Dartmouth Cooking

This evening was a Dartmouth Club of London event, which thankfully I didn't have to organise this time.

Yet, the demands of work meant that I couldn't even finish up until 6:15 PM, leaving me with five minutes to try to throw on something respectable-looking (when will I learn to dress properly earlier in the day if I need to leave right after work?)

I really came to regret this after I arrived at the event, held in a spacious loft right on the Thames near Tower Bridge. As there was this guy there, not conventionally handsome, but really funny and witty and easily entertained everyone in our group and captured my attention. I didn't feel like he paid any more attention to me than anyone else, although he was so socially skilled as to make it seem like you were the most fascinating person whenever he was talking to you.

We spent the evening making canapés, some better than others, although I was impressed with how easy it was to make belinis and other nice little nibbles. I have to admit that it was a great activity as well, that really got us all talking to each other and socializing.

At the end of the evening, when we were all calling cabs to head home, I realised what a find I had on my hands when he revealed that he lived at the other end of my street. Oh my goodness, another Neighbour Guy! (To be honest, he looked kind of like the original Neighbour Guy too).

We shared a cab home with a Class of '10 (could hardly believe that they're that young!) and after dropping her off, made our way home together. (He insisted that we not ask her for any money, but cover the cost of the cab ourselves, since she was a student. I realise now I'm paying forward the kindness many older and more financially stable people have shown me over the years, but it meant I ended up with a more expensive cab ride than I had expected!) Once we reached the top of my street, we parted with a kiss on each cheek as we made our way in opposite directions down our same street.

After I got home, I did pause to take myself to task. After all, he was a Class of '87. Do the math. That means he's 15 years older than I am. And here I'm worried about S being 4 years younger than I am? Imagine a 15-year age gap! And you figure that a guy who is tall, smart, funny and good-looking must have something wrong with him if he's still single at this age...

Still, he's nice. He said he's be having a flatwarming sometime soon, and of course I was invited. Might be fun to socialize with my neighbour sometime again in the future.