Killjoys

Last night I went to dinner with my friend Erin. We went to this Belgian place that had been recommended by someone in the office, and it was quite good.

Towards the end of our meal, this older Englishman leaned over and says, "Can I buy you two drinks?" We both politely declined, but he keeps talking to us, so we keep talking to him.

He was a pretty interesting guy. He has kids who are about the same age as Erin and me. He is a lawyer who used to work in the diamond industry. He's traveled a ton.

Finally, we let him buy us each a glass of wine, and we kept talking to him. A little while later, he offered to buy our dinners. We both declined.

During the conversation, he managed to get in that he is intimidated by young women like Erin and me, especially American women, because we seem so confident. I don't know that either of us necessarily feel this way all of the time, or even most of the time, but it's interesting to hear from an outsider this is how we appear.

He kept trying to buy us more wine, but we kept declining. Several times we were called killjoys when we refused. Somehow, he ended up buying our dinners. I think when we weren't looking, he flagged down the waitress and told her he wanted to pay for our dinners as well as his. It wasn't cheap - probably about €60 for the two of us, which with the rapidly declining US dollar is about $90.

The whole experience was a bit surreal. Is this what all 65 year old Englishmen are like?