Australia Blog

State High Invitational Tennis

After pretty much destroying ourselves on Friday night at the National Festival of Beers (wait for the photos of that one!), the Ging and I decided that a 9am round of tennis would be a good way to purge the toxins.

Brisbane State High School on Vulture Street in the City has 4 hardcourt courts that are free on a first-come, first-serve (no pun intended) basis. After the last time, when I was very late, I got there right on time and the courts were all full. Ging had been there about 10 minutes already.

Some guys who were waiting for their doubles partners to show up kindly let us have a bash for awhile and it felt good to work up a sweat. Ging was regularly killing me with passing shots down the line every time I ventured in to the net and apparently the guys behind me were having quite the laugh at my form.

Figuring I'd take the humiliation one step further, I challenged Ging to a match. That's when the wheels came off (though fortunately no knee dislocations) for the former Cunnamulla Open champ. She simply couldn't handle the pace on my serve that has been described by pundits as "like a snail with haemorrhoids", and the wind was playing havoc with her ball toss.

We only played one set because there was no point killing oursevles in the hot sun (and I wanted to quit while I was ahead) and it was my first set win in Australia for many years.