When I had mentioned dinner to Giggles at the tennis courts earlier that day and the fact that it was in Queens she had seemed hesitant to accept the invitation. But being a trooper, she agreed to come. In case anyone is wondering how I met Giggles, we met at work and became quick friends when we traveled to Thailand together for an assignment. We were both reasonably new at the company and to NYC and bonded over our newness as well as a particularly traumatic massage experience our first day in Bangkok. We all met at Tournesol, a small french bistro just one subway stop from Manhattan on the seven train, where Smiley and Boo had their first date. Boo made reservations at this restaurant declaring that dinner in the city on a Saturday night is "amateur hour" and we all nodded in agreement - long waits, crappy service and a large bill for all your troubles.
We were scanning the menu when the single diner sitting beside me leaned over and dropped his comment card in front of me to give a "preview" for the meal ahead of us and strongly recommended the French onion soup. In fact when the waiter took our orders he said "They'll all have the French onion soup." Smiley looked visibly annoyed a this point. We did not get the French onion soup, but instead Giggles had the chicken liver salad, Smiley and Boo shared a lovely looking brie filled tart topped with figs and I had the carrot soup.
Do you know how I know this is great soup? I did not add ANY salt and pepper, something I normally do with most of my food. The soup was smooth and not too sweet, with chopped celery and carrots and what I think was balsamic drizzle. Sometime before our first courses, the lone diner piped up again! This time to ask how we all knew each other as we seemed like interesting "couples". At first we laughed and joked that me and Giggles are lovers, but his leering made me quickly say "Sorry to destroy your fantasy but we are just friends." As if this wasn't enough, he then passed out business card for his girlfriend (I can't imagine the poor soul dating this dude and quite frankly why was she not there with him!) which was for some website where you get cash back for your everyday purchases and she in turn pockets some cash too. Out of curiosity, I kept the card and logged on the site and it looked like some Amway-type garbage - no thanks!
For the main courses, Smiley had the pollack in parchment, Boo the grilled salmon (I think), Giggles the grilled calamari with avocado and cucumber salad and for me the goat cheese aumoniere with pistachio and beet that was almost too pretty to eat (but of course I did and it was fabulous).
The aumoniere was crisp and flakey and filled with creamy goat cheese atop sliced beets, orange segments, sliced grape tomatoes and crunchy pistachios. Everyone appeared to enjoy their mains and Giggles mentioned we should bring Frenchie here for a meal. During dinner, as we sipped refreshing rose wine and talked about work, travel, family, effeminate straight men and all the wacky people with which me and Smiley had attended school. We also discussed how Smiley met her man, on Chemistry.com, which Boo described as a dating website designed for five year olds. We exchanged stories of online disaster dates on Match (all) and EHarmony (Giggles) and then Smiley volunteered Boo for one very special story of his experience with a woman he met on Craigslist (I always assumed this site was for random hook ups). Up front he admitted he and this lady did not exactly have long-term mind (and I was correct) to which Smiley looked shocked and exclaimed "I did not know that!" She dissolved into laughter as she would not have brought up this story had she known that detail, which had apparently gone unmentioned in prior tellings. Boo met his potential booty call at a bar for drinks, which she chugged, then asked multiple times "Soooo are you attracted to me?" This was followed by her throwing up the drinks in the bathroom and then making him order a pizza which she ran out on - pretty epic. I had only met Boo once before at a bar on Canada Day, surrounded by wasted Canadians transplanted in NY drinking Labatt Blue and singing loudly to Celine Dion, Justin Bieber or whatever the hell was playing. Bottom line, it was loud and we didn't get the chance to really talk. But now that we have, I could tell he was a very cool person and quite compatible with Smiley.
The dessert menus were placed in front of us and we decided to split the creme brulee and the bread pudding. I also had a coffee and Smiley a glass of port. Here is the creme brulee we destroyed....
And the yummy bread pudding we also killed...
We hopped on the subway back to the city and quickly said our goodbyes when me and Giggles got off at Grand Central before the doors closed. "That was fun!" said Giggles, and it really was! On my way out of the station, I was stopped by a group of Chinese tourists asking for directions to Macy's at 11:30 pm. I told them the way with the qualification "Ummm you do know it's closed now" - weird. I walked home thinking about how interesting the results often are when you merge old and new friends. You hope they'll get along but at the same time not so much so they decide to reveal all your embarassing stories (well some are fine)! I've been lucky as the old and new have mixed seamlessly and I attribute this to the fact that the majority of the people I choose to surround myself with are just easy to be with and open minded. Old friends are a comforting connection to your past and who you used to be, while new friends reflect where you are now in your life and hopefully - the new friends will someday also be referred to as old friends.
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