First place: Jo Ann Edquist, Chris Slade, Eric Payne

The February 18 short mat club tournament was unusual since both finals featured spouses — on opposing sides.

The Paynes were leads in the “Firsts”” finals and the Klausens were skips in the “Seconds” final. No noticeable spats between sweethearts took place. After all, why would they? It is easy to forgive your love when their mistakes are to your advantage.

Or maybe tranquility reigned because both families realized that their joint winnings were decided, even before the game began. If only hedge fund managers knew the returns from short mat bowling! The Klausens were getting a 40% return on their entry fees in one single day! And the Paynes knew they had more than doubled their money just by showing up for the last game. And the rewards were plentiful; half the players got prize money. The other half had to write off their investment, but where else can you play organized games for three hours with your friends for $5 – with coffee thrown in?

2nd place: Anne Pyne, Brent Jansen, Georgia Thorneycroft

There was yet another opposing “pair”; Brent Jansen and Chris Slade, partners in the A Pairs league, faced each other as skips in the firsts final. There, things were a little more tense, with mind games played throughout by both parties.

3rd place: June Klausen, Steve Rikely, Norma Alison

There is no need for this particular reporter to tell tales, or even record the score. Suffice it to say that Brent felt that the result would have been different had the mat been properly aligned, while Chris could only express his thanks (frequently) to be facing a player who was off his game (although the final result may have much more to do with Jo Ann and Eric who were clearly “on” theirs.) It is believed that Steve Rikely, who organized the tournament so ably, has recommended that both skips attend sportsmanship counselling, noting that they claimed to be unaware that the bowling Rules of Etiquette also apply to the indoor game.

4th place: Joan Roberts, Svend Klausen, Tanis Ranger

Of course, all of the above paragraph is actually “fake news”, as the current vernacular would have it. The smiling photos surrounding this report tell a different story and make it clear that we all had a good time.

Extra short mat tournament planned

The one-day format of the last four short mat tournaments has proved popular. Even though this latest tournament had the most attendees ever at 24, four other club members enquired just the night before about possible available places.

To respond to this rising interest,  we plan to stage an extra one-day club tournament – this time on a Sunday, March 12, IF AND ONLY IF someone new would step forward to organize it. It would help if such a volunteer had very elementary skill in Excel spreadsheets, which we use for scheduling, but it is not strictly necessary since we have an easily repeatable format for the one-day tournament. Plenty of help would be available to the new organizer. Contact Steve Rikley if you would be prepared to volunteer. Remember, someone has to do it; why not you?

Reporting by Chris Slade