I Got Hustled (Ley's Birthday)

Before I start telling you how I got hustled, I'd like to say welcome to the 200th post of the Cellar Door!

Last night it's time to head out to the Mission to celebrate Ley's birthday. She's picked a 10 o'clock start time at a Senegalese restaurant at Mission and 19th. But our night starts earlier than that. At about 9, with Hessica telling me she's not really sure she feels like going out, I tell her there's only one way to fix that...the rodka. So we each have a drink while getting ready, and once I'm showered and dressed, I'm feeling pretty good. When I tell Hessica that we're going to need to stick around for the end of a basketball game, she decides to make another drink. As she's heading to the kitchen, I realize that I can TiVo the end of the basketball game, so I tell her not to pour the drink, but the vodka is already in the mug. I ask her, "what are you going to do with that?" to which she responds, "take it as a shot?" I think this sounds like an excellent idea and dance around the dining room as she attempts to finish what she's poured. As the elevator takes us downstairs, I get the feeling she's faded.

We get up shortly after 10 and after getting drinks at the bar, meet up with the birthday party that includes Brie, Cristal, Ley and Van, McButter and Za and about 15 or so others. The highlight of dinner comes when, at the end, as everyone is getting up to leave, Hessica attempts to make it easy for someone to get past her between the bench they've been sitting on and the table. She keeps scooting down to make room, and unknowingly and rather drunkenly scoots herself right off the bench and onto the floor. Amazingly, she manages not to spill more than a drop or two of her drink as she does this.

From the restaurant we head over to the Lex where a smallish Thursday night crowd gives our group room to spread out. On the walk over, I pull out a j and start it around and one of the girls in the group says, "you must be the infamous _____." I get a good laugh out of that one. Inside it's drinks and pool. Two of the guys in our group, physics majors, duel for a bit and the winner joins Van against Hessica and myself in a horrendously bad doubles game. But, all four of us are pretty equally bad, so it's not too much of a concern. About midway through the game, an interesting character comes through the door. She's tough, rugged around the edges, wearing a black head cover, not unlike Omar's. She's got cornrowed braids coming down her back which are contrasting nicely with the all white zoot suit she's wearing. She looks mean.

She sits down next to the table as we're playing and starts giving Hessica little hints and tricks. For a moment, as I'm lining up to take a shot that I'm going to hammer into the corner pocket, she says lightly, "easy, easy." I don't make the shot, but I can tell from the shot I get off that had I nailed it like I was planning on, there was no way it was going into the pocket. We finish up the game, which appears very painful for her to have to watch. As we're back to sipping our drinks, relinquishing the pool table to others, she starts to lobby people for a game. When she gets to me, I say sure I'll play, I mean, I haven't gotten my pool fix in for the evening, so why stop?. It's only after she's gotten the balls out and I've started racking that she comes up and asks me what we're going to play for. Hustled! I think pool etiquette should dictate that you mention you want to play for stakes BEFORE you start racking on an innocent victim. But hey, I'm in it now so I agree to a 5 dollar bet on the game. She nods gruffly at this, glad she's getting something, upset she's not getting more.

After she cleans two balls off the break, I get a chance to shoot, make a shot and have her remind me that I need to call the shots. I do this for the rest of the game. Things look dire as I'm several balls down until I hit a streak of three very nice shots in a row (including one where I use the cue ball to hit one of my balls to put my ball closer to the whole in...that was a nice shot). I pull to within one down and shoot myself in the foot by being unable to put my ball away...I know as I miss it it'll be the last shot I get. Sure enough, she puts it away and I hand over the money. It was my first time playing for cash, and it made the game so much more exciting...even though I got hustled, I don't think I've had more fun losing.

Up next: Weekend debauchery including the going away party for Miller. Cheers!