Ten days later...

 

Going backwards through time, here.  This photo is from the Mothers' Day outing on Saturday.  FGC was with, but as usual, he's being left out of photographic evidence for program reasons.

Said FGC was behind the camera, taking the photo of foster mom and foster grandmas (both of us).

One of the appetizers that we shared around was called Tot-chos, a tater tots version of nachos.  It was really pretty good.  Other offerings were flatbread pizzas and chicken and shrimp on sticks.  Nonalcoholic "fancy drinks" work for both FGC and for me.  One was a strawberry concoction, and we both had that.  There was also one called something like misty dew.  Son was avoiding alcohol for his own reasons that evening and he said it tasted rather like lemon meringue pie.

This has been our mothers' day outing for two years now, with a child involved, so it's kind of locked in as tradition.  The bar has outdoor seating on a balcony on the 6th floor and you can see a whole lot of the University campus from that roof spot.

Saturday morning Ember and I met a former co-worker of mine and her dog Zoe to have the two canines meet and try a parallel leash walk at a nearby park (neutral ground for both dogs).  It went pretty well, for a first meeting between dogs that don't know each other.  As is generally the case, they take their cues from their humans and once they both figured the two humans were OK with each other, they would be OK with the other dog, too.  We will try it again next Saturday, weather permitting.

Back up a day from that and we have Friday May 8th.  Ember and I started off as usual, with our morning rituals, down to poo patrol and the coffee run.  

Then a message popped up from DIL.  My son was headed for the ER.  Didn't matter that it was probably a small thing, just needed attention sooner, rather than later, mom genes kick in.  I spent a couple of hours keeping him company while he languished in triage.  The good thing about boring ER visits is it means the big scary things have been ruled out.  DIL showed up shortly after I did.  She could not concentrate on work.  In the end, they discharged him, sent DIL off to the pharmacy, and the day continued for me in a more normal fashion.

Ember and I went on a longer than usual walk when I got home, then she was ready to collapse in a puddle of warm puppy.  

Backing up to the middle of the week, and we have the setting of a start date for the deck work.  First week in June is the plan.  The contractor would have been OK with starting on the 18th of May, but since I will be getting Carl for a two-dog weekend plus on the 23rd, I did not want to risk something going wrong (bad weather, delivery delay, or any number of things that can happen with house projects) and not having access to my back yard by a simple opening of the door to the deck during my two-dog time!

Also mid-week:  a new fitness watch arrived, and I got it all set up.  I had been wearing the new "cheaper" smart watch for about a month. I have decided the integration of systems does mean something to me. I traded in my Google watch for the new Google 4 version.  The trade-in process was pretty smooth.  They sent packaging, and as is normal these days, there are YouTube videos showing step by step what to do.

Now we get to the "just for fun" photos:

Lap Kitty.

Google Assistant fail.  It got activated accidentally.  It volunteered to "take a selfie".  I spotted the countdown on the screen, 4... 3.. 2, and started to say "Nooooo!"

I thought it was a funny shot, so did not erase it at once, and now it's your giggle for the day!

It would not be an Emberville post without a glamor shot of the star.

Life is good.  Keep on Sparking!