Text 11363, 74 rader
Skriven 2005-04-11 22:30:08 av John Massey (1:123/789.0)
  Kommentar till text 11362 av Stan Hardegree (1:379/1.2)
Ärende: Pool
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"Stan Hardegree -> All" <1:379/1.2> wrote in message
news:9097$POLITICS@JamNNTPd...
 SH> This is a long post about not much, so you can skip it and not miss
anything:
 SH> ....

 SH> When I was 13 years old, I played my first game of pool at the Teen Club
 SH> at Fort Lee, VIrginia.  The first time I ever picked up a cue, I won 28
 SH> straight games of eight ball before I sat down.  The game's elegant
 SH> logic made sense to me - the angle of reflection equals the angle of
 SH> incidence, a cue ball struck below the equator will back up and that
 SH> stuff.  Over the next few months, I figure out how to control english,
 SH> making me a pretty good bank and position player.  When I sat in church
 SH> with my parents, I would play imaginary games of eight ball in my head
 SH> in instead of listening to the sermon.  I would sneak into service clubs
 SH> and play until the manager discovered that a 14-year-old kid was beating
 SH> the soldiers - and told me to leave.

 SH> Ten years later, I was four- time intramural champ at West Georgia
 SH> College.  My last year in college, I played the best tournament pool I
 SH> have ever played, beating a black kid named Lonnie Dixon 2-1 on two
 SH> eight ball runs.  Lonnie also ran the table, but I won the coin toss, so
 SH> I broke first in a loser breaks tournament.  Ah, to be lucky.....

 SH> While in the Army the first time, I used nine-ball winnings to buy a 20
 SH> oz Palmer cue, which I use (and pamper) 28 years later.  I love the game
 SH> so much that one of my dogs tags listed my religion as Nine Ball.

 SH> Today, I am ranked by the APA as a level 7 player, meaning that if I
 SH> play in team competition, I cannot be paired with another player at my
 SH> level.  Level 7 players are the only ones so restricted, meaning that
 SH> level 6 guys can be partnered with other level 6 guys.  Two years ago, I
 SH> beat a touring pro by the name of Fillipino Slim during an exhibition
 SH> here.  Slim takes his name from the fact that he fell in love with
 SH> Manilla during a tour in the Navy.  Slim called all seven shots after
 SH> making a high ball on the break but missed after snookering himself on
 SH> the sixth shot.  He didn't shoot again.

 SH> These days I play mostly with a fellow named Ed Hurst, a BCA qualified
 SH> instructor, and perhaps the best player I have ever known.  Ed owns a
 SH> table and we get together a couple of times a week at his house to play,
 SH> have a couple of drinks and discuss the English canon (yeah, another
 SH> pool-playing English major).  On my best day, I can beat Ed about 50
 SH> percent of the time.  Oh HIS best day, I have no chance.  Once a month,
 SH> Ed and I travel to Marietta with another insanely good play named Troy
 SH> Vaughn to play snooker, a maddeningly hard game.

 SH> Cindy and I have have planned to add a room and buy a table for some
 SH> time (I haven't owned my own table since I got married 25 years ago) but
 SH> have been waiting for the right time to expand the house.  Last week I
 SH> got a call from Brenda McCreary, widow of our late and much lamented
 SH> city manager (and my good friend) Steve Russell.  She said, "I have sold
 SH> my house at Mirror Lake, and if the owners don't want Steve's pool
 SH> table, I want you to have it."

 SH> Steve and I spent many hours over that beautiful table, playing games of
 SH> eight ball, discussing life and, most of all, the beautiful women we
 SH> married.  Some of you may remember that Steve visited with us briefly
 SH> during a Fest several years ago.  My buddy Steve shot himself almost
 SH> three years ago now, my one and only friend in this life to have
 SH> committed suicide.

 SH> The new owners of Brenda's house didn't need the table, which now sits
 SH> in my garage, assembled, levelled and ready for play during our next
 SH> Fest.  Five-hundred-pound, eight-foot single piece of slate.  Green
 SH> cloth.  Leather drop pockets. Heaven.

 SH> How about July 16?

Works for Kemis and me.

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