accidentally social

my best friend, C,  occasionally tells me off for misrepresentation. she alleges all i do is "fun things" while i try desperately to convince her otherwise. so in the interests of fairness, let's put it out there that my absolute favourite past time is sleep. and when i'm not sleeping, i'm usually watching trashy teevee. my idea of a perfect weekend? not setting the alarm, waking whenever, moving to the living room, eating lasagne and ice cream (not at the same time!) and washing it all down with fruit beer or semi-decent bubbles. after a week of non-stop social interaction and mental over stimulation, i need to decompress. and i'm unapologetic about it. "me time"?! pfffft. oh honey, it's my time and i'll do whatever i want with it ;) the best part about all this? the mister is with me 100%, unless he's got a bee in his bonnet about visiting a market/ restaurant / park / other cool new place so hip it hurts. with no family here nor its associated commitments, we get to be as selfish as we want. much as i adore my folks (hi porpor, please don't disinherit me!) it's nice to have almost no responsibilities and absolute freedom to do exactly as we please. 

however, the best laid plans to do nothing on the weekends occasionally get scuppered by fantastic people passing through london. in fact, we've just had one of our busiest weekends yet where in about 30 hours, we met up with 12 people. we started at one of our favourite markets with a friend doing his phD and a couple from singers who've just relocated to london. before the mister even had time to drink his coffee, we linked up with my cousin's in-laws-to-be for lunch. they're the sweetest couple ever and the sort of 'grown ups' that the mister and i want to be. they spoilt us rotten with amazing wines, the kind we'd never splurge on ourselves, and the best of modern british cooking. their london-based son had asked for bak kwa and they gifted us the same. now this bak kwa was life-changing. the mister usually isn't a fan but one whiff of this apple wood smoked baby and my formerly personal stash was fast dwindling. 

after a huge lunch, we moseyed over to soho for coffee with friends who were in london on their honeymoon. one drawback about being based so far away is we've had to miss many weddings. but then they honeymoon in london and we've a chance to celebrate with them on a more personal scale - even better! from coffee with transitioned to pre-dinner drinks then a massive eight course autumnal japanese supperclub with my brother and our favourite orthodontist-to-be (hellooo three year masters and recent london transplant!) in fact, the last time the four of us were together was at our iceland wedding, which reminds me of the same supperclub we went for on our first anniversary. oh, another friend from singapore happened to be at the very same supperclub (what were the chances?!) and we got to catch up as well. as obedient supperclub guests, we took our host's 'carriages by 11' instructions very seriously and rolled back to my brother's for more drinks and part of a movie before i, well, fell asleep on on the sofa and had to be brought home. when sunday rolled round, we arranged to go to church with 2+2+1 friends (a first! it's usually just us!) and had lunch as a big happy family after. 

when we finally got home and regressed into default couch potato mode, i asked the mister how we'd ended up doing so much in such a short time. he claims i'm secretly social and thrive on social contact while i'm adamant we're more accidentally social than any thing else. don't get me wrong - nothing about the weekend was obligatory and every one we'd the privilege of catching up with we did indeed want to meet. and maybe that's part of growing up - learning how to set boundaries, how to say no, how to be protective of 'us' time, how to prioritise sleep... but it's a lesson for another weekend because i'd an amazing time seeing family-to-be and friends dear to us. we don't see the people we love as often as we'd like to, and finding out in person that they're happy, healthy and in a good place is a great thing.

(hot pot on a cold night can't be beat!)