This week, I dreaded an obnoxious business trip: I had to fly early Thursday morning from New York to Los Angeles, rent a car and drive to Irvine for a business dinner; host a meeting all day on Friday and then fly home Friday (tonight) night on a redeye.  

Well, Wednesday night, the dogs were restless and did not let me sleep.  They woke me up at 2:30am to go out.  By the time they came back in, it was 3:00am and I set my alarm clock to go off at 3:15am.  I had not packed, the car service would arrive at 4:30am to bring me to the airport, I had to shower and I still had dishes in my sink from the night before.

So, of course (the MySpace junkie that I've become) I checked my MySpace messages while the dogs were out. 

One of my first (in fact he was the first) MySpace friends, Chris, emailed me asking me why I was awake at such an ungodly hour.  When I told him of my pending journeys to his neighborhood – we scheduled a lunch.

We went to a quaint, little, French bistro in the Fashion Island mall (everything in Orange County takes place in a mall or corporate office park) called French75.  Having been there once before, I knew we were in for a comfortable, yet high quality meal.

Our server brought us a basked of bread with a delicious spread made from black olives, egg whites and anchovies.  I opted not to drink wine because of the ridiculously early wake-up time and the impending business dinner that evening.

Don't you just love when a menu has several wonderful-looking dishes to choose from!  They had at least three can't-lose items in each menu segment.  Chris and I decided to share the classic escargot in butter and garlic sauce as an appetizer.  These scrumptious snails tantalized our tastebuds. 

As an entrée, I ordered the Moules Frites with a side of Béarnaise sauce – one of my all-time favorites!  The perfectly prepared mussels melted in my mouth and the slim, salty frites stated my starchy desires.

We opted to share the chocolate soufflé for dessert.  When the rather large puff of chocolaty goodness arrived, our server cracked it's center and filled it first with Belgian chocolate sauce, then Contreau whipped cream and more chocolate sauce.

Poor Chris listened to me chew his ear off all afternoon.  As dessert wound down, my phone began to ring.  Colleagues began calling and the time came for me to return to work.  

I really enjoyed meeting Chris and hope to have lunch with him again some day on one of my next trips to Irvine. 

And now, I am sitting in the airport lounge, waiting for a midnight flight back to New York.  I won't land until 8:00am tomorrow morning, which means I won't get home until 10:30 or 11:00am.  Not all business travel is glamorous.