Dogs in restaurants.
8:17 a.m.
I was so exhausted yesterday I couldn’t bring myself to update. We brunched with our friends from Rochester, the ones with the autistic son, at their favourite breakfast restaurant. Hubby, Buddy Boy and I were early, so we secured a booth and waited until the other family arrived: mother, father, autistic 10-year-old, his high-achieving 8-year-old brother, and the newest addition to their family, a service dog.
This is an interesting development, the use of service dogs in the care of autistic children. The mom told me how it works. The dog bonds with the parents as the alpha members of the pack. The child for which it was acquired hasn’t got the ability to nurture and bond with it in that way, but the dog will recognize that this person is important to its masters, and hence important to it. The animal in question takes the boy for a walk when either the mother or father take it for a walk. The lad has a leash strapped around his waist attached to the dog. The mom says he hasn’t run away once since the dog came to live with them. He’s more focused, is using his vocabulary more (French and English) and the future looks a little brighter. The father is frazzled by the antics of his eldest. Anything helps.
After we bade them adieu, the three of us went dishwasher shopping. The model we settled on is expensive, even on sale, but not as expensive as some others. It has a grinder and a drying system that doesn’t use up extra kilowatt hours. It also wasn’t in stock. If it had been available, we would have purchased it on the spot. As it is, we have to wait two weeks, so if at the end of that time we still want a new dishwasher, we know where to find it.
When we got home, I went to bed for a few hours, totally exhausted, and got up in time to make a barbecued salmon dinner for Buddy Boy’s last supper. His two best friends joined us. There were also boiled potatoes dressed with butter and parsley and a salad, and Buddy Boy and one of his friends finished off the blueberry pie that was leftover from another meal. Now I can begin my dieting in earnest!
After the dishes were cleared away and washed (in the sink), the dad of the autistic boy came over. He and Hubby pulled out the guitars, got me singing, and we passed a very pleasant evening. It was past midnight when our guest left. Hubby ended up driving him home, and the two of them shoveled the driveway then. Looking out at it from an upper window, you’d never know that now.
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