Hi Guys!
Thanks for all the good wishes...
:crying:
That means a lot.
Well.... :worship: Raymond won... oh well... He's just tough.
The whole day was a bit of an odd day at The Briary.
I came in third as I did last year.
I had a real shot this year.
At the 42 minute mark I was only 1/3 the way through my bowl when... my pipe gurgled and I felt a little pop inside the bowl...
The pop was apparently the production of a little puff of steam...
And it instantly snuffed out my ember. :crying:
The second place came in just a few moments later... the same thing happened to him.
It was amazing how fast our pipes went out... he was 3/4 the way through his bowl.
When all of the above happened Raymond was about 1/2 the way through his bowl...
Congratulations to Raymond :clap: ... again.
His time 1 hour 22 minutes 23 seconds. :clap:
Here is a side note to the competition...
Us "old codgers" were out numbered in this years "Slow Smoke".
I was heartened for the future of pipe smoking by the following.
There was a contingent of Music Majors from the University of Samford.
A young professor of Music Theory (from Samford) and a one student from UAB. The professor (Matt) was the oldest of the "young contingent", I believe he was under 30.
One was a young lady.. Miss Orange. Bless her heart she was out before we got underway... Her pipe wouldn't light... took her three matches...
but she did go about 20 minutes when she did get it lit. We were also entertained by one of the Music students with guitar music (really very talented), and a lot of "musician jokes" as well.
The guitarist, Miss Orange, and Raymond's knees, a little while before the competition.
More photos to come...