If I had to pick one dog that could keep me both happy and warm in the event that I was sentenced to spend the night in the arctic circle, it would be a Samoyed, a pack of them to be exact (to be even more exact, a blizzherd--if you’re a stickler for collective nouns).

Pomeranians are the toy-sized cousins of spitz breed dogs, a classification that includes much larger canines, including Akitas and Malamutes. While they’re a good bit smaller, they do come with some of their larger relatives’ characteristics, including being high energy, playful, and highly intelligent. Because of this, you’ll need to keep certain things in mind when seeking out gear for playtime

In The Year of Magical Thinking, Joan Didion recalls the death of her husband, John Gregory Dunne. The event is so sudden that it happens in less time than it takes her to fetch something from the kitchen. The transition is so abrupt, that she recalls feeling, “There was a level on which I believed what had happened remained reversible.”