After Jilly’s super party back in January – reported here – I wanted an opportunity to return her hospitality and also to catch up properly; it’s never sensibly possible to do that with the host of a party at the party itself.
So we arranged to meet for dinner a few weeks later, settling on Barshu. Jilly’s always liked my taste in oriental food and I thought top notch Sichuan food might be novel to Jilly and make a change for me.
Jilly left it a bit late to respond to a few choices I put to her:
You’ve guessed correctly. I think I’d prefer Chinatown rather than City, and the Sichuan does sound intriguing, but if it’s that good, I understand that it may be already booked.
It wasn’t already booked so I booked it.
The e-mail trail also informs me that Jilly was running a little late:
If you get this message, forgive me, I’ll be a little late. Running time of No 55 somewhat/entirely misjudged…?
I like the penguin.
I think I got some reading done while waiting and I don’t remember waiting all that long.
We talked about all sorts of things, but of course a major topic was the parent situation; all past tense in my case, some past and much still tense in Jilly’s.
The evening flew by, like it does, very pleasurably. The food was excellent; it always is in Barshu.
Jilly and I agreed it had been too long since we last had a meal and a chat. We agreed not to leave it so long again next time; which we won’t, but still we’ve left it longer than we’d ideally have liked. That’s what grown-up life does to us all.