Sandra, Liza, Linda, Andrea. I’m safely behind the lens for this shot.
I commented last year about the double meaning of the term “Club Night” for me:
- almost monthly real tennis gatherings at Lord’s which I, for my sins, curate;
- once or twice a year get togethers with my BBYO youth club pals from back in days of yore.
This time, the Korean setting also had double meaning, as the previous week I had attended a work event with visitors from Busan on the Tuesday, then curated real tennis Club Night at Lord’s on the Wednesday.
One of the London-based Korean speakers was most impressed to learn that I would be eating at Kimchee the following week, as he and his family really rate that place. Well done Andrea for choosing it and using your connections (the Kimchee website) to book the table.
As always, it was really good to see everyone who could make it. We chatted about old times…and new times…and all that.
The evening flew by.
Someone thought that I’d be the best placed person to arrange a group selfie of the five of us who attended that night…
…but they were wrong. My effort was pathetic. You see young folk doing this sort of thing with apparent ease, but I have never got the hang of doing anything more than a double selfie.
That’s why I took the headline photo in traditional fashion, which accords with the way I was trained by my dad to take photos.
But I was not in that photo, so I had a go at mogging the whole evening with a solo selfie.
Hawk-eyed readers will observe that I even manage to get my thumb in the way for a solo selfie. Discerning viewers will also conclude that my mogging attempt failed aesthetically.
OK, so I am useless at taking selfies with phones, but I have got the knack of instructing free versions of AI software to help get me out of holes. I sent the above three pictures to Google Flow (Nano Banana 2.1) asking it to produce the five person selfie that I ought to have taken.
I think it’s done rather well. Or should I say that I have done rather well, instructing the software with such precision.
But the truth is, we don’t need pictures from these get togethers – it’s the memories and the friendships that really matter. Those have endured for decades and for sure will continue to endure.