Johnnie + Johnnie & Mom

So Johnnie made it a point to invite me to dinner for tonight, where we would be eating the sustainable fish that we will shop for this morning. I love how he gets these ideas in his head and how he intermingles what he wants to have happen. That invite had an educational component (learning about sustainable fish and where to buy them), it had a routine component (we do shopping on Saturdays) and a family component (dinner). You really gotta love this kid! But before all that, I was supposed to come over for breakfast and though I slept in, he Facetimed me to ask me to come over and make breakfast. Of course all I really cared about was spending any kind of time with him today, either an hour or two or however long Lisa lets me, knowing full well she's got a bunch of agendas going on. But first there would be breakfast. I had already downed my pineapple smoothie this morning so I didn't really care if I got to eat anymore. But as it was Lisa wanted me to make French toast for she and I and Johnnie was perfectly happy with a bowl of cereal. It is amazing to me how little he eats here at Lisa's house compared to how much he eats at mine. And that's ok, since we're looking to do dinner tonight. I always make sure he has plenty to eat. Anyway, Lisa agreed to let Johnnie go with me grocery shopping. And I sweetened the deal by telling Lisa we'd even do her grocery shopping for her. Yes it's probably going to cost me an additional $50, but for more time with Johnnie it is worth the price. And so it was that we first did HER groceries, doing the Mitsuwa (for noodles), Trader Joe's, Ralphs, and Whole Foods circuit (for Lisa's foo-foo yogurt drinks) and got it all done in an hour really. And then after dropping those off at her house, off we went for the 2nd round to do MY groceries. This time of course, we had to go to Sprouts to get my produce. And the was where I was going to get the barramundi that we were planning to eat tonight anyway. By then it was already lunchtime too. I floated the idea of eating at Shakey's which was right by Sprouts to Johnnie. But then again there was also Panda Express in Pavilions down the block. Guess which one Johnnie chose?! As for me, I didn't want to eat Panda Express. And so I took us to Ono Hawaiian BBQ to get me some fried whitefish and chicken katsu. Johnnie ate his food <told ya I'd make sure he ate properly> and I ate mine and by the time we were on the way back he was falling asleep in the backseat. He had the right idea. That was what I wanted to do too. And so I dropped him off and Lisa was, by this time, glad to have him back as she also got her ME time in as well. I told her I'd be back in a couple of hours for dinner and off I went and took a nice hour-long nap. I got the morning that I wanted to have after all :)

At the Promenade. I drove back to Lisa's around 5 PM. By then I had had a nap and I was ready to cook the barramundi and do whatever it was that Lisa wanted to do for a Saturday night. It turned out to be way different than I had expected. When I drove up, mom and son were just getting home from walking around the block <I guess-Johnnie was on his bike> and Lisa seemed surprised that I was there. We WERE going to do dinner tonight weren't we? Then again, with Lisa you never know. When she gets cooped up in the house as she had been, she simply will want to get out. And tonight, right then she wanted to return the pillows she had bought at Santa Monica Third Street Promenade. I could tell she wanted to buy other things as well. Hey, I was game... in fact, at that point I was thinking maybe we can even eat dinner at the Promenade. I think the last time we were all there together the three of us was the holidays in 2019 before they left for Paris. Of course, I was just here last week returning my cable gear to Spectrum. I parked pretty much the same place I did last week. And then off we went to return her pillows. To Pottery Barn no less. The LAST TIME the 3 of us went in to Pottery Barn was a time period I won't forget. It was the first week of 2017.  Johnnie was 2 years old. And it was the day after we had that horrible fight that made Lisa move out of the bedroom.  Not good memories to be sure. I was thinking it was perhaps the Universe's way of surfacing yet another thing that I needed to clear, another thing I needed to heal. And tonight, it was way, way different. First of all, with Johnnie older, he was looking at furniture in the context of what I told him I wanted to do, which was to replace the couch he sleeps on with a much better couch. Not that it's bad mind you, it does function just fine. But I could upgrade it as well. Maybe not right now, but in the future to be sure. And so we let Lisa return her stuff, looked around a bit, and the difference this time was there was just no negative energy whatsoever. We let Lisa buy her new flip flops at Tilly's on the Promenade. And then these days, at least Johnnie is on my side when I ask him if he's hungry. It isn't just me anymore. And so Lisa is far more agreeable. We didn't know where to eat. And so ending up at this popup eatery called Ugo's Italian cafe was a surprise. The bigger surprise was that the food was actually pretty good. And like in Italy, the portions weren't American super-sized. We had just enough to eat, Lisa with meatballs, me with lasagna, and Johnnie with a pizza. The surprising thing was that Johnnie actually ate some of my lasagna and liked it! Fancy that! And then after dinner, Johnnie had it in his mind to go to Barnes and Noble. Off we went to the only open BN we knew, which was in Marina del Rey. I had already bought Johnnie a book this morning, but he wanted one more simply because his mom promised him they could go. Which was what we did. By the time we got done it was already past 8:30 PM and it was time for me to go home. But we did have a nice family time together this evening. Which would be the 2nd Saturday in a row we did that. I got to have the Saturday I wanted after all :)