use of electronics to speak of.  The most high tech aspect of the weekend was our virtually nonstop listening of Billy Joel's smooooooth 80's hits on cassette.  I mean... Uptown Girl?? Tell Her About It?? You May Be Right?? It's Still Rock'n Roll To Me?? Come ON.

We played rummy and drank Dos Equis and smoked menthols and ate ridiculously awesome tacos and got massages on the beach and slept 12 hours each night and walked around collecting seashells and had a bon fire and mainly just took naps on the sand under an umbrella.  In short... we were really busy guys!

And Rosie was such a good girl the whole trip.  I love that dog, and I am infinitely glad she is in my life, but make no mistake... she's a terrible dog.  She will look you dead in the eyes and hate-piss all over the carpet.  She will claw at your face at 3 am because she wants "fourth dinner."  There have been nights where she would literally not let me sleep for more than 30 minutes at a time.  And, given her age and her diminished faculties, there is no real way to discipline her without seeming cruel, because she has zero idea what's going on.  It's been a slooooow, rough process but I've more or less learned how to work around her needs to make sure I sleep most nights while making sure she's always my happy little girl.

BUT... in Mexico that was all different.  She never ran off, she slept the entire time we did at night and even politely scratched at the door when she wanted to go potty.  What. The. Fuck.  

Bahb and I kind of think it has something to do with her acute awareness of how far from home she was.  She knew she had to be a good girl if she wanted to come back with us!

Oh and she HATED the ocean.  HATED it.  It was hilarious.

But we didn't torture her too much with water fun, we mainly just all curled up in the sand and snoozed the afternoon away.

The trip was beyond wonderful.  It was relaxing and rejuvenating and restorative. It fully enabled me to turn off whatever bullshit I ordinarily allow to fester in my mind most days and just be truly present, and slightly drunk, I was always slightly drunk.

Buen viaje is right.