Nancy, sunny company in Oud-Zuid

The smile arrives before she does, which is to say you hear it in the way she says your name at the door of the bar. Nancy is 30 and has the particular confidence of someone who stopped performing several years ago. Guests notice the warmth first, the energy about a minute later, and the complete absence of fuss somewhere around the time the menus arrive.

She is 170 centimetres and curvy, with long golden blonde hair and blue eyes, and a golden hour beach glamour to the way she puts an outfit together. Swimming is the reason for the posture; she is in the water several times a week and would swim outdoors all year if the Dutch weather were even slightly more reasonable about it. Violetta is the other one who does laps.

The rest of her is road trips and food. She would rather drive eight hours to somewhere unremarkable than fly two to somewhere fashionable, and she tells the story of every wrong turn beautifully. Sushi is the fixed point of her week, and Thea is the one she argues with about where in Amsterdam actually does it properly. Neither of them has conceded a point in years, and both of them enjoy the stalemate enormously.

She lives in Oud-Zuid, close to the calmer hotels and an easy run down to the airport if your evening finishes near the terminal. She talks easily in English, and never at you. Nancy is the right name when you want an evening with no edges to it, nothing to manage, and a companion who will still be cheerful at one in the morning. Thirty suits her. She has none of the anxiousness that sometimes comes with being younger, and all of the appetite.

No plan at all is the plan, and Nancy is one of the few who genuinely means it. Give her a hotel and an hour and she will handle everything after that without making a production of it.

Sushi anchors her week, so dinner usually ends up somewhere with a counter, and she has a long running and entirely unresolved dispute about which place here does it properly. She talks easily and never at you, tells the story of every wrong turn on a long drive beautifully, and the habit of performing a version of herself disappeared a long time ago. She is still good company at one in the morning, which is not true of everybody. If the night finishes nearer the terminal than the centre, Oud-Zuid makes that a simple run.