The Empty Cabinets of my Mind

Follow the Yellow Disc Road

As much as I'd like to keep whining about Emily, right now I have to go play shuffleboard on my home team.  I was tied until I went on a 5 game losing streak after which I won 4 games in a row, so this is a critical day for me.  I hope to be tied again after the first game and the next one will be a tie breaker.  Ewww.  This is not at all like watching paint dry. 

Just Shuffling Along

When friends in my new community first suggested I take up the sport of shuffleboard, I will admit that I told them that the hot place would freeze over before I played shuffleboard.  You see, I thought that game would be like watching grass grow or paint dry.

Wrong.

I am participating in my fourth tournament already and committed to indoor team play from October through March.  Already I have persuaded a good friend to join too.  We are both having fun.

My Second Tournament

I am going to try to compete in a shuffleboard tournament called Old Olympics.  In my view that is a pretty funny name, but not as funny as me trying to do anything athletic.  I am a prize klutz.  I am so clumsy that at least once a week I stop to thank the stars above that I wasn't born with the name Grace. 

Don't get me wrong, I love the name Grace.  There was a little girl in my elementary school who had that name and she typified it in every way.  But not me!  I was a skinned shins tree-climbing kind of girl. 

The only sport I did fairly well in was soccer, but that was a long time ago.  I can barely ride a bicycle.  So I started learning to bowl in January, looking for a fun, healthy exercise.  It is fun and it is exercise, but I'm not very good at it.  OK, I'm awful at it. 

But there is an indoor shuffleboard court at my summer place and I overcame the "This is like watching paint dry" prejudice rather quickly (as soon as I actually picked up a cue and tried pushing a disk down the court with it a couple times) and have now competed in two tournaments and signed up for two more. 

Seriously, I think this is something I can learn to do. 

 

A Bump on the Head

This is something that drives me up the wall about search engines.   I was chatting with some friends after a bicycle ride tonight and managed to tip it over so that the bike fell on top of me.   So I went inside to look up first aid for bumps on the head.  The first hit was a website that purported to tell me "Where to Buy Minor Bumps on the Head."

Egads, I can find those on my own for free.

Yes, it is a folder :-)

I Grimaced

When our complex manager proudly showed me the shuffleboard courts in the commons at my new digs, I grimaced and said "Hell will freeze over before I play shuffleboard." 

Ah, but I changed my mind.  The people here are really nice, but also persistent, and their argument of "How do you know you don't like it if you never tried it?" won me over.  I went to watch a match and got hooked.  So now I'm shopping for one of those stick thingees.  Ah, yes, a CUE.  That and an appropriate pair of shoes.  Any excuse to go shopping!  Surprisingly, they didn't have any shuffleboard cue sticks for sale on eBay, nor do they seem to be available in any of the local stores, but there are several online stores that sell supplies and equipment for the game.    Shuffleboard has been played in the US since colonial times, and by some estimates around 5 million people play in the US today.