not quitting my day job

Life continues, I think without any tremendous upsets. Though if there were, I don't know that I'd remember just now, the same way I sometimes forget to tell doctors I had my gall bladder removed. It's done now, so who cares? Evidently I didn't need it anyway.

In the Department Of Useless Skills I'd Rather Not Have Time To Develop, I am becoming a fairly skilled pool player. The other night, after endless missed shots, I found this article, and noticed that the expert player at the next table was in fact letting his cue slide loose several inches in his hands after it hit the cue ball. It made an immediate difference, and last night I was consistently sinking all the shots where I know where the ball is supposed to go. In other words, my ability to place the ball is catching up to my understanding of where it needs to go. Tonight I stopped by Otto's, a Latino deli that happens to have a pair of pool tables, and won against a comparable player twice in a row.

Hurray for enjoyable unwanted hobbies, I guess. Don't get me wrong, I enjoy pool a lot, and it's been fun to really study and understand the game. It's especially fun to really develop skill at something I've known since childhood, but it turned out I've been playing in the most amateurish way all these decades (which is also true of backgammon). Yet, this all comes about because I have to keep myself awake for 90-120 minutes after I want to go to bed, and I'd much rather be able to go to bed.