So okay, what were the odds? When I was last in Madrid a few weeks ago and heading for the train station I ran into my old friend Pablo, who was there visiting for the weekend. We hadn’t spoken for about five years (part of our ongoing tempestuous friendship spanning over 20 years). And so, to just randomly run into him in a city the size of Madrid, when I haven’t run into him at all during the last five years here, well, that was weird. So I said to him “THIS is weird” and he said “No, YOU’RE weird”, which kinds of sums up the very mature way we talk to each other. 😉

But somehow this led to us meeting for lunch today, so that Pablo could help out with some Tapas Research. I reckoned it would either go fine or we’d end up having yet another big fight and not speak for another five years.

But hey, it went fine.

We had a nice relaxed lunch at Tradevo Centro and caught up on the past five years, pointedly skirting a couple of possible ISSUES. Will we end up being friends again? You never know. But we have decided that we are good Tapas Research buddies, and Pablo even offered to take on the daunting task of helping me improve my Spanish accent in exchange for plates of my spaghetti carbonara. Watch this space.

Meanwhile, here are pics of me and Pablito taken in 1999 and 2009. Think we now need a 2019 one to complete the collection.