I learned a couple of things on Friday afternoon and evening. First, a friend of mine plays competition croquet. Yes, you read that correctly, competition croquet. There is a croquet center on the west side of the meadows to which I had never paid very much attention until yesterday. Now, there are two forms of the game. Croquet Golf, which is pretty easy to play and, while different that what you might play in the states, pretty much action oriented. Then there is Association Croquet, which is a mind frying version and takes hours to play. For instance, I played the Golf version first then decided to play the Association game. Some other people decided to play the Golf version and while we were still on our second hoop, they had finished three games of Golf. It was an enjoyable evening by all, however and I might take up the Golf version of the game.

I have taken a couple of things in about the English and their games while learning croquet and cricket. They are complicated and slow games which take hours and hours to play (in the case of cricket, days). Probably because the idea is (as explained by a friend of mine while we were at the croquet club) to have as much Pimms as possible and sit out in the sun doing not much of anything. A quote: "Damn! It's my turn again, old chap!?"

After the croquet, we decided to have a pint at Cloisters which is a pub nearby then to a nearby Indian restaurant. In this restaurant, we found a large number of men at a table and one of them in a dress looking very uncomfortable. This is when I found out that it was a stag night and the guy in the dress was getting married. Now, I have never run into this particular tradition and honestly it seems a bit silly to me but that is probably the point. In any case, we had a long discussion of this particular tradition and what it really boils down to is making the groom as uncomfortable as possible then getting him (and everyone else) roaring drunk.

Otherwise, a good night all around.

posted by Chris  #12:06 PM | 0 comments |