the downside

of being taken out by your boss for an awesome Japanese dinner is not getting home until 11:30 PM. (And only two hours of that was eating -- I was at the office from 9:15 AM to 9:15 PM, and I was probably actively working for 10 hours of that time. Damn paper roof tiles.) This morning I pretty much had to choose between cooking lunch and showering, and cooking lunch lost.

I didn't eat out much last time, and I probably won't eat much this time, but an overview of things I ate (can't remember it all; this was sort of like tapas, where the izakaya employees/owner brought out little plates of lots of things and we shared):

Cold boiled shrimp (with all the parts -- eyes, legs, antenna, etc. -- still attached -- took a while to dismantle that with chopsticks)

oft young bamboo shoots, which one ate with soy sauce and wasabi (I used a little wasabi to be a good sport) (they were sort of big and floppy, not like the little diced bamboo shoots you get in a can)

Tempura-ed green veggie something. . . looked like some sort of little green flower/stem thing; they served tempura just with a little pile of salt to dip it in

Fish chunks and yama no gobo (new word! means a kind of root vegetable that's like a chewy white carrot) boiled in tasty soup

Slices of fish sashimi with the skin still on -- what kind of fish??? don't know, but it was sort of marbled white and red

Different slices of fish which had been just barely grilled around the outside, with a pile of vinegary green onions on top

More tempura of unidentifiable yet tasty vegetables. . . my favorite appeared to be squash, as it was very large orange slices with a green rind, but it tasted like sweet potato, not squash. There was also a sweeter, chewier, white veggie slice -- turnip? More proof that I will eat about anything if it is battered and fried.

Dark miso soup with lobster chunks (this was toward the end of the meal, so I couldn't drink all of it)

Unagi (sea eel) (I think? it may have been river eel -- that's what he originally asked for and I can't recall whether they had it or not) in its standard delicious sauce (that one's cooked, incidentally)

Little baby squid (maybe three inches long apiece), which I tried to be a good sport, but were in fact pretty gross. The little head was sort of filled with this squishy pasty stuff that I'm pretty sure was squid internal organs. Ick. I kind of didn't eat the eyes and tentacles, which the izakaya owner noticed and laughed at, but the other office guy, Andrew, didn't even try one, so I didn't feel too bad.

Cold tea.

There's probably some stuff there that I'm forgetting, but that's most of it.

I was able to follow some of the conversation my boss was having in Japanese with the izakaya owner (I say izakaya as "small drinking and eating establishment, but it could be the wrong word.) Probably not as much as I should have, but still, I was happy that I got some of it.