Dog Days

I promise this isn’t becoming a dog blog, but I needed to explain where my time has been going lately!

I knew going in that having a young dog was going to create some logistical challenges for traveling and solving escape rooms and other puzzles. All of a sudden an hour pit stop along a travel route becomes a problem. Can we bring the dog in? Will he be ok in the car for an hour? Do we have to tag team in an escape room or have one team member run out every 20 minutes to check on him?

I anticipated those challenges and accepted that I might miss out on a few good escape rooms during a road trip because of them. What I didn’t anticipate was the day to day impact, even at home- that even a grocery store trip or having a friend over would be something requiring coordination and planning. Or that I would struggle finding time for an online puzzle hunt, even at home with nothing on my calendar.

Granted, most of the challenges are temporary. The two biggest challenges are 1) eternal vigilance to make sure our puppy doesn’t do his business inside while we’re still training him and 2) waking up throughout the night when Hans hears a neighbor make too much noise and lets us know. Once he settles in and gets past those hurdles, we’ll have more energy and we’ll be able to go about our days more or less like usual.

Thankfully I still managed to do an escape room each of the past two weekends; my parents are eager babysitters for our dog and helped in both cases!

I’m hopeful that having a dog doesn’t totally destroy my ability to wander around and solve puzzles. Worst case scenario, I’ll have a new buddy to explore and help me find Geocaches!