"When" He Misses....

It was another unusually warm day for early January. It was a high of 73 and a low of 56, which made for perfect lunch croquet conditions. The contenders, Roarke, Christi, Chris M, Chris B, Scott, and Matt slogged down to the usual spot and set up a standard course on what Roarke would call "fart grass."



The game began like many others. The early balls, blue and red (Scott and Macdonald), hit a snag at the first wicket thus setting up a trail of colored stepping stones for the rest of the group to move past. The black ball (Chris B) capitalized on both balls to make it through, stopping at the third wicket. Roarke had an easy ladder of croquet balls to surpass Chris B, but couldn't make a short shot through the second wicket. To be fair, the short shot was today's biggest challenge for all the players. Not "if," but "when he misses" became the choice taunt. Christi and Matt both came out to a slow start but as we all know, the win rarely goes to the fastest player around the course. Slow-play Scott has proven that many times before.



The turning post proved to be a thorn in every ones side. There was a traffic jam going into it between Scott, Macdonald, and Matt. Chris B took it upon himself to help Macdonald out of the jam by giving him step by step instruction on the best shot possible. He did this out the goodness of his heart and not for selfish reasons. Scott begs to differ.



Roarke made short work of the second half, leaving himself a comfortable foot away from the last wicket before poison. He was sweating bullets though when he turned around to see Matt bearing down on him. Matt roqueted roarke to the other side of the turning post only to flub his final shot to make poison. Chris Macdonald and Scott scrambled to catch up but were without the means to bridge the next three wickets. Chris was drooling over this most fortunate turn of events. A short pop over to Christi gave him the two shots he needed to reach Matt who was resting just under the last wicket. Matt was roqueted into poison but swiftly dispatched for an easy kill. Chris learned his lesson in the last game and high tailed it away from everyone. "Go small or go home," his motto. Roarke was accurate once again in setting himself up for poison and was about cheer for himself when he heard that familiar cackle. Moseying in like a little boy with chocolate ice cream all over his face was old man Lynch. Roarke knew that the pressure was on now. It was just what he needed though. He made two very impressive long shots to kill Christi and then Mackydoodle. Scott soon found himself in between a rock and a hard place. Roarkes next shot should have been his undoing because he left himself inches in front of scott and a wicket. If we were playing golf I would have called it a "gimmie" and just declared roarke dead. Scott wasn't able get the lie he needed though and was left scratching his head. Chris being the greedy dog that he is suggested that scott throw him a scrap(roarke). Scott attempted, but failed to send the scrap more than a foot. Chris promptly committed suicide by sending himself through a wicket giving everyone a good laugh. Roarke took out the former stat leader and made chris eat the words, "when you miss."