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Telegraph
11 hours ago
- General
- Telegraph
Eating dinner at 10pm is nothing short of pyschopathic
Almost everything about Covid was bad, obviously. The virus itself, the pain it inflicted across the world, the restrictions on individual liberty, and the banging of pots with wooden spoons on our doorsteps every Thursday evening (astonishing to think this is the country that came up with Magna Carta, and yet over 800 years later we'd regressed to the point where we decided to show our appreciation by behaving like deranged toddlers with a set of kitchen equipment). On the other hand, it shifted our body clocks forward a bit, did it not? It did for me, anyway. Pre-Covid, an 8pm table booking was no problem. Splendid, in fact. Dinner out with friends, nothing could be lovelier. Post-Covid, it seemed mad. Practically wanton. Be out at that time, away from my home? Only sitting down for dinner at 8pm? What is this, Spain? Now, if I'm meeting pals for supper, I generally try to get away with a 7.30 booking, although ideally 7pm. That allows plenty of time for chit-chat but means we can still be in bed by 10. If friends are coming over for dinner, I often say to them airily 'any time from 6.30' in the hope this means I might be tucked up with my book even earlier. At any sign of lingering over the coffee and bag of Minstrels, I start loading the dishwasher. It's enormously relaxed, an evening with me. Last November, while having dinner with friends in New York – 'the city that never sleeps' – I practically fell asleep at the table because our reservation was for 9pm (although I suspect jet lag and the three margaritas before dinner didn't help matters much). But a friend across the pond says there's been a more general shift to earlier eating even there. And yet there remain among us a good number of psychopaths who want to eat at 10.30pm, or even later. I'm not referring to our southern European friends; various London restaurants have recently announced that they're opening reservation slots for later tables. Mountain, a Soho restaurant where I once tried tripe (not for me), is now offering punters the chance of a slot at 10.30pm. Tomos Parry, the co-founder and chef of Brat, a very trendy Shoreditch restaurant, says he's noticed late-night diners creeping back. If you fancy a plate of extremely spicy noodles, you can book a table at Speedboat Bar, an excellent Thai restaurant also in Soho, until 12.30am on Friday and Saturday nights. This has been hailed as a 'late-night dining revolution', which I don't remember Marx banging on about much. Restaurateurs are, naturally, delighted. Times are hard, getting punters in to eat is challenging, especially when everyone's on the fat jabs, so if they can keep throwing out plates until the wee hours for those who do want to eat, so much the better. Jeremy King, restaurant impresario, has recently unveiled a new late-night menu at his new-ish joints, The Park and Arlington. Book a table after 9.45pm and you get 25 per cent off. Notably, these are all fairly central London restaurants, and I wonder how many of their late-night clientele live reasonably close. Or at least only one zone away. Well-heeled sorts who don't baulk at the price of fillet steak and can totter home or hail a black cab for a fare under a tenner. Because if you book a table at 10.30pm, you're not going to be heading home much before midnight. The trains have stopped running back to my parts by then. There's the odd night bus if I don't mind two hours crawling southwards, or it'll be a £50 Uber. Bed by 1am, maybe, which isn't hugely practical if you have to work for a living, or have small children, or a small and unruly terrier who demands his first outing to the park at 6am. That's to say nothing of the potential digestion issues. I don't wish to be indelicate, but can one get a good night's kip if you hit the pillow with a stomach full of tripe after midnight? As Pepys himself once surmised: 'I did eat very late at night, which I perceive makes me feel heavy and sleepy.' Quite. Experts quoted in health articles constantly extol the health benefits of intermittent fasting, or restricting one's eating to an eight- or 10-hour window. But good luck with that if you're swallowing your last mouthful of crispy egg noodles after Cinderella's curfew. No more for you until at least lunchtime the following day. Many years ago, one late night as a teenager, I sat across a table from a boy I had a crush on in a restaurant called Vingt-Quatre on the Fulham Road. It had opened in 1995, London's first 24-hour restaurant, and the novelty was thrilling. The novelty of sitting near a boy, I mean, although the restaurant was pretty thrilling too. We shared a burger and the bill came with a small pot of Smarties, which seemed the height of ironic decadence. He paid and afterwards walked me back through the dark streets of Chelsea to put me on the N137 home to Stockwell, so it was a relatively chaste evening. Not the sort of thing that gets poets excited. But it felt practically Byronic to me – the late night, the Smarties, the slow meander to the Sloane Street bus stop. I swooned about it for months once safely back at boarding school. I understand it, in other words. I understand that late-night dining can be exciting, and romantic, possibly even a little dangerous if your alarm is going off soon. But my appetite for danger must have waned in the intervening 23 years because dicey behaviour these days means going to sleep after 11pm. Perhaps this is more to do with age than Covid. Or both. Still, if restaurants are increasingly catering for daredevils who wish to risk indigestion and trapped wind, those of us who prefer 7pm tables may stand more of a chance. Or maybe even 6.30pm. Could you make 6.30?
