But why would the afternoon have been awkward without Mike and his familj??
I wasn't there, but I assume David is referring to the fact that he and his wife were dragged by TMZ. David specifically points to Mike and his family being kind and supportive--I know that might be hard to believe by some people on this board.
If I were in David's shoes, I could see being afraid that I would receive the cold shoulder, or worse. I'm glad to hear that David seems to have had a positive experience.
I don't know why it should be hard for anyone to believe. As far as we know, Dave and Mike have seemingly supportive and on basically good terms for 5 decades. Or at least I don't think there's been animosity/bad blood/sore feelings. Almost like a Bruce and Mike situation. I think part of that is there was zero time in the band during which either was vying for a piece of any shared artistic pie... maybe because Dave wasn't in the band long enough for that stuff to develop.
In any case, it's nice to see that Mike (and apparently all the living BBs members) are being supportive of Dave during this time. Yes, Mike unfortunately endlessly brings up bad stuff related to the Wilson brothers (to a point even when Mike's biggest supporters have eventually rolled their eyes as if to say "enough!"), so maybe some people might stretch to think this would be the case with Dave too. But that's not going to happen fortuantely, because Mike has no longstanding jealousy and/or resentment issues with Dave, in the way Mike does with the Wilsons, where he feels the heaps of fan love directed at the Wilsons are simultaneously at his expense.
This type of thing is a complete non-issue with Mike and Dave, where (I think?) not a single fan thinks Mike and Dave negatively impacted each others' artistic growth, adulation, etc., so they fortunately just don't seem to have any of that Wilson/Love baggage that might otherwise perhaps cause Mike to act finger-waggingly (if one is to attempt to predict Mike's reaction by factoring in Mike's unfortunate finger-wagging track record with the Wilsons).
Glad that Dave is immune to this. And I hope (perhaps unrealistically) that this is a sign that Mike will put that finger-wagging thing he repeatedly does behind him for all time now with regards to all his bandmates, past or present.