Breaking Bread with Friends.

"Friends," the 1990's - 2000's America's top sitcom was not my favorite show; "Everybody Loves Raymond," was.

But when "Friends" went off the air, and I had free time due to my part-time retirement, I found a new chance to watch its reruns.  That's when I  discovered the bits and pieces of the friendship the four characters had.

This same route of seeing a show happened with Seinfeld.  When it was on its active telecast, I rarely watched it. But when it played on reruns, that's when I started watching it.

Funny, but I seem to enjoy more watching reruns.  Maybe this explains my ongoing fascination with the movie, "Back to the Future."  Whenever I find myself alone at home and have the urge to binge- eat on unhealthy food (chips, beer, peanuts, chocolates, etc), I would pop in my old video of Back to the Future I, sit back, relax and laugh. 

The scene where Marty McFly enters Hill Valley on the Saturday of Nov. 5, 1955 and "Mr. Sandman" playing,  never fails to excite me.  It's as if I were going back in time myself.

This love for the past, or nostalgia, happened in real time yesterday.

Wednesday, we had an extended lunch with some friends over at Mesa.  We enjoyed their cuisine tremendously.  Actually, last Monday, we were also at Mesa and a friend loved the food so much she asked us to meet there for lunch to meet another friend.

On Monday, we had tawilis with mango on a spoon as appetizer, seafood bean curd wansuy soup, pinaputok na tilapia with onions and tomatoes and the pride of Mesa - chicken adobo, mixed vegetables, and for dessert, turon with chocolate topping, and a San Mig for me, of course.

Yesterday, Nang Adors ordered pomelo salad with latik, sinuigang na salmon belly, crispy boneless tilapia served with four sauces, adobo baby squid with its own ink, green mango with bagoong, and another round of turon for our dessert.

The lunch was really intended to brush up on an important issue, but as always with old friends, it was a chance at lending assurance that no matter how long ago friends met each other, there would always be that same level of trust, camaraderie and love.

It was also a fitting way to welcome the start of the Holy Week (Holy Thursday), that of breaking bread with people whom you care about and who care for you.