ANDREW’S BIRTHDAY BASH By Andrew Gregory
At some point last winter I realised that my 60th birthday would fall on the Thursday of the AC World Championships in Florida. Where be8er to spend it than in the sun with many of my croquet friends? Piggybacking on others' organisa7onal skills I turned up, without much idea of what I actually wanted to do for the day itself. My family doesn't really do the birthday thing. I decided to have a dinner on Thursday evening. On Monday I started men7oning to Bri7sh players I might be doing something. And the Irish players. And then the Bri7sh referees. And some others. Before I knew it there were 30+ 7cks on my list. At this point I decided to try to find a venue. In retrospect it might have been an idea to do this first. I had to cadge use of a phone from various people as it would cost an arm and a leg to use mine. By Tuesday a'ernoon I was drawing a blank.
Our house was about a mile and a quarter from the croquet club. On our drive in we passed "Havana Nights Cuban Pizza". I walked there to have a look. Not the most prepossessing place. But it was authen7c in that the staff's English wasn't great. Well it would have to do. I went back there Tuesday evening to confirm. I wrote down "Thursday 7.30 30 people". I thought I'd ask a few more chaps along, thinking that some people would inevitably drop out. By 6pm I'd probably asked 50+. I couldn't ask everyone ‐ there are 72 players to begin with ‐ so I had to have rules. e.g. "No Australians (except Trev)". Now I was having ki8ens. What if the restaurant was duff, or they couldn't accommodate us a'er all? I recruited Ken Jones. He is my oldest friend in croquet, as the leading player at Edgbaston when I joined. Also he speaks fair Spanish. We went to the restaurant. Yes they were expec7ng us. No they don't do sangria. Yes to beer. Wine? It came in plas7c cups. Oh dear. There was a liquor store across the street. Could we bring wine in? Yes we could. At least that's what Ken gleaned with his Spanish. By now I'm thinking that complete disaster had been averted. But how many would come? Would the food be edible? By 7.30 a dozen had turned up. We ordered some nibbles and beer. They had set up a long table for 30. By 8pm we had extended the table twice. 40 odd people had turned up. Some very odd. Haute cuisine it was not. But it was OK if chao7c. Not sure if everyone got the food they ordered, no idea on payment but all worked out well. Can I ask the WCF to have the 2035 Worlds back here in October so I can celebrate my 70th?
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