It was about five o'clock late yesterday afternoon when one of my best friends, Jake, arrived at my house with his girlfriend to watch a movie with Valerie and I. We watched Blood Diamond, a heart-wrenching story which revolves around illicit diamond trade during Sierra Leone's civil war, which was quite a good movie (and four out of five stars in my book).
By the time the movie was finished, however, it was near eight o'clock in the evening, and none of us had eaten dinner. I didn't really feel like cooking that late, so I suggested the four of us all go out to eat. Valerie, ever practical, didn't want to go out and spend more money at a restaurant when we'd already eaten out quite a bit during the weekend, but my suggestion won out (this time). We decided to try our luck with the ever-crowded Kitchen 64, even as the darkling sky threatened a storm outside.
As soon as we stepped out of the car I knew I'd made a fantastic decision because there, on the patio waiting for a table, were our friends Nikki and Joel, and Kevin and Tiffany. We hadn't seen these two fine couples in several months so we happily sat down with them after putting in my name for a table of our own.
The sky gave us a drizzle as we started to chat, and as that drizzle turned into rain-in-earnest, our four friends were called in to their table. Content with our serendipitous encounter, our original party continued to chat it up.
Not five minutes later, however, Joel popped his head back out of the door back on to the patio and told us to come in and squeeze into the huge booth they had acquired, and to our joy, our party of four became an octet. What followed was a fine couple of hours of reminiscence, food, wine, the news of Nikki and Joel's impending parenthood, and plenty of crowd noise in this young Northside hot spot.
We said our extended good-byes afterwards, as friends often do, varying our farewells a little after just one more topic of conversation, lingering in the parking lot during a break in the rain storm. Finally we parted ways, returning to our separate places of residence, all attempting to mentally forestall the work week that lay ahead.
By the time the movie was finished, however, it was near eight o'clock in the evening, and none of us had eaten dinner. I didn't really feel like cooking that late, so I suggested the four of us all go out to eat. Valerie, ever practical, didn't want to go out and spend more money at a restaurant when we'd already eaten out quite a bit during the weekend, but my suggestion won out (this time). We decided to try our luck with the ever-crowded Kitchen 64, even as the darkling sky threatened a storm outside.
As soon as we stepped out of the car I knew I'd made a fantastic decision because there, on the patio waiting for a table, were our friends Nikki and Joel, and Kevin and Tiffany. We hadn't seen these two fine couples in several months so we happily sat down with them after putting in my name for a table of our own.
The sky gave us a drizzle as we started to chat, and as that drizzle turned into rain-in-earnest, our four friends were called in to their table. Content with our serendipitous encounter, our original party continued to chat it up.
Not five minutes later, however, Joel popped his head back out of the door back on to the patio and told us to come in and squeeze into the huge booth they had acquired, and to our joy, our party of four became an octet. What followed was a fine couple of hours of reminiscence, food, wine, the news of Nikki and Joel's impending parenthood, and plenty of crowd noise in this young Northside hot spot.
We said our extended good-byes afterwards, as friends often do, varying our farewells a little after just one more topic of conversation, lingering in the parking lot during a break in the rain storm. Finally we parted ways, returning to our separate places of residence, all attempting to mentally forestall the work week that lay ahead.