It was Sunday lunchtime. I was having the lamb, while my dining companions chose beef, chicken, and lemon sole. We were in a chain; despite last week's difficult economic news, it was busy, with a positive vibe.
A few bread sticks kept us going until the main courses arrived. The conversation turned to tennis, and Andy Murray's brilliant win against Rafael Nadal in the final of the Japan Open.
Could the British number one finally win a grand slam next year? The answer, however, was left hanging in the air, as a toddler at the next table began to scream, testing out his lungs. They were working extremely well, and his father told him to be quiet. But the little lad was understandably more enamoured of the noise he could make than of his dad's embarrassment, and proceeded to screech at ninety second intervals.
To be fair his parents, mostly the father, continued to marshal their children - the boy had two older sisters - but to little effect.
I am not a parent, and so do not know at what age children will sit at a dinner table in a restaurant and be quiet for at least an hour, but somewhere between eighteen months and two years is not it. The father, as his kids continued to throw food on the floor and be, well, small children, ordered a second Stella. His wife was quiet - presumably exhausted.
The children had ice cream for pudding, and for a minute or two there was a relative hush. Until the baby started crying. Unseen in the bottom of the buggy, a small infant began to scream its lungs out. Neither parent picked it up. It was as if, with four children, they were inured to the sound. For fifteen minutes, until they finally left, the baby sobbed to no avail.
I am not for a moment suggesting they were bad parents. The children seemed happy and were well-dressed. And money cannot have been tight: if they can afford four children, and to have Sunday lunch out, they must be comfortable. But our lunch was disrupted for a good hour by the sound of their offspring.
Not to mention the baby with a different family on the other side of the room who also seemed intent on testing his vocal cords.
I was on the verge of saying something. Something like: 'Excuse me, could you please get your children to shut up? Anytime kind of now-ish would be good.' But, not being a parent, I wasn't even sure that was possible. And, in any case, the father could be heard saying to one of his daughters that they wouldn't be coming back, because she hadn't behaved very well.
Clearly, becoming a parent involves sacrifices, and unless children can be quiet, then eating out, en famille, should perhaps be one of them. I think the parents probably enjoyed their Sunday lunch. The father had his two pints of lager, and his wife seemed to relish her food, but the diners around them were thrust, entirely without their consent, into a sort of audio warzone, in which quiet, considered conversation was rendered impossible at times.
There may therefore be a business opportunity here: how about a new chain which doesn't admit under-tens? It could be called Calm Down Dear. The idea would be to ensure that diners leave the premises with their sanity intact. Sunday lunch would never feel like an extension of the local mother and toddler group, and discussions would be conducted at regular decibels. Sounds like a Winner, if you'll excuse the pun.