Reuters
a day ago
- Business
- Reuters
Till loss do us part: insuring wedding mishaps and contingencies
June 20, 2025 - When planning for the happiest day of their lives, to-be-wedded couples typically decide the guest count, entertainment options and whether to splurge on an open bar. Purchasing wedding insurance is probably the furthest from their minds. But unexpected events happen. Large gatherings of celebratory people are prime spots for mishaps. So purchasing wedding insurance might add a little peace of mind to an otherwise exciting, but stressful day (and be well worth the investment). There are different types of wedding insurance. Event postponement and cancellation insurance, for example, covers losses from delaying or calling off the wedding. Liability insurance covers the couple in the event someone is injured at their wedding and pursues a claim or sues them. Where there is no wedding insurance, however, a couple's existing homeowners and auto insurance might not apply to cover injuries or property damage resulting from the wedding. Before the COVID-19 pandemic, many people did not contemplate event postponement and cancellation insurance for something other than bad weather, illness or injuries. Some couples who purchased wedding insurance before the pandemic were fortunate enough to recoup costs from delaying their wedding for a year (or several) due to social distancing guidelines. Nowadays, event postponement and cancellation insurance for an unanticipated virus may be difficult to acquire. Many wedding insurers exclude health-related outbreaks or emergencies that would delay a wedding from the scope of offered coverage. Depending on the venue, vendor or event package, some insurance might already be included in the couple's event. Wedding venues and vendors frequently have their own policies to protect them in case there are any unexpected losses or they are held liable for another's injuries or property damage. While a vendor's policy may or may not include coverage for business losses or liabilities, those policies do not typically insure the couple. To be eligible for a property owner or vendor's insurance benefits, the couple must qualify as insureds under those policies. Insured status might not extend to a couple if the policy is intended to insure only business-related losses or liabilities. Business liability policies often cover the company's officers, employees and even volunteer workers as insureds. Those policies typically do not provide liability coverage for customers renting the business' property. To avoid losses due to an unexpected postponement or cancellation, it is probably best that the couple purchase their own insurance. Not all wedding policies are the same, so the couple should carefully assess the offered coverage and any limitations on what the insurance covers. If the couple fails to purchase wedding insurance before the big day, what if someone is injured at their wedding and pursues an insurance claim or sues the newly married couple? Insureds may look to their home insurance for liability coverage for damages arising from the venue's property conditions, such as a slip and fall. However, homeowners policies usually exclude liabilities occurring at non-insured locations rented to insureds. As the California Supreme Court explained in the 1986 decision, Preston v. Goldman, "Generally speaking, the personal liability provisions of a homeowner's policy bind the insurer to pay damages for which the insured shall become liable as a result of accidents in and around his home." In the 1983 case, Safeco Ins. Co. v. Hale, a California appellate court recognized that homeowners policies' other locations exclusion applies to injuries arising from conditions of premises the policy does not insure. The court interpreted "premises" to mean "the land and more or less permanently affixed structures contained thereon. It does not contemplate easily movable property which may be located on the property at a given time or even on a regular or permanent basis." Based on this definition, a slip and fall on the rented dance floor could be barred from coverage under an "other locations" exclusion. In contrast, the North Carolina Court of Appeals refused to apply a homeowners policy's "other locations" exclusion to bar coverage for guests injured at a warehouse the insured rented to host his birthday party. In the 2004 case, Erie Ins. Exchange v. Szamatowicz, the insured rented a warehouse approximately 20 miles away from his home to celebrate his birthday with over 100 guests. A fire broke out at the warehouse and some of the insured's guests sued him. The Szamatowicz court held that the warehouse did not fall under the policy's "other locations" exclusion because the warehouse was used in connection with the "insured location" — the insured's home. The insured decided to have his birthday party at the warehouse instead of his home to accommodate the large number of guests and to not disturb his infant son. This North Carolina decision may not be followed by courts in other jurisdictions. Birthday parties are often hosted at home, and the warehouse was used in lieu of the insured's home, not in connection with the home. Would a court apply the "other locations" exclusion if the guests were injured at a rented wedding venue? If a guest slips on the dance floor and sues the venue — and the venue cross-complains against the couple — would the couple's homeowners policy cover the cross-complaint? The couple signed a contract promising to indemnify the venue for liabilities arising from their wedding. Many homeowners policies exclude liability assumed by the insured under any contract or agreement. Another potential wedding-related liability issue is if guests have too much to drink and get into car collisions while driving. Homeowners insurance typically excludes liabilities, such as others' bodily injury or property damage, arising from the ownership, maintenance or use of a motor vehicle. Most motor vehicle exclusions in homeowner policies broadly exclude liability based on an insured's negligent supervision or entrustment of any person using any motor vehicle. For example, a homeowners policy's negligent supervision or entrustment exclusion would apply if a hired bus driver had too much to drink and then drove guests home after an open bar reception. The driver crashes, and guests riding in the bus are injured and sue the couple. A lawsuit alleging the couple is liable for the collision based on alleged negligent supervision of the bus driver or negligent entrustment of the rented bus to the driver (the couple hired the driver who got inebriated at the open bar reception and drove guests home) would be excluded under the policy. A couple's personal auto insurance might not cover their guests or vendors' auto collisions resulting from their wedding, either. The guests or vendors decide to drink and drive their own vehicles, and injure others in a collision. If the guests or vendors are sued and seek coverage for the lawsuit under the wedding couple's auto policy, the guests or vendors might not qualify as insureds and their vehicles might not qualify as insured vehicles. A pre-wedding purchase of event insurance that includes liability coverage might be the best solution for many of the things that can go wrong at a wedding celebration. Couples should not rely on their existing insurance policies to cover potential losses or claims related to their wedding. As part of the wedding planning, it would be prudent to buy wedding insurance for any unanticipated events or losses that may arise. Just in case there are more than just wedding bells ringing in the air — like, God forbid, an ambulance siren. Erin Mindoro Ezra is a regular contributing columnist on insurance coverage for Reuters Legal News and Westlaw Today.
