Ain't she cute

This is my daughter.



She's 10 and I think is good enough to beat a lot of adults.

Sigh, I wish I'd gotten this early of a start.

Hi readers, (real or imagined) this weekend me and my team participated in the WCVNEA championships. I did less than stellar in the single elimination singles Tournament losing my first match 4-1 and thus being knocked out of play. Ugh!! I may have felt a little better about it if I had played my best however I stunk.

My teammates performed about the same, and that was a bit of forshadowing for what was about to come for the team event. I have to say we played our 1st match quite strong and was very pleased with that. We had a very large lead on the the other team and the match ended early in the 4th round with us gaining enough points to make it mathematically impossible for them to come back. That was Friday night. Our next match wasn't until Saturday afternoon. This is because we had a bye in the first round and won our match in the second round and they needed time to play b side matches.

Our first match on Saturday was a heart breaker with us starting out with an early lead, most of the team was playing well and I had even had a really nice break and run. Trouble popped it's really ugly head up early in the 3rd round when the other team had a couple of back to back runouts, and we went from being in the drivers seat to playing catch up. My game in the 3rd round wasn't going well and had turned into a safety battle after my opponent had run off 7 of his balls and missed his shape on the 8. I cleared of a few balls but the 8 and 4 of my balls were in an ugly cluster along the side rail so I had to play safe after I cleaned up the loose balls(Matches were decided by total points or balls sunk so I wanted to make sure I got whatever easy points were available before I played safe)

Below is a diagram of the layout after I had played a few safeties and had finally had a chance to knock one of my balls out.


When I realized what my opponent was lining up, I told him I'd like to have a referree present. It was somewhat obvious to me that he was lining up a carom off the 5 onto the 8. The ref came over, and asked him what his shot was, he replied he was going to try cut the 8 in the corner.

I stood back and watched, the ref stood over the shot, my opponent shot, it looked like he had in fact hit the 5 first so I looked to the ref who momentarily had a had a puzzled look on his face then he declared it was a good shot. Ok, the fact that the ref made the wrong call in my mind I can live with, the fact that my opponent got a lucky kiss off my 1 ball to win the game totally ticked me off. That's pool, if your sitting there's nothing you can do, there's always the chance that you're going to lose everytime you give your opponent control of the table(no matter how limited).

After that lose, I think we picked up another win and it looked like things were going to be ok as our other teammate was well on his way to winning his games. We watched intently until he got down to the 8 ball. Now some of you readers know that VNEA rules indicate that when shooting on the 8ball you must call the pocket by placing a patch beside it. I'm sure you figured out from that last statement what happened. Yes, our player who's been playing since October in this league and you'd think would be well versed in the rules by now was lining up the shot and hadn't patched the pocket. We looked on with dread because, we knew based on his play during the regular season that he had a problem with remembering the patch.

Team Rule #43.21 If a player loses a game because he has neglected to patch the pocket he must purchase his teammates a beverage of thier choice.

I had a beer. It helped catch my tears after we lost that match. This had happened somewhere around noon. We went and looked at the bracket to find out when our next match was, we were somewhat shocked to find out it wasn't until 11:00 PM. Oh Joy!!!!

I finished my beer and discovered that my lovely girlfriend had expected us to play a little longer so she had had a couple of beers too and we weren't going to be driving anywhere anytime soon. So I mentioned that some other players we know were playing a match in the Masters room and we could go watch for a while and sober up.

A little while later we went for a walk and discovered a Persian grocery store and went in to find out what they had for sale. The lady working the counter spotted us immediately and decided that we needed a guided tour along with a commentary on how each food complimented Iranian culture. We felt so well treated that we emptied our pockets and purchased all sorts of lovely food including rice filled vine leaves, wild cucumber pickles, rose water and some sort of salsa looking canned concoction you're supposed to serve on rice. We did pass on the carbonated yogurt drink. I'm sorry I wasn't that adventurous so I can't tell you what it tasted like. I know you're all dying to know.

We would have purchased some of thier safron which is Orange, not yellow like spanish safron. My girlfriend insists it's red, but it's not and one of the guys that was at the store (family memeber?) also insisted it was orange, but it wasn't within my modest budget for the weekend. We will be going back and maybe by that time I will have worked up enough courage to try the carbonated yogurt drink.

11:00PM.......

We all played well, nobody made any serious mistakes but unfortunatly we lost by several points. It all came down to the last game and our players opponent played a really good safety to get ball in hand and end the game much to our disgust.

We'll get the Basta....... next time. :)

Ever have one of those days?

Yesterday was one of those days where it seemed no matter what you did there was always something that went wrong.

