This is a summary of our trip from my blog:
Borana and I had decided a few weeks ago to make a trip out to Janet Atwell's poolhall for the MALT Tour's Tennessee State Championship (and U.S. Open qualifier) but we had not idea what a task that would be. The only airport that flies into that area of Tennessee is a small regional airport and only the small regional jets fly into there. I fly way too often and I've pretty much banned flying on NWA and many other flights that contract out most of their flights to those regional jets. They are really unsafe (statistically proven) and I get motion sickness VERY easily, so we opted to fly into Charlotte and drive over from there.
To our surprise, Nicole Keeney was also headed out there from Charlotte where she was visiting a friend so we decided to all carpool and head out there Friday afternoon. We get in the car and I begin to freak out because the address for the hotel is Bristol, VIRGINIA (not Tennessee) and having prepaid for the hotel I was worried. That shows how much research I did before going, Bristol is right on the border. My GPS apparently wanted to play some jokes on us though because it took us through a route that cut through the mountains and even took us down a small dirt road half way thru the trip
Once arriving at the hotel, Nicole tries to check-in to her room that her boyfriend reserved for her over the phone only to find that he made a surprise trip to meet her there and was already waiting in her room for her, SOO sweet!
The poolhall was located in a neat little area of downtown Bristol and was a good change the gross sketchy places that some tournaments are held.
The tables played great and the room was very big and open. They were a little higher than I'm used to so I was pretty uncomfortable at the table all weekend but I think it was just a mental thing that I couldn't get past. I played pretty poorly all weekend and was knocked out of the tournament on the first day. Borana and Nicole were kicking butt though so I was happy to stick around and watch the later rounds. Both of them met up with Kim Shaw early in the tournament and were knocked to the losers side but both came back strong with some impressive wins over ranked WPBA players. Borana defeated several opponents, including the house pro, Janet Atwell in and impressive 7-3 win and finished 7th in the event.
After suffering a hill-hill loss to Kim Shaw, Nicole came back strong knocking out several players from the losers side (including Val Finnie) and went on to take 2nd place and capture the qualifier spot.
Bristol itself was pretty neat, a little too country for my taste (and I live in TEXAS) but the town was pretty and had some neat things about it.
Saturday night Borana and I went next door to the Stateline Bar & Grill to grab some dinner only to find out it turns into a club at night. For our amusement, there were 2 wedding parties there that night...2 VERY drunk wedding parties. Among the interesting characters we met that night was a guy that is 6'10". Chris, this could have been you
We had a fun night watching all the girls go crazy dancing and seeing the drunk spectacles. But since Borana had to play in the morning and I was exhausted, we went home early.
I got back to Ausitn on Monday and have been flying around Texas everyday since then. I'm heading to McAllen and Houston today and tomorrow. The Bogies OBCues stop is this weekend and I'm looking forward to spending the weekend with one of my favorite travel partners, Carter. He's an awesome roommate and is always willing to make the starbucks run for us in the mornings. I'm sad that Samm isn't going to be here this weekend but hopefully I will see her soon.
