Pleasant afternoon in a Canadian pool hall

A week ago, I was in New Brunswick, Canada, and I had a few hours to kill, so I went to the Dooly's pool hall.  The day rate there is about $8/hour, which is high for pool halls around here (New Hampshire), but not bad at all for Canada.

When I got to the pool hall, there were three guys playing on a table in the back, and I set up on a table near them.  Immediately one of them came over and asked if I wanted to play a game.  I told him that I wanted to warm up first, but that I might be interested in a game later.

Several times in the next 20 minutes he came back over to ask if I was ready, and finally I said that we could play some.  I asked what game he wanted to play, and his answer was "The real game".  By this, I assumed he meant 8-ball, which turned out to be the case.  Apparently he did not recognize any other valid form of pool.  As he was also 15 years old, I decided I could forgive him for that.

He was a decent shot, but he did not know much at all about playing position - setting up for the next shot.  As long as he had a shot, he would make it most of the time, but he would usually place himself in a position where he had no valid shot and would have to try something very difficult.  I would then take over an run out (often, not always).  We played about 12-15 games in two hours, and he won one of them.  It was a lot more fun than practicing by myself the whole time, and while he was very much a kid ("I'm a pretty good shot for my age, huh?"), we had a good time.

It was also really good practice for the next 8-ball tournament at Buster's, as it turns out.