The mother's day sphinx

Ma, Lou and I meet up all the time. There are plenty of excuses for lunch, brunch, breakfast, coffee, walks, movies, library forages, can you come fix...?, look at, admire, help choose outfit for... moments. But rarely do the three of us take ourselves out for dinner and since it was Mothers Day on Sunday Lou insisted on a cracking Italian in Devonport.

At 6 we headed into the Patriot for a glass of wine and propped up the bar swapping 'my fella' stories before wandering across the road to the Restaurant. As we approached we were delighted to see a window full of people at cosy tables, drinking wine and eating from great platers of food and we smiled with expectation until Lou spotted that the name was different and she'd in fact booked the Restaurant next door. bum.

We filed in past the young greek waiter with a handlebar moustache, sat down and eyed up the specials board. Mum asked us what 'cavaldier' was and unknowing Lou called over the waiter.
'Hi, um, can you tell me what cavaldier is please?' She says.
'ah yes,....' he says and looking firmly at me he begins to answer Lou's question. It was very odd suddenly being the sole recipient of someone else's question but I nodded, um-hmmed, yep, oh right as he spoke. Lou began to chuckle next to me forcing me to hold tight to the corners of my own mouth until he'd left.
'he didn't even look at me!' she blurted,
'nor me', stated ma.
Minutes later the waiter came back to take our order, having read the title of the restaurant to be Nicollinos Mum said,
'does Nicollino still work here?'
Our waiter looked down at the table and as his head came up his eyes fixed again firmly on my face. I began my nodding routine while mum and lou looked at each other confused. Mum whispered to lou in her 'no one can hear me' voice that everyone can totally hear,
'he still just looking at her'.
Lou started laughing. My grin spread across my face like a cheshire cat but I managed to hold back the girgle till he'd gone again. I have concluded I'm like some kind of sphinx. I'm going to practice consequential riddles on Pete.

Suffice to say the food was excellent, halfway through our meal our waiter brought us shots of Ouzo and Lou and I recalled an Ouzo night at a London comedy club when I'd turned to explain my irritation at truely seeing double only to find lou squinting through one eye trying to sort out her own vision.













































A perfect evening. The waiter kindly choreographed some pics and we left with promises to return every thursday for their band and ouzo nights where dancing on the bar are a pre-requisite. It was the, 'if you want to see a fat man dance...' comment that got me to acquiesce ;)