I just couldn't stand it! It had been since Thanksgiving when I hosted "The Great 2004 Thanksgiving Backgammon Party And Chinese Stir Fry Ordeal". So, I thought that it was time to get together again and have another backgammon party and welcome in the New Year.

Unfortunately, a few who wanted to come came down sick, but that didn't stop a few of us from having a great time! Problem was that it got out of hand almost immediately. I had planned to assign parings to matches and generally organize the whole thing. But no. Marissa and David Houdek just couldn't wait. Before I knew what was happening, the two of them were at each other's throats and all hopes for organization went out the window.

It was a wild night, let me tell you! But we have to change the scoring process, though. We'll keep it that you have to win 3 points to win the match, but it will be cummulative matches won and not cummulative points that determines the overall championship match (which again will be 5 points). People got really carried away throwing the cube and some of the scores were +8 and that's a tough score to beat if the games you play didn't accumulate that many points. When you play for money, it's all about the points but in tournament play we have to go with matches won. Colin steamrolled everyone out the door Saturday and there are some folks looking to get him back - like me!

I had chips, cheese and crackers, soda, beer, and some wine and I cooked up an Italian rice and vegetable dish for dinner. Of course - some wanted no part of that, so I also had the staple of life for them: pizza.

The original plan was to use the doubling cube in our play. The winner of each match was decided by who wins 3 points first. All first round losers were to go into an elimination flight, and the winner of the main flight and the winner of the elimination flight to play a 5 point death match after dinner for the championship.

This was supposed to be the schedual:

• 4:00pm - 5:00pm: Pre match bad talk and party time!
• 5:00pm - 7:00pm: Main and Elimination flights play off games.
• 7:00pm - 8:00pm: Dinner (earlier/later depending on games).
• 8:00pm - 9:00pm: Championship 5 point Death Match
• 9:00pm - 11:00pm: Movie time!