Rules of Ping Pong

Rules of Ping Pong

In a ping pong game the first player to reach 21 points is declared the winner. However, upon one player reaching 21 points with the opponent trailing less than 2 points, the game must continue until one player takes a definite 2 point lead over the opponent, at which point that player is declared the winner.

To start a point the server serves the ball with the paddle to the opponent's side of the ping pong table. If the server fails to serve the ball into play, either by serving the ball into the net or serving it out, the point goes to the opponent. Once the ball is in play either player can score points. The players must hit the ball back to the opponents' side of the table. If one player fails to return the ball to the opponent's side either by netting the ball or hitting it out, the point then goes to the opponent.

To start a point with a serve, the server throws the ping pong ball up at least 6 inches and as it comes down the server hits the ball with the paddle. Before crossing over the net the served ball must hit the server's part of the table first before bouncing a second time on the opponent's side. After the serve the ball remains in play as long as it clears the net and bounces once on the opponent's side of the table with each stroke. The point ends either when a player hits the ball into the net, or when the ball goes out without bouncing at all on the opponent's side of the table, at which time the opponent earns a point.

Happy weekends

The first was making sugar cookies for Santa on Christmas Eve. Rise and I mixed up the dough early in the afternoon so it would be chilled and ready when cookie cutting time came. Then we sat my mother at the kitchen table with the four kids and they began rolling out the dough, with Grandma as the supervisor. It was fun for her to see those same Christmas cookie cutters she used with us being put to use once again with a different generation of young¡¯ns, as Angel and her husband Matt referred to their family. My son Kevin got into the action, loading and unloading the cookie sheets from the oven. Marshall, the youngest, was ever so proud of the gingerbread man that he dressed in jeans and a print shirt, using sprinkles and sugar. We rescued a flour-covered Grandma from the cookie table and moved into the dining room to play games. The players rotated from the board games to play ping-pong on the ping pong table in the basement from time to time.