Albuquerque for the holidays: singing dogs and such

Hi everyone, from the frozen tundra of Albuquerque. Decided to pack up the teenager and the pooch for a ROAD TRIP! [ROAD TRIP must be yelled, of course.]

I have the week off from work as we shut down the office (yay!) so decided to take advantage of it. It took around 7 hours, so it wasn't too bad. We left at o'dark thirty to avoid any holiday traffic on Christmas eve and sailed right on through. Once we hit the NM border the snow was piled up, but it was mostly cleared when we got to Albuquerque and on to Rio Rancho. For the teenager, there was a nice little patch in Dad's backyard.

We woke to 18 degrees-- yes, 18 tiny little degrees. Oh, it's been a while since I felt that kind of cold, living in Phoenix now. Dexter, my dog, did a lot of singing and dancing for his walks given that I wasn't willing to go at our usual 6 am. Did I mention it's 18 degrees then?

Decided to introduce Jamie to a Jewish Christmas with a movie and chinese food. Of course, the movie that we selected was.. well, let's just say that while I enjoyed it immensely and it was very well cast, The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo may be best not viewed with three generations of family sitting in the theater. Jamie, at the end, looked at us and said 'That was kind of like watching a porno with your mom and grandfather.. how awkward!' lol!

There's a nice little off-road hiking trail a few streets over that we've been enjoying. While the dogs are very nervous around each other and we've been keeping them on leash for their own good, they've been doing fairly well overall. The house is filled with teenagers, furry and non-furry!

Heading back to the animal shelter today to visit some of the critters there. I'm in love with a spunky senior dog there [go figure!] and Jamie is in love with two cats, a preggers dog, a pig and a goat. She's only asked 99 times if we can take them all home, so we're doing ok!

Not much to tell from this trip, but it's been nice and relaxing. Colder than I expected and I've been hibernating a bit, not wanting to go outside too much until the temps hit 40 mid-day. It's been nice to catch up on some sleep from my busy Phoenix existence, even with a singing and dancing dog..

New Mexico Christmas 2011