Christmas Do. (part 3)

The final "do" of the year was this lunchtime and was organised by one of the ex-secretaries from our old building in Wythenshawe.

There was a strong sense of camaraderie in that building. When we first went there in 1996 the sense of something new and exciting starting imbued us with a kind of team spirit that has survived for ten years, even though many of the original joiners have since left the company. It was a new venture - the first time we had tried to build a business around Microsoft technologies and application development - and they were exciting times.

The excitement has long since passed, but the friendships remain and we'll probably continue to enjoy a Christmas dinner together every year as long as Chris keeps organising it. At 15, numbers were slightly reduced this year owing to many people working away from Manchester, and as it turned out the ex-staffers outnumbered those of us who are still there. That just meant the conversation was more interesting, as everyone brought their tales of the year's activities to the party.

We started out with a drink in the Paramount bar on Oxford Street and then repaired to Don Giovanni's for the meal around 1.30pm. The meal was nice, but nothing special. Tuscan bean soup followed by the traditional turkey dinner. There was one slight hiccup when the dessert course was served. We'd already waited for it for half an hour when the waiter came around with a notepad. I thought this a little strange, as we'd all placed our food orders over a month before, but didn't say anything except to repeat my request for Tiramisu.

He returned to the table ten minutes later to inform us that Tiramisu was off, and the remaining choices were profiteroles or panacotta. I was really disappointed with this as I'd been looking forward to the dessert all day, and I wasn't really in the mood to take it lying down. I layed into the guy, loudly telling him it was a disgusting way to treat Christmas guests, I'd only come for the Tiramisu, we'd placed our order months before so how could they have run out? I placed an order for panacotta but added I was very disappointed and it was the least bad choice as far as I was concerned.

The panacotta arrived (and between you and me looked quite nice) but I left it untouched in front of me. Ten minutes later the headwaiter came striding across the restaurant, beaming widely and carrying two plates. He'd managed to find two remaining portions of Tiramisu and placed one in front of me, and one for the person next to me. I thanked him graciously and tucked in. It was delicious. When I'd finished I noticed he hadn't removed the panacotta, so I polished that off too. Bonus!