I woke up stuffed up. OK, no big deal I had a good rest, bring a hanky with me and I'm good to go. Wrong.... my nose ran like a leaky faucet most of the work day. Great...... OK, so after annoying the hell out of my coworkers most of the day I decide to take a decongestant to plug things up.

All is well that ends well right? Nope, now I can't keep my bloody eyes open and I wonder how I'm ever going to play pool tonight. Speaking of pool I decide it's time to call my team mates and arrange transportation.
Call number 1: Number dialed...... phone rings with aerosmith playing in the background ( I really like that feature and should look at getting my cell phone to ring like that if I ever get it reactivated)




"Hello Captain...... "

"Hey Player C we're playing way on the south side tonight, I assume you'll be needing a ride."

"OK, you live over by Pub X I'll meet you there OK? "



"Sure how about 5:30?"



"Works for me, cya then"

"OK bye"

click.

Call number 2: ring ring ring ring... You have reached Player J, leave a message...

"Hi it's your captain, we're playing on the south side tonight call me at work so we can arrange a place to pick you up"

(I should mention between the 5 players on my team there's only 2 cars, pool players ugh!!!)

Call number 3: ring ring..... "Hello captain"



"Hi Player D, we're playing at Sportsman's tonight, when can I pick you up?"



"I should be home around 5:30"

"OK, "

OK, so now I've made contact with 2 out of 3 players and I figure the 3rd will call me soon. I'm not at all worried and have faith all will work out as planned so I go on with my day at work trying to refrain from walking around with a hanky tied around my nose like a nose diaper.

At about 2:45PM the phone rings.

Ring Ring Ring, I answer. "Hello"

"Hi, this is Player J"

"Hi Player J, what's up?"

"I got a job and I won't be able to play pool"

"You mean just tonight right?"

"No, I'm going to be working nights."

"Oh that sucks, thanks for letting me know"

Click.

This is great, Player J was already a replacement for another player, we've been having "staffing issues" with the team this year and Player J is the 3rd player we've had to replace and it's been more than frustrating, especially with the Western Canadian VNEA championships 2 weeks around the corner. Player J said even though he was working, he'd be able to play for us so that's one load off our mind, however we were looking for a player with enough weeks even before Player J quit.

So..... back to the phone.

I neglected to mention that I had left my cell phone(fancy address book really) at home so I hand to call my girlfriend who was home sick to get my players numbers. So, now I had to bug her again.


Call number 4: ring ring ring " Hello"


"Hi baby, sorry to bug you again, can you please get the numbers for players G and K for me?"



"Sigh, sure baby, here they are....."

click.

Call number 5: ring ring ring.... "You have reached Player G, please leave a message after the tone"



Fword.



Click.



Call number 6: ring ring "hello"


"Hi Player D, Player J just quit, he got a job. Do you know anyone who can play for us, I called player G and got his voicemail and I don't really want to call Player K"

"um, well, my coworker here used to play, I'll ask him. Let me call you back"




Click.

Ring ring.... "Hello"

"Hi, he says he can play, I'll get a ride from him."

"Great, Cya there"

Click.

Wow, that worked out OK, now fast forward to the Match.




We did OK, but not stellar any means. I played a perfect night, sorta. What I mean is nobody beat me......... but myself. I won my first 3 games, my 4th game, I ran out from the break and was faced with the following shot on the 8 ball.









I should let you know that my last ball was down at the bottom of the table and I didn't want to let the cue ball loose for fear I'd bump balls and create a mess so I actual played for that position.



I had eyed up the 8 ball and discovered that it was dead for the corner on the top left hand side of the table.


I knew I'd have to put a bit of bottom spin on the cue ball in order to push the 8 closer to the rail and hit it quite firm to get it all the way down table. I did both, the 8 ball sank, the crowd went wild, the cue ball sewered and there was a collective sigh had by all. Ugh!!! double ugh!!!





My last game was almost a mirror of the 4th game, I ran out to the 8 and missed, my opponent sank a ball then missed, I cut the 8 down to the corner pocket and my back spine took the cue ball to the opposite corner pocket.. Triple Ugh!!!!!!!!!!



So, we came, we saw, we played, we got a couple of rounds but when it all settled we lost the night. So we had a few games afterwards then left.





We got out to the car, got in and I backed up. I thought boy this feels rough, I wonder if I have a flat tire.


I got out of the car and looked. Yup flat tire. I am so unimpressed. This is the second flat tire I've had after a pool night in less than a month.

Oh well, I had help changing it. After the tire was changed I had an uneventful drive dropping my teammates off and going home.

That was the end of one of those days. Thank the goddess.