March 10, 2020 was the fifth meeting of Season 14. As part of our “Labors of Hercules” themed season, we played bank “Stymphalian Birds” which was Attack from Mars, Elvira’s House of Pancakes Horrors, Jurassic Park, Star Wars, and Iron Maiden.
Danny won the night, Derik took second, and Mike took third. Danny is also in the lead for the current season, with Mike 17 points behind him. On the other end of the spectrum, Joseph reports that he had one of his all time worst games of Attack from Mars, in which he did not so much as topple a single saucer. For full results, check the standings document that Joseph keeps updated for us.
The Tuesday Night Smackdown game was on The Simpsons Pinball party. Jason “the Mag” won the top award (a “medal” decorated with a shamrock) and Travis won the undercard bout.
Those of us who stuck around late got to meet meet a surprise visitor, Mike, one of the owners of Pinball Pete’s, and play some games with him. When we were introduced he made a wry remark about how we weren’t really supposed to shake hands anymore.
The night had a strange feeling to it, a sense of being moments ahead of a storm. At the time we were still expecting to have the quarterly charity tournament, March Hare Madness, on March 18. But the first cases of what everyone was still just calling “the coronavirus” had just been reported in Michigan. Before I left, I stopped in the bathroom and washed my hands much more thoroughly than normal, the way that has since become habitual – in other words, almost as well as Joseph has always washed his hands.
Season 14 will resume on August 10, but July will taken up by a couple of unofficial meetings in place of league nights. We will be meeting tonight at 7 for a non-season “just for fun” mini pingolf tournament, Silver Balls in July, and for an early Super-Ball XIV (Zen tournament) on July 24. See you all (I hope) soon.
My recollection in the Smackdown game is that I put up one of my best Simpsons scores ever, something big enough I think it intimidated people away from playing themselves. And then in finals, naturally, I had one of my most mediocre games of all time. I can’t even call it hubris, I just had stuff not work out.