365 Pink Feather Boas All in a Row - Day 96 (Tuesday 6 April 2010) : Having My Phil of an Old Friend

Continuing what seems to be a recent Tuesday tradition of catching up with friends I haven't seen in many a long day (and quite a few fleetingly short, fast ones), I met up with long standing friend, Phil, tonight, recently returned from being a missionary with his wife and three kids in Mozambique.

I never did make it to Mozambique to visit him - every time I contemplated it some disease outbreak or unrest persuaded me to go to Canada instead which has a dearth of ebola virus or cholera outbreaks - but thankfully he's back in Australia, working at Bondi Junction and living in Wollongong. We met up in the City and walked down to The Rocks for a hearty steak and salad dinner at my favourite pub, Phillips Foote, acompanied by wine (me) and beer (him), and we caught up on the events of a number of years of sporadic contact during which I came out (which Phil didn't handle well at first, as he'll be the first to admit, but which he now understands is who I am... he even asked how I met my gorgeous guy), he had another child, and I changed jobs and he changed profession and countries! Phew!

The lovely courtyard of Phillips Foote (we sat at the table in the top left of the photo, up the stairs)

There was so much to catch up that we continued the catch up - we slipped back into the sort of easy familiar conversational style that you have with old friends, no matter the years of separation - next door at The Rocks Cafe where I had the yummiest lemon meringue cake (with a towering crown of meringue that I ate separately from the lemon custard section, a habit I haevn't shaken since I was a kid!) and a wine before we walked back to Circular Quay and our trains home.

It was a delightful reunion and it will be so lovely to be back in regular contact again.