I have been ignoring my love lately

Ok, that sounds bad. Actually I’ve been ignoring one of my loves lately. Snooker. How could I have forgotten to mention both the Malta Cup and the Welsh Open? I think somewhere in the middle of looking for my writing mojo, hoping for the writers’ strike to end, discussing the ramifications of the strike over my beloved TV shows and various other every day annoyances it slipped my mind to report. But I’ve been watching and damn, it’s been fun!

I have to admit I don’t quite care about the Malta cup. It’s not that important and I only watch it because hey, it’s snooker. But most of the players aren’t that interested either, or so it seems from where I’m sitting, Ronnie O’Sullivan didn’t even come this year so it’s usually just running in the background while I do various other important things(to be read as: do nothing online). But it exists and to my complete annoyance Shaun Murphy won it this year(did I ever mention the guy bugs me to no end?). And to make matters worse he won against Ken Doherty. So I will pretend it didn’t happen from now until next year. Mmmkay?

And now that we discussed the thing that didn’t happen I can move on to more important things like the Welsh Open. Tonight they played the final and what a pretty game it was. The finalists were, to my complete happiness, Mark Selby and Ronnie O’Sullivan. Since Paul Hunter died I haven’t had a couple of players who I love seeing play so much as I used to love the games between him and O’Sullivan. But now…ding-ding-ding I have a winner! They’re both great players(and did I mention pretty as well?) and it’s fun watching them play. They’ll do faces, kneel(ok, that was Selby in the World Championship it I remember correctly but I laughed like a maniac) and try the weirdest, toughest shots and usually get them too. To be honest I wanted Selby to win but I was thinking that O’Sullivan will. But I was wrong and I’m happy about it(O’Sullivan has 19 ranking tournament wins and it was the first for Selby). The first session of the final ended 4-4 so the second(and last) session started from there. It quickly became 5-4 for O’Sullivan and then 6-4. Mark got a frame but then Ronnie went all the way up to 8-5. Let me quote Selby here “I thought I had no chance at 8-5, even if you give Ronnie a one-frame lead he usually steam-rollers you.” But the “comeback kid”(their nickname, not mine) won the next 3 frames so it was 8-8 in a game of first to 9. And the final frame was fun and exciting and ended with Selby’s victory, although it was from O’Sullivan’s mistake(I’ll look for a video of the shot tomorrow). Congrats to the winner and good luck in the World Championship(I’ll be rooting for another Selby-O’Sullivan final…one can hope :D). And here’s what O’Sullivan said about playing against Mark "You can't feel involved in the match because he plays in strange patterns and plays different shots. It makes him tough to play. You know there are going to be a lot of long frames and it's hard to get a rhythm going. It's an endurance test, to see how patient you can be." Because every snooker fan knows that his biggest quality is patience < /sarcasm >.

In another news, I mentioned a wedding I had to go to next week. I didn’t mention that the friend that’s dragging me to it decided we won’t go. Smart call, ‘cause now I’m going again. Ain’t that fun? So this week is nice clothes shopping time because I have nothing in my closet fit for a wedding. Yes, I know all women say that. But I really mean it. Actually I don’t even have a closet. Are hiking boots inappropriate for a wedding(no, I don’t hike I just have the boots for it)? Oh, the fun I’ll have. The shopping gene was lost on me. So prepare yourselves for a 3 page long rant about how much I hate shopping.