Dinner with Neil Sedaka
23 Oct 2012
One of my favorite memories from our trip to Istanbul was the dinner we had at this little place called Lokal. It wasn’t that the food was so good, but we had such a good time. For starters, the menu came inside this Neil Sedaka record cover. I laughed so hard when I saw it, and heaven knows how they acquired it. (The whole joint seemed very multimedia-focused, as they brought us our check inside a DVD case). But the best part of dinner was that we decided, over a gigantic slice of cake, to try to pick each other up, as if we had just met. I would really recommend this as a hilarious game for any couples out there, since you have access to limitless information about each other. Eric said things like, “So, lately I’ve been really interested in maps and interstitial spaces…and Dostoevsky.” After I stopped laughing I said, “Well, I’ve been thinking a lot these past few weeks about the Idaho Stop and cognitive biases…and machine learning.” I don’t think I’ve laughed that hard in a long time, and this little game has the added bonus of making you feel really known and loved by your significant other–it’s touching to see that they notice and care about all the millions of little interests that make you who you are. So, even if you can’t get a hold of Neil Sedaka, I highly recommend this kind of dinner. And maybe you can play this in the background.

Oct 23, 2012 @ 19:33:28
What fun! When you two are here at Christmas, we can double date with you listening to my Barry Manilow 8 track tapes.
Oct 23, 2012 @ 19:55:21
Hahahaha, awesome!!
Oct 24, 2012 @ 04:27:40
This is hilarious! Thanks to you I went around half the day with “Laughter In The Rain”
stuck in my head. After a determined effort I was able to replace it with “Beauty School Dropout.” And the pickup game also sounds like hilarious fun!
Oct 25, 2012 @ 10:07:02
Haha, sorry about that! But your comment made me laugh so hard!