Many would consider ordering a different sandwich at the cafe the ultimate spontaneous lunch decision.
Not for authors and journalists Maggie Alderson and Mia Freedman.
When the pair were working together at the now-defuct Cleo, one lunchtime they decided to go get piercings.
It did not end well.
“I ended up in hospital. I nearly lost my ear!” Alderson said to Freedman in the latest episode of No Filter.
“I got my belly button pierced, you got your cartilage and they didn’t warn you that’s like a high-risk place to get pierced,” Freedman said.
Alderson said it didn’t occur to her that a previous operation where she’d had all the lymph nodes taken out of the left side of her head when she had cancer could cause complications.
“They didn’t say to me ‘Be careful about infections on the left side of your head’. If I’d had it on the other side of my head it would have been fine,” she said.
Despite the incident, The Scent of You author has a very positive attitude towards the experience.
"It was an interesting experience and if it hadn't been for that I wouldn't have read A Suitable Boy which someone from Cleo, I can't remember who, brought to me in hospital which I was in for two weeks," she said.
"Something good always comes out of something bad and I met some amazing people on that ward. It's great material."
It didn't put Freedman off though - last year she even videoed herself getting two more piercings in her ears, much to her children's displeasure.
Listen: Maggie Alderson on fiction, Anna Wintour and fashion after 40. Post continues after audio.
"I’ve been wanting for a while to either get another tattoo or more piercings, some might call it a mid-life crisis. Maybe it is," she said.
"My children don't like it... which kind of brings out the rebel in me.”
Would you get another piercing?