Even though I didn’t really have any plans for the day, I ended up going out for both lunch and dinner. “Feel like having lunch tomorrow?”, a friend texted me last night. And then earlier today, there was another text, “Feel like an early dinner?”. I don’t think I was a “second choice date”, I just think friends are finding themselves in the same position as me when it comes to planning their social lives.

The thing about getting older (I think) is that you no longer have the “need” to plan a big night out on Friday and Saturday with your friends. The “need” to organise dinner parties, restaurants and the like disappears with age, I think. You’re just as happy to go out for dinner during the week and spend your Friday or Saturday night at home. I still like going out on a Sunday night, though. I will often go out for dinner on a Sunday night, as I think it “expands the weekend” just that little bit further.

So for lunch today, it was dumplings and noodles in Chinatown, and then tonight it was pork belly, pasta, and brussel sprout salad at Cafe Sopra/Fratelli Fresh in Kings Cross. In both cases the meals were terrific. I especially loved the simplicity of the pork belly (pictured). Tasty, and not too many flavours.

After a late lunch, and then an afternoon nap, I caught up with a friend for dinner tonight at 6.30. By about 8.45, we had finished dinner and were headed home. She needs to be up early tomorrow for surf club control, and I just like getting up early these days. 5.30, 6.00, suits me fine. Though I sometimes sleep in on the weekends. Maybe I’ll get up early and take some photographs of Sculpture By The Sea. Either way, it was nice to be out and about before the Saturday night crowds. “I can be home in bed by ten”, I told my friend. I never quite made it, as you’ll see from the posting time of this blog-post, but I DO enjoy a much quieter Saturday night than the ones I might have enjoyed twenty years ago.