The owners of the building - Fulcher Investment Properties and Parkes Development, the companies of longtime Nashville developers Ed Fulcher and Joe Parkes - chose not to give the Chandlers the long-term lease they had been seeking. Once he is standing over the table, stick in hand, he says that he will give me a demonstration. However, though various elements in the game of billiards have changed over the years, one thing remains the same - players need plenty of light if they’re going to make the most out of their experience. A small flash-bang going off in a dark, smoky billiard hall is another thing entirely. Just hope there was no hustling going on when the guns came out. Sure, the Chandlers deserve better in this deal, and I hope they find a new spot - Jim Chandler says they’re looking for leads right now - because you want the folks who are also behind mainstays like Sportsman’s Grille and Gerst Haus to succeed. At least that’s what irate folks are saying on Facebook. We had a letter from a billiard saloon proprietor in Colorado, mentioning this fact and saying he did not care so much about it, but that instantly every man in the room pulled his gun.

Everyone at the bar is smoking, but the grayest-haired man has taken the healthy option: He’s sucking down Marlboro Ultra Lights through a filter (good luck, buddy). With three years’ tenure, he’s the newest bartender on a staff where some employees’ seniority is measured in decades. Even though he grew up here and is as Old Nashville as you can find - his mom, Gayle Ray, was sheriff in the ’90s - he’s apparently the reason the city is going straight to hell right now. Cheap beer, a good jukebox and decent entertainment - that’s how a dive bar that’s closing gets romanticized as a proxy fight between Old Nashville and New Nashville. He opened M.L. Rose across the street when that stretch of Franklin Road was mostly pawn shops and worse, opened a second outpost in an old gas station on Charlotte Pike and has spent most of the past decade doing things the right way. That means along with all the good things - great high-end dining, a booming craft-beer scene, a huge variety of eating and drinking options - there are going to be some casualties along the way.

Two-for-one deals like tonight’s and happy hour until midnight on Wednesday are good for business, but everyone knows the real rush won’t start until 11 p.m., when refugees from earlier-closing places start heading this way. Numbers 9-15 are stripes. While these kinds of tables are great if that’s what you’re looking for, they are almost never made with slate and are designed for casual play with a lifetime of no more than a few years. When the new place opens by the end of the year, there will be a new ventilation system and flood control to keep it dry when it rains hard (which is good, because even when you paint those walls, it keeps the smell down only for a few days). Keep in mind that there are many different types of "cue sports" and each one has its own set of balls, rules, and regulations. Many studies have also shown that certain colors tend to elicit certain moods or states of mind. Delving deeper into the relationship between colors and the human psyche, what is billiards one can recognize that felt color not only influences gameplay but also the mood and atmosphere of the room.

This is mostly an issue with dark colors like black, charcoal, burgundy, and navy blue. He mixed nitrocellulose with alcohol and a waxy resin called camphor, and molded it into a ball that looked and felt a lot like ivory. Ray has taken a lot of crap over the past week. Ask McCullough about the news that Melrose Billiards is closing in September, and he’ll say, reflexively, that "it’s the end of an era." And to a certain extent, that’s true; Jim and Jerry Chandler took over the place in 1969, and for the next 41 years, it was largely unchanged. Since its inception over a century ago, the magnificent massé has dazzled pool pros and onlookers alike. As you can see there are various ways you can scratch while playing pool and each one has its ownset of rulesand penalties assigned to it. "My assumption is that some people are going to see me as the bad guy no matter what. Vents run the length of the space, whose decor might be categorized as "late-era Cold War bomb shelter chic." They might be bringing in cool air, but they sure aren’t taking anything out - after 15 minutes I already know I’m going to have to wash or burn my clothes as soon as I get home.