Remember Carter, the kid with laser-like precision slap-shotting the puck from the blue line? The poor guy came down with a terrible stomach bug of some sort. “Grampa”, he groaned as he woke me from a deep sleep at 2 AM on Tuesday. “I’m sick and threw up.”

I won’t impinge on your sensibilities with a blow-by-blow account but suffice it to say his aim tossing cookies doesn’t match his hockey skills. Nana did an estimated 25 loads of laundry and is still nursing blisters on her knees from scrubbing various surfaces within Jeff’s apartment. He missed school through Friday and stayed home from the 8 AM hockey game on Saturday. He recovered to play in two games on Sunday plus a team outdoor skating event in between so we declared him fully recovered.

Meanwhile I came down with the same thing on Friday.  I’m pleased to say my recovery was quicker and my aim, reflecting many more years of practice, was better. So, our week with Carter turned into something different than planned. But you know what? We still enjoyed being with him just the same. And what a trouper he was. Not only was he sick but he went for five days with no human contact other than his ancient grandparents. A full complement of hockey teammates (five in all) add up to less in age than just one of us oldsters.

Monday (yesterday as I type) we left Carter at school and drove to Melrose for an Uber ride to the airport and our flight back to Austin. Much to our surprise we found that Esme, Griffin and Rebecca had prepared very nice hand-written birthday cards for Judy who turned, well never mind the number, one more than before. Best of all, 11-year-old Esme made a two-layer cake, white cake on top and brownies on the bottom, nicely frosted and decorated, all by herself. She provided the energy that gave Nana an unplanned celebration. Much, much appreciated. What a gal!

The flight to Austin was on time (we’d earlier been warned by American that it would leave an hour late). We checked into our Austin Airport hotel by 10:30 PM and we were up on deck by 8:30 AM this morning.

Stop #1: the Texas State Capitol in downtown Austin. I won’t try to describe the building but it’s quite nice and, fitting Texas, large. The legislature meets for 140 days every other year so most of the time it serves as a tourist attraction. We had a very nice 45-minute guided tour.

We walked around the grounds admiring the several monuments and sculpture pieces. We found two prominent monuments commemorating Texas’s role in the Confederacy (there are apparently seven in all). One, the Confederate Soldiers Monument (aka the Confederate Dead Monument), was quite striking. It was erected to “normalized the motivations that drew Texas into the Civil War.” An inscription on the monument reads, in part:

Died

For State Rights

Guaranteed under the Constitution.

The people of the South, animated by the spirit of 1776, to preserve their rights, withdrew from the federal compact in 1861. The North resorted to coercion. The South, against overwhelming numbers and resources, fought until exhausted.

A House bill was introduced in 2021 to remove these and other Confederate memorials from the Texas Capitol. It died in committee.

The Texas Historical Museum was closed today so we left downtown a little earlier than planned and drove to meet our friends Joanne and Dan Tims at the Salt Lick BBQ restaurant in Driftwood, TX, about a half-hour west of town in hill country. It’s a low-key down-home picnic table kind of place but they serve great BBQ. Best of all, of course, was our three-hour visit with former neighbors we haven’t seen since 2004 when we left Minnesota. They have three kids and five grandkids which, coupled with our two and four, gave us lots to catch up on. Joanne and Dan have had a fascinating later-in-life career working with Samaritan Purse, an NGO that provides relief to those suffering from natural and political disasters. They served two years in Greece, among many other places, aiding refugees from Syria. A truly inspiring story of great sacrifice and service by Joanne and Dan.

Next, we drove somewhat aimlessly south toward San Antonio, passing through more Hill Country including a stop to view a big dam project that formed Crystal Lake. The sun was setting, and the right-seat birthday girl (plus a day) was getting hungry so we stopped to top off the battery and hopped on Interstate 35 to swam with the rush hour trout into San Antonio to the Hotel Contessa, our overnight accommodations. It’s on the Riverwalk and near the Alamo so we should have good sightseeing opportunities tomorrow.  

We walked a few blocks to Boudro’s, a Texas steak house on the Riverwalk. So now we’re stuffed with black angus. Judy’s birthday celebration is now on hold until next week when we go to Top Golf in Tampa for a party with friends.