GNIP GNOP

Jared here, As Kimmy mentioned in her last post I was playing ping pong with her dad, my father in law yesterday. It's quite the common occurance when we're visiting. So ok a little history on playing my father-in-law Bill in ping pong. We started playing several months ago and it was not uncommon for him to win every game every time we played...and each time we played we would play many many games. He's really good! You wouldn't believe how he can spin that ball, it's amazing. So after awhile I got a little better and would make the games realtively close...some games. He has this way of playing that he doesn't show you all his tricks at once and will continue to use one till you figure it out and just when you've got that shot down he pulls out another that totally blows you away. And he has this slam that is crazy fast, dont' hit the ball with any loft or else it's getting knocked back down your throat. So after many months of playing I was winning one game out of the 10 to 15 we'd play... ok some nights it might of been 15-20+ games. So I was improving a little...some day's I'd be on and some day's I'd be really off...either that or my father in law would be the one's having the bad days and I'd just be getting lucky. After some time, I managed to put 2 wins together... but that usually included playing 15 games plus games... then came the day where I won 2 games in a row... WOW was I on cloud nine... I believe of the course of a couple of months I did that twice... once Bill quit just after that so he didn't run the risk of losing 3 in a row. Well I was feeling pretty good about my ping pong until the day the skunk arrived. If you don't know what a skunk is, it's when the other player has 11 and you have 0 and you lose. I think most play 7 and 0 but Bill's kind to me and play's it at 11. Yes I got skunked...and skunked big time. So after being humbled we kept playing day after day... only the twice have I one two times in a row... Then yesterday arrived... off to playing ping pong... I started the series off with a win...that's rare... well Bill won the following game. I tried to maintain some calmness and not get too worked up and nervous. I have to have total concentration and focus when I play him, if I slack off in the slightest way I won't notice the spin on the ball or how he hit the ball and game over. Well after he won I managed to win again... ok so now it's 2 games to 1, in my favor. Again I don't think this has never happened....so we began another game... I managed to win that one... I almost kept him to single digits on that last game, but got a little over confident and lack of concentration and he won several points in a row. But for the first time in Gnip Gnop history I was up on him 3 games to 1. With time running out we decided to call it quits and I arrived upstairs for the first time with the advantage of games in my favor. Now this is very unusual, as typically Mykenzie (niece) reports to the upstairs something as follows "Kimmy you're going to be very sad, they've played like 20 games and Jared hasn't won any"... So for the first time I won 3 games, although they were not in a row, I still managed to win 3 games...something that is unheard of even when we play 20+ games... I arrived upstairs with the majority of the wins. Yes, I'm bragging while I can as I'm sure the next time I'll once again be humbled... I'm just glad we didn't play 20+ games....as I'm pretty sure we'd of arrived upstairs with a different story. But as my gnip gnop improves and Bill show's me more of his trick shots, I'll hopefully wind up with at least 1/2 the wins. Well that's all for the Gnip Gnop stories for now. Just a 4 more sleeps till Copper Harbor.

Jared