14th October - Chinese Meal at Pearl City Restaurant

I met Debbie in the Old Monkey Pub tonight. Sue, Michelle, Haydn, Ray and Dave arrived not long after us and we chatted about what we had been doing since we last saw each other. Dave O passed round his photos of Claire and Mark's wedding last month - it looks like they had a good day. Neil, Sue F, Alan K and Nicola arrived later. By the time it got to 9.15 pm we were all feeling hungry so I decided it was time to make a move. Michelle led the way to Chinatown - apparently the restaurant isn't a buffet place as we first thought, but it looked good anyway. We ordered some prawn crackers and then started to choose our meals. I decided to have Vegetable Spring rolls followed by Chicken Satay. Stuart ordered 3 courses(!) - Spare ribs,soup and Lemon Chicken. The portions turned out to be fairly generous so I wondered how he'd manage to finish it all. Haydn seemed to have the best deal - he had steamed duck with mixed meats and seafood -it looked enough for 2 so we all helped him to finish it! We sang "Happy Birthday" to Michelle and toasted her health. She certainly chose a good restaurant as everyone was pleased with their meal.At about 11pm, people started leaving. Ray was first to go, then Haydn who had to catch a train back to Glossop. Debbie agreed to share my taxi which turned out to be a 7-seater MPV! Although the city centre was busy because of the boxing match at the Arena, the taxi driver said he hadn't been too busy.
I'm quite pleased I went out with Activities tonight for a change as it was good to see everyone and I enjoyed the meal.