That’s Army talk for After Action Review. Which is what this is.

The Thanksgiving get together at Dolce Vita went extremely well. I was a little nervous about the turnout. We had two big turkeys and lots of side dishes. There was also a similar party going on at the VFW, so I was not sure how many folks would actually show up for our gig. Turns out we had a very full house. In fact, we had 26 folks sign up for the dart tourney, which was our biggest ever. 13 doubles teams playing on four boards in a double elimination format made for a long night, but we had plenty of food and of course Dolce was well stocked with all forms of liquid refreshment.

Lonnie really outdid himself with his contributions to the feast. Made a great green bean casserole, candied yams, tasty stuffing and his famous cheese dip. He topped it off by playing some fine darts and finished 3rd in the tourney.

We also had a little ceremony to honor Jim and YJ (owners of Dolce Vita) and to thank them for their outstanding support of the dart league. The Dolce teams took up a collection and we presented Jim and YJ will an all expense paid trip to JeJudo Island (the Hawaii of Korea, don’t ya know). Kudos to Grant for the idea and handling all the details with the travel agency.

At the tourney I was partnered up with Jesse of Dawg Pound and I just had one of those nights. In our first match I was lucky to get a one mark on most of my throws. So, we got into the the losers bracket right out of the box. We took our next two matches before going down to defeat against Dan and John R. Well, that was good enough for 4th place at least. Alistar from Scotland and Matt took first and shared the W200,000 payoff. Congrats.

My darts were a tad better in the Friday night tourney, taking a first in singles and a first in doubles. My ability to throw consistent darts remains elusive, but if it was easy it wouldn’t be much fun. Or so I keep telling myself.

Anyway, even by my standard the photos I took on Thursday were extremely poor. But by God, I’m going to post them regardless…

Matt carves the bird while Dan helps himself to the scraps. Nothing like teamwork…

Matt is focused on the task at hand…

Result! Two birds carved and ready for consumption.

Tera was the first to arrive and the first through the food line…

And John was not far behind. He’s an English guy, so maybe his distant ancestors were among the Pilgrims who participated in that first Thanksgiving feast. Hey, it could be possible…

So Yung is one of the Dolce bartenders. She rescheduled her day off so she wouldn’t miss out on the Thanksgiving dinner. And she loved my fruit salad so she is obviously a smart gal.

YJ claiming the pecan pie.

Jim and Lonnie.

Grant’s wife Myung Hee and her Canadian friend Margaret.

Now that we are all stuffed with turkey it’s time to get on with the darts. Here Jim collects the entry fees. The bar kicked in W100,000 which made the total purse W360,000. Not bad at all. Although my share of the payout didn’t cover my entry fee. Alas.

Here’s Jun at the oche (the line your foot can’t cross when throwing). Yeah, crappy photo. It’s hard to take a good dart picture because most folks don’t appreciate a flash when they are throwing…

Tom C. is one of the best darters in Itaewon. He taught me a lot about the sport and playing strategically. A great guy and a fine Soldier as well.

All right, I think that about covers it. Hope y’all had a great holiday.