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There were a few worrisome moments before the start of Tuesday’s game after we had all brought shed loads of food to share with The Premiers by way of apology for not turning up last time, when it looked like nobody was going to be there to enjoy it!! But turn up they did, obviously motivated into it by their comedic Captain – it is obviously being so cheerful that keeps HIM going.
Having teased us with talk of his missing our last game of the season, Craptain Reg chose to grace us with his presence after all. I think it was part of a cunning plan to get you all dreading having to be in my power and then so pathetically grateful that Reg was there after all you would all ball up a storm and send us out of the season in a blaze of glory. Life is just full of disappointment, isn’t it?!
I have been desperately trying to think of a brilliant way to excuse myself from yet another poor performance, but I think Sparky summed it up perfectly for me when he said “she’s a pissy little cow who couldn’t hit a barn door” after my shocking 10. Add to that Conspiracy Pete’s “can we have that in writing?” in response to my despairing cry of “I don’t have to play next season”, and I don’t think anybody is going to be offering me any sort of fee to sign on again, if I get asked at all! Jockey handled his misfortune with much more aplomb, coming out with “I’m not a conventional skittler” by way of explanation after missing the last 4 pins grouped together for a potential 9 on his 4th up, when he put the 3rd ball down the empty side of the alley! I admired Reg’s philosophical attitude in appreciating that whilst Jockey, who scored 15, & I may have dropped 34 pins on the first up, at least it wasn’t as bad as last week’s 38…
With this opening gambit not being entirely appreciated, the Dream Team duo took to the alley all puffed up with testosterone and confidence at executing a better attack. TB rather irritatingly scored a few more pins than I and secured his superiority over me in the averages, bur he and peRV didn’t fare much better really with 13 & 16 respectively, they just got luckier with the opposition not scoring so well! No sour grapes there… They dropped a further 12 pins to leave us 46 down and Craptain now wheeled out aRCe & JL to stop the rot!
As usual when there is football on, support from the ranks was depleted as half the team was glued to the Liverpool/Chelsea game. Personally I found Jockey & aRCe’s bragging competition over who had the biggest more entertaining, until I realised they were talking about feet and lost interest. Everyone got stuck into the food too, so that concentration on the task in hand was maybe not at its peak. However, saved the indignity of being paired with Jen and going on first, as well as being able to let his hair down (!) with a drink or two, aRCe was obviously more relaxed and produced a 27; and, throwing all caution to the wind and risking the wrath of ‘er on the alley, JL matched it with a 28 to pull back 11 pins AND turn the game around, earning themselves a “well played the pair” into the bargain!
Craptain put himself on next with CD and, I quote, “pulled 27 pins back on the game, got a well played the pair and made the game winnable”. I can just see him swaggering about with smugness now, so it pains me greatly to report that CD produced the highest score of the evening with 31 – although, it could have been more if he hadn’t messed about and missed the 9th pin with his 2nd ball after sending 8 tumbling with his 1st… he could easily have had a spare but threw it away with careless abandon, just like his 2nd ball, and settled for taking out the last pin for a 9 with his 3rd ball. Craptain put in his usual reliable performance and hit 25 so that we were now only 8 pins behind The Premiers.
Having played so heroically, our Craptain must have been congratulating himself (OK, and CD a bit too…) for pulling the team from the jaws of death secure in the knowledge he had 4 safe pairs of hands to entrust with finishing the game off in style. Sparky & The Hammer, whom I thought was a little anal that evening, were given first chance to prove their worth – and failed dismally, dropping 10 pins with their 13 & 18. The general opinion was that Sparky was playing off balance having consumed indeterminate amounts of food, and that he should be more careful to eat a balanced diet so as not to damage his skittling ability. The Hammer can be forgiven because he turned up to play despite suffering great indignity earlier in the day, which reaffirmed his belief that he could never be gay. So good of him to ‘share’, and lovely that he chose to bring his younger brother along with him too… I can’t remember now whether his name was Lump, Claw or Sledge.
We had quite a crowd accumulate throughout the evening, lured there no doubt by the thought of food, like animals to a kill! With so many distractions it was difficult to keep up with what was going on a lot of the time: Liverpool beat Chelsea; no decision was made over which of our Chuckle Brothers was the randy one – I noticed Sue was keeping very quiet at this point!; Paul turned up with the desserts in the form of gloriously sticky cakes – causing a bit of a distraction when he tried to find out how many boxes he could stack on top of one another before they fell over… I was trying to SAVE your beer, Hammer, not deprive you of it!
Anyway, having reached the climax of the evening, Captain Laugh-a-Minute from the Premiers came down to tell us he didn’t have enough players to finish the game – he sounded like he was off to cheer himself up by kicking a few of his team-mates heads in, in a dark corner of the car park… So, like many an anticipated moment of ecstasy, it was suddenly all over before we were ready. It was quite ironic that the opposition ended up apologising to us instead of us making amends for standing them up on our previously rearranged game – and, although I unfortunately cannot remember who I should credit this particular phrase with, quite a sad end to the season that the we ended up playing with ourselves!!
The evening was concluded with The Chuckle Brothers going through the motions of the last up against Chuckle Son and Charlie. Barnesy was in her element being all official about scoring properly and ensuring PhoeBe and Conspiracy Pete were forced to play: Hammer considered it a right pain in the ass at having played at all when Pete got nowhere near his usual standard and finished on 17, but in his own words he couldn’t possibly do two things at once and be top of the averages as well as the only Almond to score over 700 this season! PhoeBe finished with a 23, and I have to apologise to Paul & Charlie for not writing down their scores – I purposely missed off Charlie’s because he chose to trample all over my feet, but I thought Paul managed to score more than Chuckle Dad and wanted to put that in writing for him!
Everybody now has their burning questions answered for them: Hammer couldn’t overcome the treachery of Conspiracy Pete to oust him from the top of the averages; the peasants let Craptain reign supreme after the Big Boys so that there is no danger of him wanting to resign his position; there wasn’t much separating the Middle Boys, but Jen separated them from the Lost Boys!; CD succeeded in finishing above peRV and is no doubt hoping the stigma of the 6Xs can be put behind him now – you can rely on me not to mention it Chris, wouldn’t dream of it. The only questioned left unanswered is, did Conspiracy Pete credit Jen with all the scores she deserved? – I’m sure I never moved from near bottom of the averages all season. Oh no, wait, I know why that is… I’m rubbish!! How could I have forgotten when CD has been telling me that all season?
And so endeth the 2004/5 skittles season for the Almonds, which allegedly should see us leaving the relatively calm waters of Division 3 for the bigger swells of Division 2 – let’s hope the waves don’t send us crashing straight back down this time! End of term party is on Friday 24th June, ticket requests & money to our charming Secretary Sue ASAP please.
It has been a pleasure doing business with you – have a good Summer.
Match Reporter signing off!
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