Women out and about!

I seem to have been in serious ladies-who-lunch mode this week, catching up with various different groups of friends. And there are more to be organised for the next couple of weeks. Yesterday's lunch was considerably better than Monday's. This is no reflection of the company but rather on the food. On Monday one of our party had booked us into a restaurant that was taking part in Manchester's Food Festival, getting us a special deal. The problem was that the special deal was steak and chips and a cocktail. Now, I have not eaten steak for more years than I care to count and gin-based cocktails have never been my thing. So it goes.

Yesterday's lunch was at La Viña, a pretty authentic tapas restaurant on Manchester's Deansgate, where I had a Catalan dish (not a political statement at all) which they called "suqueta" but which the Catalans call "suquet de pescadors". It had prawns and mussels and clams in a tomato sauce - the Catalans do like their tomatoes. For those who can read Catalan, here is a link to a recipe. I also had garlic mushrooms and what they called a winter salad. My friend had something with aubergines, an over-rated vegetable in my opinion, an Asturian dish with "alubias", white beans, and a winter salad.

We love going to La Viña, partly for the amusement of seeing what selection of tapas they will serve us and whether it actually matches up with what we ordered. Maybe it's because the Spanish waiters are so friendly and chatty that they forget stuff but we have several times had weird and wonderful but erroneous dishes. Yesterday, true to form, they served us one winter salad and one dish of another, less appetising looking salad, which we sent back to be exchanged. The food, however, is always good, especially washed down with a nice glass of wine.

All this eating out plays havoc with your exercise routine. So today I get back on track: a run down the Donkey Line bridle path to Uppermill, a whizz round the Wednesday market, admiring the display of flowers, and a brisk walk back.

On the subject of exercise, I came across this article which maintains that women are often too afraid to walk through city streets and parks because of fear of harassment. This is interesting because one of my companions in my Italian class asked me to meet her at Piccadilly station in Manchester so that we could travel together to the class venue in nearby Ardwick - bus from Piccadilly to the Apollo theatre and then a five minute walk to the actual venue. I have no fears of doing this journey on my own but this lady is clearly made nervous by the look of the place. This, by the way, is late afternoon not late evening.

I walk around the city on my own a great deal without problems. Do I lack imagination or does my friend have an overactive imagination? Which of us is right?