"So, what do you want to eat?" (oops)

With today's hosts I knew that I couldn't answer, "Sushi."

And it took all I had not to order the item on the menu at Elephant Bar that most resembled it. But I did want it again. I didn't even try to play the, "I-don't-care-whatever-you-want" game with yesterday's host. I recall him going to lunch 3 times the entire year I worked for him and I was so honored that he was leaving the building with me yesterday that I didn't want to shatter and dissolve the magic by being falsely polite and indecisive. Besides, he seemed to be in an indulgent mood and I wanted to, um, indulge that...not only, but especially, because it involved my newest gluttonous affinity.

I didn't eat sushi when I worked there and sort of regret it now. For some reason I was surprised that it costs much less to go for sushi in Berkeley than in Davis. I thought the food at Tako Sushi on Telegraph is just as good as Sushi Unlimited - and it SPANKS Nobu! I know I'm the rawest novice when it comes to sushi, so any reader who might be looking for a recommendation should take my micro-review with a grain of...Cooking is one of maybe three things I'll admit to doing well, but my actual tastes are pretty pedestrian. Ask any of my wine and beer sophisticate snob friends. As with the cell phone and Facebook, I was a late adopter. With sushi, I've not made quite as quick advancements. I've only recently progressed to tuna and I still stick pretty much to rolls. I am amused when I hear someone order omakase and I wouldn't order it myself. But I am uncharacteristically passive when a dining companion orders it for me.

I liked that neither of us felt like a sushi expert, though I suspected that he was holding back. I liked not talking about sushi, but about things that seemed necessary (work) and then things that were normal and relaxed (cars, family). And the lunch hour extended itself 30 minutes and I pressed his generosity when he asked, "Who do you want to see?" and then escorted me into offices using his CardKey and hanging back as I interrupted, as briefly as I could, the former co-workers I wanted to see. It was the last day of the one I most wanted to see, other than my host. They'd had a party and she'd left at noon to start her new life as Retired. I treasure her disclosures and heart-shaped Dollar Store vase she gave me just because it reminded her of me.

I was surprised at my reluctance to leave the office. I could've easily stayed and asked questions and reminisced and more than once was tempted to just take a few files and try to help out. The atmosphere, once so charged with stress and clouded by my own feelings of insecurity and professional inadequacy, was softer. Also, there was relief that I wasn't at work and I was a bit smug for having gotten him to take a well-deserved break.

When he'd paid the check at the restaurant ("No. I'm paying. You're a student again."), I thanked him and said that next month would be my treat. If it really does work out, I will consider it a pleasurable coup. And I will again answer, "Sushi."