Robert R. Clough
Americans and Their Labors
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The last time I was in the States, my wife and I and our daughter spent a few days hanging out with Dave and Jody in Iowa City... finally, after eating Dave's roast duck breast masterpiece and all the caviar (and drinking most of the vodka) we'd brought them from Vladivostok, Dave said to my wife, Lena: "I've heard you Russians can play a mean game of ping-pong, and I know Richard's no slouch at the game; Jody's whipped my ass more times than I care to remember; how about best of seven in the garage, loser buys dinner tommorow in the Amana's?"

It went back and forth, down to the seventh game overtime... my wife was brilliant! I had no idea... finally we took them down, 27-25, and Dave said: "I'll be damned, Richard; if you'd told me you'd brought a ringer along I'd have never made the bet!" So, at about 3am we cracked open a bottle of dry white Australian Dave had iced down for "afters" and went back through the high points of the tournament, and everything else...

Richard Thomas
04-25-2008