Black coffee

I am drinking black coffee. This is never a good sign, and usually indicates one of two undesirable things:

1. I have a looming deadline and need to sustain wakefulness for longer than is strictly good for me;
   
2. I have run out of milk.

Today, it's the second reason which applies.

I spent two hours after leaving the boathouse this morning having lunch and coffee with a pair of sisters with whom I used to play in a youth orchestra in Sheffield. I have recently re-established contact with the elder of the two, who has taken to working in the chemistry department in which I did my PhD, and consequently we now have a number of mutual chemist friends, and the younger of the pair rows at one of the more serious Hammersmith clubs. Other than catching the odd glimpse of her hanging over the balcony of her club following what I presume by her general appearance and demeanour to be have been a mammoth erg, or passing by her crew on the river, I haven't seen her for perhaps ten years.

She is rather more robust-looking than she was a decade ago. I imagine I am, also.

Time passed quickly and easily, catching up over toasted sandwiches and cappuchinos at a nearby cafe, touching on old haunts, old friends, places we've lived in or visited since our youth orchestra days. It was when the elder sister was describing to me the location of the Sheffield pub she'd recently bought a pint in for £1.60 that I started to realise how much time had passed. The conversation when something like this:

"It's The Harley - you go along Glossop Road, past Loch Fyne"
"What Loch Fyne on Glossop Road? Come to think of it, what Loch Fyne in Sheffield?"
"Oh, used to be Hanrahan's - on the right as you go into town."
"Oh, right, gotcha."
"Well, it's on that corner where the tram comes up, opposite Pizza Volante - The pizza parlour formerly known as The Flying Pizza, before there was a gun-related incident in the car park, or something like that..."
"Next to the Midland bank?"
"Yeah, well, it's HSBC now"
"Yeah, course..."
"Well, there - it was £1.60 a pint. That's what I used to pay when I was a teenager and drinking in Sheffield. It's the same price now - like going back in time..."

It was at this point in the conversation that I went into shock at the realisation that I was participating in one of those conversations which my parents used to have with their friends about How Places Have Changed And How Things Aren't Like How They Used To Be. I was horrified.

I was also horrified earlier this week to spy the clump of grey hairs sprouting around my hairline. They are rapidly multiplying. This is serious. No longer can I pretend to be young. I really am an adult. People who used to be far too young for me to be seen socialising with are now my contemporaries and fully-fledged adults in their own right. They show all the signs of being adults, such as working for a living in responsible jobs, drinking alcohol in moderation and only on weekends, and no doubt eating their green veg without being bribed. They probably like the tastes of olives, celery, and Stilton and finish meals with an espresso rather than an ice-cream sundae. I am ageing beyond the point at which I feel a part of the Spring.

In another sign of ageing, I am becoming scatty. Whilst I was aware I needed to pick up milk on my way home (and had ear-marked as the place to do this the newsagent next to the cafe in which quite by chance I found myself having lunch), in my haste to run home through the hail and flee the evidence of ageing, I completely forgot to buy milk.

I am drinking black coffee. It is never a good sign.

P.S. I cannot believe the number of typos I have had to correct in this post. I hesitate to add a P.S. as I assume I will introduce yet more of the accursed things.