18 hours ago
Yes, it's ‘just' me — please don't sit me in Siberia
T here must be an art to eating out when there is 'just one' of you but, if so, I haven't mastered it. 'Yes, it's just me,' I say to the man at the entrance who is looking over my shoulder, trying to spot my phantom friend. 'No,' I add, brightly, 'just me!' I've tried to stop myself saying 'just'. It just doesn't work.
It sounds like an apology and, on some level, it must be. As Three Dog Night (remember them?) once sang, though admittedly not about dining: 'One is the loneliest number that you'll ever do.' Even the online booking system seems aghast. I have to keep changing the number of diners from the de facto '2' to '1'. If I look away for an instant, it flips back to '2'.
