I am one husky-print fleece and labrador calendar away from becoming a properly scary Dog Person, despite Harvey's one-puppy mission to embarrass me publicly in as many diverse ways as possible. When he's being all snuggly on the sofa I'm just like zomg he has the cutest little furry feets in the world and if he didn't use them for so much gross stuff I would blates glomp them all. ..

Puppy toes aside, I wish he'd stop running into other dogs' games and bringing me the stolen tennis ball so that I have to sheepishly return it to the owner and explain he hasn't learnt any manners yet. Last week he took a running flail of a jump at a leashed dachshund, nearly flattening her, not that you could tell the difference, she looked like a coffee table before and a rather disgruntled coffee table after. Her owner stood over me while I clipped him back up, which was approximately the least helpful thing in the world as it kept the source of the excitement within sniffing range. Most dog people are somewhat excessively friendly so it's upsetting when somebody has a go at you for something your dog has done, it's not as if he's been eating toddlers, his little jaws wouldn't fit...

When other people come over and witness accidents their faces set in an expression of suppressed horror; yesterday he weed everywhere when I shouted and scruffed him and I merely sighed and fetched the mop. This just isn't normal, although when I think about it neither is letting an animal live loose in your home and take over your life with his big, floppy ears and his motor-powered, waggy tail. He really isn't the only one with the unconditional love to give.

Harvey is currently cowering because I opened a bottle of Coke and it hissed at him; this is why random strangers assume he's a pretty little girl. We were playing on the beach yesterday with friends from oop north and a rather better behaved spaniel, who actually is a pretty little girl, unfortunately it was our little monster that we took home to bath, reeking of fish.

In the evening we went with Bryony and Scott to Simply Italian, although having just eaten some emergency halloumi on toast I wasn't that hungry... I realise this may be the most middle class emergency anybody's ever had outside of having nothing to wear to the theatre, although I do have this problem too and it's nothing to be sniffed at. I ate half of the world's most gigantic salad under the completely mistaken belief that salad would be much lighter on my cheese-addled stomach.

Then it was a magical mystery tour of the outskirts of Eastbourne town centre, which is always great in boots not made for walking, although I should've realised that I'd spend most of the night on my poor, dog-tired feet, mostly hiding in a corner of Maxims, trying to laugh at the punters while sticking to the Zero Eye-Contact rule. I was a bit of a noob at such sports and made the vital mistake of leaving the pack to visit the loos on my own; my re-emergence down the stairs was met with almost a round of applause from the fortysomethings gathered at the bottom, all looking haggered from their second divorces, and in my naivete I turned and beamed. I'd call it a schoolboy error but that makes it sound so much worse. It takes a lot of desperation-induced confidence to grope a girl in a non-packed, brightly-lit club, that is all. Kayleigh and I may need trauma counselling for a brief period, although it could've been worse, we didn't pull.

Harvey now won't come near me until I put down the Coke. I think it's time for another walk on the beach, after all, he hasn't eaten anything too awful for several hours, except for polishing off the rest of my cheese on toast that I foolishly left on the sofa. And some polystyrene, like, obvs.

The new boy in my life is sitting by my feet dribbling warm milk from his jowls; I always did know how to pick them. Harvey might be the prettiest puppy in the world but he's at that age where he really is as thick as the shit still warm on the carpet. Observe presently as he barks at the sofa until it gives up the squeaky ball he's knocked under it, only for him to recoil as the echo lends the impression that the sofa is barking back. I attempted to rescue the ball, he jumped on my head because this is the Best Game Ever.

He's the waggiest tailed, most deliriously happy puppy I've ever seen, even after baths and, infuriatingly, mid-punishment. I love him more than I expected I could; enough to follow him round with old papers and scented poo bags and congratulate him for pissing all over my lawn. He's a big, soppy, stinky bundle of fur with a need for constant cuddles and constructive attention. My house, meanwhile, is now also a big, stinky mess of fur and paper, so if you need anything important disposed of, please don't hesitate to bring it round. He's already chewed through my laptop cable and rendered it unusable, for which he is in more trouble than he can imagine, although the fact it was plugged into the mains at the time is a little more worrying. He then ate Dorian's bluetooth thing, which I swear wasn't covered in honey.

We've done morning walkies and I have appointments to get to this afternoon; inevitably I shall return to a scene of chaos, even if he is just doing what puppies do, he could do it more neatly, damn it. You must all come round and see him soon, not least because I need two legged company to stay sane. Now I have to go and clear up the bit of wood he's shreaded all along the hallway without turning it into the newest Best Game Ever.

I keep looking over my shoulder in the hope that checking what the grill is doing at the same time as my email constitutes proper cooking. Apart from the exploding sausages, I would mark the exercise as a success. Naturally my culinary capabilities are just a small part of my domestic goddessness but I make my own apple sauce and everything.

I do wish it were scientifically possible for human women to give birth to puppies. It does worry me a little that Dors is more excited about spaniels than the baby, although that is on the grounds that babies are a bit useless until they get to the age where you can teach them to play football, which is perhaps a fair point. I have clinically diagnosable puppy fever but there will always be a level on which I will be slightly disappointed that no matter how many tricks I teach them they'll never be able to talk or add or become successful architects. Luckily they're cute and furry and never going to go through a difficult teenage stage of piercings and drugs. Theoretically, of course, spaniels are nuts.

