Cribbage @ Marx Cafe - May 13, 2012

Game 1 (Teams: Joel & Charles, Ann & Me; Winners: Joel & Charles)

Game 2 (Teams: Joel & Charles, Ann & Me; Winners: Joel & Charles)

My highest hand of the night was a double-double run for 16 points in the first game.

Worst moment of the night (for me) happened in the first game. I played an ace, the third in a row after both Ann and Charles. I was feeling rather confident so I made a snide remark, something along the lines of, "oh that's too bad". My moment of glory was shattered seconds later when Joel played the 4th ace. I wasn't expecting that. It hurt but I earned it. Karma.

We got skunked in the second game.

More people had arrived by the time game 2 ended. We broke things up. I played Joel while Ann and Charles played a game.

Game 3 (Players: Joel, Me; Winner: Joel)

After our game Joel had to go. I watched Ann and Charles finish up their game, which Ann won.

Game 4 (Players: David, Ann, Me; Winner: David)

David joined us after Charles left. I was in 3rd place for the entire game and just barely avoided getting skunked.

The weirdest moment of the night happened during this game. It was David's turn to count his points. He threw down his cards and said he had two pair for 4 points. His cards were Q-Q-5-5. Ann and I looked at the cards, then at one another then back at the cards then at David. She looked as confused as I felt. David looked back at us. He still hadn't put 2 and 2 together. I dunno how he missed seeing that many points but once we pointed out his mistake the veil was lifted, he understood confused facial expressions, and took the additional 8 points he had in his hand.

Including me, a total of 8 people came to this event; none of them were new to the group. We got the waitress to take a picture of us which came out quite nicely. We were there for about 5 hrs.

Cribbage Meetup @ Thai at Corner - Apr 18, 2012

This was a meetup that almost didn't happen. Even though I announced it there wasn't much response positive or negative. Only one other person showed up and he didn't RSVP until an hour or two beforehand.

That said, I had a lot of fun. The food was great, as usual; I had the Tilapia Basil and a Sam Adams. Eric and I played three close games. I won the first one by a single point and the next one by two. I won the final game by 13 points.

I had my best hand of the night in the first game. I was dealt 5-J-Q-K of spades. I discarded the other two cards, whatever they were. The turn card was another face card. I scored 20 = 8 (4 x 15) + 8 (double run) + 4 (flush).

Eric's best hand scored 24 points, which may have included a triple run. I know he had a triple run at some point I just can't remember if it was during that hand or not.

Cribbage @ Old City Cafe of Jerusalem - Feb 9, 2012

I can't remember ever getting skunked in back to back games, let alone three times in a row, but it happened tonight.

Game 1 - Opponents: David, Eric; Outcome: I got skunked

Game 2 - Teams: David & Eric, Steve and Me; Outcome: We got double skunked

Game 3 - Opponents: David, Steve; Outcome: I got skunked

Game 4 - Opponents: David, Ann; Outcome: I won

I won game 4 in style. I had the lead for most of the game. Towards the end Ann caught up to me. She almost won on the last hand but didn't have enough points in her hand to close the deal. I didn't have enough points in my hand to  win, but the crib was mine. I only needed four points to win, before counting the crib. It was possibly my best crib ever: 7-8-9-9-9; a triple run plus a 15 for a total of 17 points.

Despite getting skunked as many times as I did tonight I really enjoyed myself. The food was very good and I had fun chatting with the people with whom I played.

Cribbage Meetup @ Soho Tea and Coffee - Jan 11, 2012

I had to sneak out of the office early to make it to this meetup but it was worth it. We had a good turn out. At one point we had three games going at the same time. One was a 2-player, one was a 3-player, and one was a 4-player.

A total of 9 people showed up to play, 3 of them were new to the group. 1 of the new people was Miriam's sister who was visiting from Ohio. The other two 2 newbies, Maria and Jules, live in the DC area. In addition to myself the non-newbies were Joey, Miriam, Leilani, Ann, and Charles.

Game 1 - Teams: Maria & Joey, Jules & Me; Winners: Jules & Me

Game 2 - Teams: Joey & Jules, Maria & Me; Winners: Joey & Jules

Jules left after G2.

Game 3 - Players: Joey, Maria, Me; Winner: ?

Joey, Maria, and I sat around and chatted for 15-20 minutes after G3, until another game ended. At that point we were going to play a five-hander with Leilani and Miriam but at the last second Joey ditched us to join the other group: Charles, Ann, and Miriam's sister.

Game 4 - Teams: Leilani & Maria, Miriam & Me; Winners: Leilani & Maria

G4 was close. I'm not sure if we had a shot at winning it but I know that I made a couple bad plays that cost me a few points and helped Leilani to score some points. I had my best hand of the night in this game: 4-4-4-7-7. The turn card was a 4, which converted my hand from an 8- point hand to a 20-point hand.

Game 5 - Players: Joey, Me; Winner: ?

In the end it was just Ann, Joey, and I. Everyone else left before we started G5. Ann watched and chatted with us while we played. It took us about an hour to finish the game, mostly because we kept stopping to chat.

It was pouring rain the whole afternoon and evening. I got soaked between walking from Foggy Bottom to Soho (8 blocks) and then walking from Soho to 16th & P (8 blocks).

I wasn't hungry when I arrived at Soho. I was planning on grabbing a bite to eat at a kabob place just up the street from Soho on my way home. That didn't work out because I stayed later than I thought I would. By the time I left Soho at 10:30 the kabob place had been closed for a half-hour. I suppose that I could have said something and we could have moved the final game down the street but I was enjoying myself, I wasn't too hungry, and I didn't want to break the spell.

I had good bus luck on the way home. I made it to 16th & P just in time to catch the S4. I only had to wait a couple minutes at Silver Spring before the 15 showed up.