On my walk to the gym this morning, I noticed that Virgin have been digging furrows again. This time they had followed the rim of the Six Bells Roundabout. This is clearly a continuation of their fibre cable broadband initiative. It is also clearly marked by a long line of meandering traffic cones.
My fear that my way would eventually be blocked and I’d have to reverse direction and head home, gradually dissipated as did the traffic cones. All was well and I went to the gym as usual.
While I was lucky with the trip to the gym, I wasn’t so lucky with my trip into London for the first Date Night in a long, long time. The problem was a signals failure between Waterloo and Clapham Junction.
I’ve missed Date Night but not the train problems.
Sadly, the train problems weren’t sorted by the time I went home except for one delightful fact…the train problems didn’t affect MY train going home. For joy!
Anyway, one reason we’ve not had Date Night for a while is because Mirinda has been working from home a lot and only been in London on the rare night. So our Date Nights have been at home. This week, though, she was staying up Monday to Thursday and I’ll be staying up on Friday night (I’ll be at Lords on Saturday) so I wanted to re-institute it properly.
On the way into Waterloo I had a text from Mirinda asking if I minded if Sarah joined us for dinner. Of course not, I said. I haven’t seen Sarah for yonks and it’s always like a Beijing Reunion when the three of us meet up. (Speaking of which, we were all a bit surprised that it’s been four years since we went.)
The first thought (for Date Night as opposed to going to China) was to meet up at The Big Easy.
Being there first, I went in and checked it out. It didn’t take long to realise it was very busy. Sadly the Rum Bar has long since gone, along with the tables and chairs that once dotted the floor. This, it seems, has also seen the demise of Wednesday Night Live Music. All very sad.
Having had a jolly good wander around, I was going to ask the head waiter at the door when I overheard him telling a couple that if they wanted a table it would be an hour and half wait. I don’t know about them but I wasn’t waiting. I headed downstairs and met Mirinda and Sarah on the way, turning them around.
Mirinda then suggested we go to Canteen, another favourite of ours. Only, Canteen is no longer there. It’s now a burger place with a very popular bar. This has always been the case, mainly because of the big outdoor area just beyond the doors. This is even more popular because of the big screens showing the tennis direct from Wimbledon.
We decided to just go to Jamie’s like we’d originally planned (as long it was still there, of course).
Fortunately it was still there and it wasn’t too crowded. And we had a lovely meal. The only thing I found a bit annoying was how they now serve wine in two sizes called ‘normal’ and ‘small.’ This is clearly an attempt to get people to buy the bigger size. Sarah, obviously, asked for a normal one. It was very big. I’d call it large. I suggested that next time she should just ask for the bottle.
Apart from that we had a delightful time and, eventually strolled off to the Tube for our various trips home.
While Date Night was lovely, I did have a bit of an accident earlier on. I decided to burn some rubbish. I am usually very careful but there’s nothing to explain why I didn’t move the brown and exceedingly dry conifer away from the burn bin before lighting it. The results speak for themselves.
I reckon it’s now properly dead. And cremated.