Life in Albany

Saturday, February 25, 2006

Riley Dog

I promised myself this wouldn't turn into a dog blog but by special request of perhaps the only two people who have looked at this site so far I will post some photos... Jason got Riley at the beginning of the summer last year from a breeder up in Fairbanks, AK. I should have taken my cue when the the breeders felt obligated to issue a disclaimer on border collies before letting us adopt him. The biggest deciding factor for me was this:

He was undoubtedly the cutest thing I have ever seen. Jason had grown up with a border collie so he had a better picture of what we were getting into. Needless to say these dogs require a crazy amount of energy and attention. They are super smart, which apparenty means smart enough to know that they do not have to do anything you say! He also has a bit of a Jeckel/Hyde thing going on which anyone who has met him can attest to. Denali was a good place for him, I could take him to work with me and he even got to go on some helicopter adventures! But moving to Albany and to a tiny apartment has been a bit of an adjustment. We were hoping to get him involved in the fine sport of skijoring (i.e. 'come on Riley, pull me up that big hill'). But due to the marginal winter we are having here we've only gotten to take him out twice. Right now we are in puppy classes with him. Our instructor's philosophy is that there is no such thing as a bad dog, just bad owners. Great... He is definetely the star of the class since he is twice as old as all the other dogs. They all think we are so good with him, little do they know that he is just smarter than us.

I am also trying to get him to make some new friends in the park we go to. All the other dogs wander around the park without leashes, but I am too worried about Riley's propensity to chase after cars, bikes, old ladies, etc. to let him off leash. Last week he was approached by a little weiner dog and almost killed me trying to scramble up my leg to get away. Those mean weiner dogs! So yeah, he is a bit neurotic. His favorite thing to do right now is perch on our back deck and guard the house, and he will do this for hours. There is also a terrier next door and they like to stand on their decks touching noses a lot.

Thursday, February 23, 2006

Welcome to Albany!


I thought I would set up a blog to keep up with friends now that I live so far away, and now that I actually have time to do this. (and to be honest, now that so many of my friends do it and I love checking in on them this way). Maybe it will inspire me to do something exciting every week in order to have things to blog about… I just moved from Alaska, where I've been living for the past five years, to Albany, NY with my boyfriend Jason. We put over 6000 miles on his new tacoma on the way down, if you can believe it!

I guess technically we arrived here in November, though I ‘officially’ moved here in January (with some trips in between to Disneyland & Puerto Rico). We managed to find a cute apartment in the swanky “lark district” of town, and they were somehow cool renting to a hyperactive border collie! The building was built in 1852 so the place has all those quirks that old houses have. It does have a backyard and washer/dryer though so we are in love! We are also one block from Washington Park which Riley loves! Not to mention Jason and I can both walk to work (picures of our street and the emblem on our building). Albany has a population of 90,000 though it is condensed and very ‘east coast’. It is built up instead of out which I really like so it has a much bigger downtown area than anywhere else I’ve lived. It is also the capital of NY so there are an overabundance of lawyers, politicians, and state workers. Hence the ginormous Empire Plaza at the end of our street. This plaza takes up 5 city blocks and looks like something out of ‘70’s Star Wars! It is literally a vortex as there seems to be no way in or out and all freeways converge underground through a parking garage to get re-routed throughout Albany. As far as I can tell it is where they house all the State employees. It also contains the mysterious Egg ... Jason & I have actually gone to see a couple of shows here, acoustic Jeff Tweedy (excellent!) and Keller Williams. Not sure what the architect had in mind with this one and it is something of a joke around town. Thanks for taking time to check out the blog and of course you are all welcome for a visit anytime!

A few pictures of our apartment: