All entries for June 2005

I can't believe it's over!

We've left Rootes, and with it we've left behind the Brave and Noble Game. To finish, we had the tournament to end all tournaments – literally, it seems – with 12 competitors. Victors in the first round were Stu against Becky, Colin against Andy C, Anthony against Rob, Andy P against Iain, David against Christine (ooh…), and Richard against Tom. The second round saw the highest scoring loser – David – go through, and join the Big Three in the semi-finals, where the second round match of David vs Richard was repeated, but this time David won 16–13 (yes, for the first time ever we played to 16… we've never had a tournament this big before). In the other semi-final, Anthony lost narrowly to Colin, 16–14, before winning the third place play-off. And so we came to the final, by which time the spectators had, as usual, lost all interest, and gone to bed… David, unaccustomed to such high-profile play, lost 21–9, leaving Colin with the Golden Sash – forever…?

: 25 Jun 2005 17:30 |  Comments (0) |  Close comments |  Report a problem

Some shocking news

Remember that fabled Rob vs Colin Glassball match when Rob ended up having to go to a maths lecture in his dressing gown? Well, we have reason to believe that the match itself may have been – gasp! – against official regulations. The referee on the night – stand up, Mr. Clohesy – apparently did not notice that there were a massive 14 bottles forming the Bottles, not the regulatory 13. We even have a picture to prove it – thanks Rob. No sour grapes there, then.
So where do we go from here? Probably what should happen is a rematch – except, Rob has already carried out his forfeit, so if he were to win the rematch, it wouldn't really be fair. Perhaps finishing above Colin in the last tournament he played in was satisfaction enough.

: 18 Jun 2005 19:23 |  Comments (0) |  Close comments |  Report a problem

More Colining

What is a 'Richard'? That is the question. Ever since the 'David' hit the nation's consciousness (hitting the ball either underneath the table, or – more classically – against the edge of the table while serving… the definition is different to that given below. It's been redefined) people have been queueing up to have Glassball lingo named after them. And so Richard claims that his name is synonymous with trying a new kind of strategy that is doomed to fail (well, he might not have added the 'doomed to fail' bit)... he even goes so far as to claim that a 'Richard' has already been defined as such, and that it was my idea. I have no recollection of this, except a small feeling at the back of my head that he's actually right… therefore I am planning to give up in my attempts to make a 'Richard' a failure to get the ball over the bottles 3 times while playing for serve. There, I said it.

: 17 Jun 2005 02:52 |  Comments (0) |  Close comments |  Report a problem

Tournaments…

Well, apparently I've been charged with updating, which makes a nice change from Richard hogging all the updates. There was a rather dull, mundane and fundamentally pointless tournament held the other day, in which I was knocked out in the first round by the eventual winner, Anthony. We actually played enough matches to rank all eight of us (after four matches, the four winners played knock-out, with a hird place play-off, and something similar went on for the losers of the initial matches… well, it's a bit complex, but at the end of the parenthesis, you'll see…)
1. Anthony
2. Richard (yes, you read that right… not 3rd)
3. Andy C.
4. Rob
5. Colin
6. Tom
7. Stu
8. Andy P.

Now, of course, these statistics are stupid. Ahem. The tournament that really mattered was the one held last night, competitors being the Big Three, David, Christine and David's little bro, Phil (who has almost had something named after him… we'll see). In the first round, Anthony creamed Christine 7–0, Richard was unfortunate to lose 7–3 to Colin, and Phil beat his brother in a tense 10–8 victory… some would say that giong into setting against a relative newbie is not as admirable as coming close against a co-creator of the Brave and Noble Game, but rules stated that the highest scoring loser went through, so David it was. Lake superior, as it were. But not for long, as both brothers came crashing out in the semi-finals, setting up a (yawn) final between Anthony and Colin. And what a boring final it was… watched only by the referee, David, it was simply a matter of waiting for the opponent to make a mistake, and eventually Anthony made enough that it ended 21–18 to me, a nice smash to finish.

: 17 Jun 2005 02:45 |  Comments (0) |  Close comments |  Report a problem

Shavers and Rob

Rob, whose previous contributions to the Brave and Noble Game have largely revolved around his amazing and seemingly infinite ability to lose to Colin, has taken advantage of the old adage, "if you can't beat 'em, join 'em" by doing a little bit of Colining. When the ball only just clips the edge of the table, we used to say 'that ball only just clipped the edge of the table'. Thanks to Rob, we will now be saying 'that was a shaver'. Nice one, Rob.

: 14 Jun 2005 20:03 |  Comments (0) |  Close comments |  Report a problem

Knock–out Glassball

We had the first tournament for a long time last night, but I won't spoil the surprise – Colin can tell you all about that in his own sweet time. The really fun stuff happened afterwards:

Anthony invented Knock-out Glassball, for people who don't mind playing for a long time. The middle bottle is balanced on its head in a glass in the middle of the table (with the usual 6 bottles either side). Points scored as usual, but any bottles knocked down during play remain where they fall, and the game only ends when the ball lands in the Glass in the middle. Richard beat me 70–66 if I remember correctly. What a game…

: 13 Jun 2005 13:15 |  Comments (3) |  Close comments |  Report a problem

FREEDOM

Later today, exams will be over for the entire Glassball fraternity… woo-hoo! As if that wasn't good enough news, we're celebrating with the introduction of Premium Glassball (more Colining, I'm afraid) in which the bottles consist of special edition Stella bottles – they have gold labels and everything.*
Also, Glassball is spreading – Tomoko became the first Oriental player, and with their natural inclination for table-tennis-esque sports, she took to the game pretty quickly. For a girl.

*everything, in this case, is limited to gold labels

: 11 Jun 2005 01:52 |  Comments (0) |  Close comments |  Report a problem