Book Club and Blisters

Wednesday was bookclub night. Normally the first Wednesday of every month I meet for dinner with a bunch of girls and we discuss the book we have selected and read the month before. This week the dinner was at a place called Finastaere, tucked behind the Santa Croce church, and the topic for discussion was the classic Pride and Prejudice. And who cannot enjoy Pride and Prejudice with such strong images of Colin Firth in the BBC series emerging from the lake with his wet shirt - what's not to love!
I go down to Santa Croce fairly often, but normally on foot from my house, so I had no idea where to park the car. The riverbank, all along the Lungarno is pretty much restricted to cars, and there are video cameras that take a pic of your licence plate number if you transgress, and the next thing you know there is an 80Euro fine winging its way to you in the mail. So wishing to avoid that, I parked up at the far end of the riverside, near to the place where I do my wine course. And I set out on foot towards Santa Croce.
I had, however, totally underestimated the distance from the car to the restaurant - especially given the high and painful shoes I was wearing at the time. A good 20 minutes later, freezing cold, I hobbled into the restaurant.
The place is nice, and, refreshingly, serves kind of watered down middle eastern cuisine. We had a mix of spanakopita, pita, humous and other dips to start, followed by a chat about the book and Austen, and the changed, or otherwise, role of women in the world today compared to that in Ms Austen's time, during a second course of tagine or moussaka.
Apart from me, all the other book club-ees are married, most to Italians, and one to a Brit. There are mainly Americans, with 2 or 3 Brits, and one French girl - its a nice mixture of people and its good to be out with different people once in a while.
It was late when I tottered back down the lungarno to the car, whilst making a mental note to myself to keep some ballet slippers in the car, or buy a GPS that will indicate better parking spots.
The next book is On Chesil Beach by Ian McEwan, that I picked, at the restaurant that I picked, although I have never been there, the Lebanese place also near Santa Croce. This time parking will not be a problem however, as I will be away in Indianapolis when the discussion takes place.