Winning Weekend

This weekend was quite enjoyable and successful. First thing was to wake up and watch the Wallabies play New Zealand in rugby. What a super match! Not only did we beat them, buw we won easily (15 points). It was refreshing after a few years of poor results to experience a big win over New Zealand again. The rest of the day was spent running errands and with some friends in the afternoon, unsuccessfully trying to work out a possible joint family vacation.

In the evening, Gary, Kevin and I went to a friend's house for a poker game. It was a lot of fun and an interesting experience. One of the female players at the table seemed to feel that it was a smart thing to do to throw money around like it was meaningless and to disregard odds when making her bets. For much of the night, this tactic worked quite well for her, constantly hitting her miracle cards and winning some big pots. At one point she had worked her $60 buy-in up to about $700...then her luck began to change. Her silly bets and outrageous bluffs began to not be rewarded. I doubled up through her twice and on the last hand of the night she pushed all in, only to be called and lose. So, in the end, she walked away with nothing, and from the way she played, was lucky to only lose her original $60. I ended up with a $120 profit, a nice return for a fun evening.

Sunday brought a drive to Norwalk CT for a cricket match. I am playing a few games this year with a side in the Southern Connecticut League which is proving to be rather interesting. This particular game was against the Bridgeport side, known as the best team in the area. Their fans were certainly also an interesting group - about 50 Jamaican men hanging out, playing loud music, yelling at the players, drinking rum and smoking pot. One of our players swore you could get high from just fielding on the boundary! They batted first and had a very strong batting lineup. Every time we got a wicket, another good batsman would walk out. One of their players is a current representative for the USA side and his ability was quite clear also. I actually bowled quite well, the best I have bowled in a while taking 4 wickets. However, before I got a chance to test myself against the USA bowler (who could bowl at 90 mph according to several people who had played him before), the rains came and the match was abandoned. A draw was not a bad result for us...but I was looking forward to facing a truly fast bowler like that. Maybe next time...