Service!

An early train for me today to meet my oldest friend Jenny in Edinburgh for the last of my very spread-out birthday treats, but her train was cancelled. I had a coffee and read the paper in the Balmoral till she arrived.

We went to look at the Turner watercolours which are only shown in January then we went to 21212 for a wonderful Michelin star lunch. As always the food was almost too pretty to eat - but we managed. The restaurant was very quiet. It is January I suppose, but I don't think £32 for 3 courses of such wonderful food is too expensive. Although the portions look small, the food is so rich it feels like more. It is very labour-intensive to produce such exquisite food - there were 6 chefs preparing our lunch and 2 staff waiting to serve it. We were able to go upstairs with our coffee and chat till 4.30 when we had to leave for our trains. It was such a treat to have time to chat in such luxurious surroundings.

Mr C met me from the train and we went to supper with friends - I was excused from eating the starter and pudding as even though L is a brilliant cook I couldn't have eaten more than a taste of it. We were there to welcome another friend who had been travelling in India for 5 weeks.

#2 daughter texted to say she feels she's making progress with her running and did 7 miles in under an hour.