zebralittle52 | They swept through town like a hurricane

I'm happy (amazed, stunned) to announce that Dad's visit really went well. They showed up Wednesday afternoon and we were able to sit and chat a while before dinner. There'd been a music conference in Austin the weekend before which they (Dad, his wife and their dog) had driven to from Virginia, then after the conference they'd headed to Galveston for a day before heading to Houston, so relaxing and talking was good for them. They're really keen on finding pet-friendly hotels to stay at while they travel, and cities with dog parks so Ralph can run around... they even took the dog with when we went out about about the city. They'd leave the windows cracked for air and a bed and water bowl in the back seat. My car's back seats flip down to access the trunk, the dog just treated it like a dog house. I'm really pleased that Dad and CZ got along, but I knew they would as soon as they started talking music.

I don't know how the ex did it, but David agreed to go out to dinner with us Wednesday night. You could tell the boy was really uncomfortable at first, but after a while he relaxed and started to talk. It probably doesn't hurt that Dad treated us all to a REALLY nice Japanese buffet (the boy's favorite.) After the ex showed up to take the boy home, we headed back to the house to talk a bit more before they called it a night.

The next day we hooked up around noon and headed out for brunch. The original plan was to eat at The Last Concert Cafe, which used to be a whore house and to this day you have to knock on the door before they’ll open it and let you in, but there was road construction and new one-way roads and we got all turned around... so we settled on the original Ninfa's instead. Then it was a slow, meandering drive through the city to show off some sites as we headed to the Art Car Museum. One of my college professors has an art car in there, and they took a ton of pictures. Then it was off to Rockin' Robin (Dad's in the market for another guitar.) On the way we passed the Music Exchange, which used to be an after-hours gathering place for traveling Jazz musicians to score heroine after a gig. Then it was back home to relax and watch National Lampoon's Lemmings before dinner.

This morning they stopped by the house before heading towards Baton Rouge. *sigh* It really was the best visit... Great food, good conversations, everything really seemed to click. *relaxes for the first time in a week* Thank god!