We are Siamese if you please

The odd juxtaposition of the coup in Thailand and my five years old's Muay Thai lessons (oh and the 50% off the a la carte menu offer that was ending on 30 September) combined to send "eat your way and the world in London" to the outstanding Mango Tree Restaurant in Belgravia last night.

I've been there several times before and I'm not going to review the food, all you need to know is that it is out of the top draw and the menu is here.

It was a favourite when we had an office round the corner in Portland House and it was good to get back to our old stamping grounds as it also enabled us to reacquaint ourselves with the Grouse and Claret, our boozer of choice back in the day. This was as well, because when I rang the restaueant to book there wasn't a table available until half past nine at night. There was time to kill.

I also quite liked the idea of going round to the nearby Westminster Cathedral to see if there were any bigots demonstrating outside with whom I could practice my freestyle theological debating technique. Paul unsurprisingly bailed on this portion of the evening's entertainment when we got out of the tube station at Victoria, but when I got to the Cathedral there were neither demonstrators nor an overt police presence.

I went in and sat down. There was a service in progress , it was towards the end of a sung mass and I listened to the Benedictus. That dovetailed so neatly with Benedictus PP. XVI that I couldn't help but feel a little as if I was in a overly contrived novel or play.

Then I went down the pub.