You still have so much power to make me lividly, violently angry. Surely you know what a child you sound when you say things like, I'd do it if I cared about you? How could I not think about you every day of my damn life? It's exactly because I've always cared so much that it hurts that you consistently use it against me. If I never drive a car it's because of you, if I hate hospitals and their bile green waiting rooms it's because of you, if I distrust skinny boys hiding lying eyes behind fucking stupid fringes it's because I'm right to.

So don't say you're here because of me when you've already arrived without a word of warning, running scared from something I sure as hell want nothing to do with. Have you forgotten that last time the official line was that you loved me, that, "I've always loved you, Alli.", although apparently not enough to check in and tell me you were bloody alive? That ship sailed such a long time ago it was afraid of falling off the end of the flat earth. I don't for a second miss the nights spent willing you to kiss me, knowing full well that if I ever did so I'd be accused of stripping you of some of your faith. Never allowing myself to admit I was being led squarely along by the chequebook.

You're the worst kind of hypocrite with your suggestion that my sofa should be open to you out of an act of good Christian charity, despite your lack of regard for the modern commandment that thou shalt not covet thy neighbours' satnavs. There's only so long that you can live by this horse-to-the-ground Catholic mentality of doing whatever you like and repenting later; did you just say 20 Hail Marys for every cock you sucked?

I know, honestly, how much you hate yourself for everything, and I forgive you for it, lest I be judged. I would love to help you if I thought I could but you'll never change and I have. My life now may not be everything I dreamed of as a little girl but I will still jealously guard it from your anti-Midas touch. I love Dorian and nothing that you say or do will distract me from that, nor would I let you get within 60 feet of him. I offer you my last grand if money's all you need but please, just leave me alone.

I'm still sad about the tree. The house needs tidying and doggy-proofing though, which is a mammoth task when you consider there are four floors and I live on all of them. I wouldn't live with me, albeit mostly because of my floordrobe, well and that cup of mould that I'm too scared to touch...

This year I am going to morph, however, into some kind of domestic goddess creature and be serenely calm about all household tasks. I shall have a sponge in one hand and an oven mitt on the other and I shall wrangle dogs away with my remaining limbs. We shall take long walks on the seafront while the washing machine runs rather less enthusiastically, then we shall collapse in a big, furry heap in front of the fire.

New years make me think too much about the past and the imminent future when the present is all that matters now. Oh, it's always about the presents. I miss people who wouldn't cross my mind were I stretching out in the heat of July. All those hastily mumbled plans about meeting up more often and keeping in touch go to pot anyway because I can't get out of bed before midday.

I will be sad to take down all the fairy lights and sparkly streamers, although they are all going in a big box of mementos from our first Christmas, which has been more wonderful than perhaps I have expressed. I love the big, beautiful tree. And you. More. So there.

I really didn't intend to become nocturnal again but I'm not exactly sleepy despite the hour. It's that time of year again when we start reflecting on everything that has happened in the previous twelve months, which let's face it is an awful lot considering I've done barely three weeks' work during them. As is traditional, the following is the year summed up using only the first sentences of the first blog of each month...

January: I'm pretty sure I'm still hungover.

February: Last night I went for a jog up the road past the Imperial Swallow Hotel, by this morning there were several fire engines tackling a major blaze and Jesmond Road was closed.

March: I am going to start a clothing range for mid-sized women; the inside-legs will come in odd numbers and the shoes will always be available in half-sizes and I'll invent such a thing as the 33C^1/2, damnit.

April: I need a job.

May: I'm not sure I really want to go back at all!

June: Ah I had such a brilliant evening, despite sober dancing!

July: Yeah, we totally pulled tonight!

August: We all go a little loopy sometimes, some of us just make more of a habit of it.

September: I don't know if you've ever slept around a corner, specifically in Bexhill, but I would recommend it to anyone.

October: It's ridiculous that I feel like I'm in a relationship because I've changed my status on Myspace and Facebook.

November: I am dying of man-flu and need your sympathy and somebody to bring me tea.

December blogging has been non-existent due to the sheer volume of Other Crap, thus the first line would technically be the one at the top of this post.

It's stupid a.m. again and I'm angry as hell to be awake and worrying. The rain is doing this passive-aggressive thing of falling in big, fat, slow drops without ever losing it and looking like raining itself out. It's difficult to contemplate how when we first moved in here we would throw open the windows for fresh air and sit out on the terrace drinking gin and tonics in the sun. In some ways that seems like utterly years ago rather than a mere ten weeks.

I have learned more about myself these past months than at almost any other time in my life and it certainly hasn't been through wallowing on the sofa or reading women's magazines; which is a pity when you consider my prime occupation for the previous two years.

In ten more weeks things will be even more unimaginably different, not least because I'll be exhausted from work and unaware of the existence of 3am. I'll have my financial buffer back but more importantly I'll have my confidence and my impeccable telephone manner, like, obvs. Then again, maybe I'll have an incredibly brief Personnel career behind me and a slightly more encyclopaedic knowledge of Diagnosis Murder.

Either way, I've decided that I'm going to survive whatever the coming days throw up, possibly through swiftly ensuring it's officially Not My Problem. I owe it to General Fluffy Paws. I realise now that you have to pass through all this nonsense in order to eventually stumble out into the life you really wanted all along. I guess I'll start saving for that handbag now, then I can work on the yacht.