Saturday, August 05, 2000
What do you get a millionaire for his birthday?
Today was John the paper millionaire of a dotcom's birthday, and the usual suspects (Mark, Jeff K, Kelly and myself were all invited to John's house.
The backyard relandscaping was finished and it was an incredible job. Two small streams, each starting from a waterfall (on either end of the back yard) and heading toward the middle. Each had a natual bridge, made of rocks, and leading to the other side of the backyard. The streams met in the middle, just behind a covered patio with an Asian feel to it. The streams were filled with koi and other aquatic plant life. It has a very pleasant and relaxing feel to it.
His wife hired two girls to come out—the first one was Christine who came out for an hour and spent it swimming and playing pool basketball topless. The second one was Vicki who posed as a pizza delivery girl but ended up giving John a lap dance.
We spent entirely too much time swimming, with Mark, Jeff and I all getting sun burns. It's to be expected from pasty white computer guys who spend entirely too much time basking in the glow of CRT screens in the dead of night.
The hamburgers that John grilled came from Sam's Club and where multi-inch thick monstronsities. They were excellent but were nearly too large. I was only able to eat half of mine; Jeff ate only half of his and only Mark was able to polish off two of them. The hotdogs were some brand (I forget) only available from New York but they were excellent. Much better than the national brands.
After swiming for several hours, John broke out the croquette set and with the help of his brother-in-law, set up the course across the entire back yard (that is, the part not taken up with the koi streams).
Croquette is a long game and one I found entirely too annoying to play. The grass was too tall and the balls wouldn't exactly go in the direction you would expect them to go, nor as far as you would expect.
It also didn't help matters that I was running dead last in the game and by the time I made it to the other side I had basically given up and decided to go after John, who was leading the game.
In croquette, if you hit an opponent's ball, you get the option of “sending them,” which means you place your ball next to theirs, put your foot on your ball, and whack it as hard as you can, sending the their ball off to parts unknown.
it's legal for the loosing player(s) (of which I was) to abandon the stated goal of getting the balls through the wickets (small metal arches set into the ground) and go after the other players. But that ment getting my ball, which was on one side of the yard, to John's ball, which at the time I got fed up, was at the other end being manouvered through the final two wickets.
I never made it. John won the game.
Afterwards, we sat in the family room watching bad movies on TV and MST3King them merclessly.
