remote cards

We’ve gone to this Italian, we’ve been here a few times, but it’s been
refurbished since. The lighting is wrong which is frustrating, oh
sure, it’s fancy, but it’s wrong. And the main thing we are conscious
of as we go through the menu and order food. That done, we become more
conscious of those around us, at the next table there are five
Americans, behind us another two. There had been a bunch of guys in
the cinema bar where we’d met talking loudly about forthcoming films,
but also about an Irish dancing competition. From the conversation
amongst the Americans this is clearly what they are here for – talking
about dance studious, about their entry numbers, and the like. To my
right the table of five, a blonde woman, and perhaps her daughter,
flame haired and beautiful – there are plenty of attractive women out
there, but this girl has looks you can’t not look at. On the other
side a grey woman, then facing them the three women are two men, a
grey man and another man of an age with the blonde. The red head has a
card round her neck, presumably her entry details or something
official. She is the only one who has dessert, a conical kind of glass
bowl, with a stack of pink and brown ice creams, little sweet items
lumps on top, which she spoons into her mouth happily. The blonde and
the red leave, the rest of the table will catch them up, talk of
buses, and locations. Then the younger of the two guys, though still
old enough to have retired from the navy, starts talking with the guys
behind me, who I can’t see. They compare notes on navy careers, on
football appreciation, and then wish each other the best of luck for
the competition the next day and they leave as well.