revised 12/15/2006
Linda and I also played on a 4.5 mixed doubles team and we won about as often as we lost. Winning is much better than losing for good marital harmony.
I still play every Wednesday night with three other long-time aquaintances, Nick Van Overdam, Rick Daily, and Eddie Slotboom. We've been playing each week that the weather permits for over twenty years. We're all so old now that the little injuries really take a toll. On any given Wednesday, we count ourselves lucky if we have no more that two substitutes. Fortunately, we have a lot of friends from the league teams that we can call on to fill in.
Linda and I finally built the Chez Benbrook tennis court during the spring and summer of 2000. It turned out far better than I had hoped and we are finding time to practice on it almost every day. Linda was invaluable as a competent day laborer during construction. She learned how to wield a wheel barrow and flat-bladed shovel to level the sand base, she learned how to handle butterfly ties on the rebar, and she helped with the erection of the ten-feet high chainlink fence around the court. When she retires from the O&G business, she's going to earn extra money ($6.50/hour) in the building trade. Either that or mow right-of-way for the Texas Highway Department!
It will be interesting to see if the increased practice time that we get by having our own court always available can overcome the steep decline in ability that accompanies old age for Jim. Linda is still ahead of the curve in that regard, so we expect her to start to move up the skill ladder. I have started thinking about putting lights on the court and I'm well into the planning and cost estimating phase at this editing.