Rant: Need More Pool

I can't stop thinking about pool. Not the type in which one swims (though they are dandy too).

7-Ball, 8-Ball, 9-Ball: I want it all. I find myself thinking about different shots after I play them, thinking about shots I watched other people play.

It could possibly be the best mixture of strategy, logic, and chance. Now, I know the physicist in me wants to say there should be no chance involved. But with unlimited variables (weight and shape of the balls, friction coefficient of the felt, levelness of the table, quality of the cue, amount of chalk applied etc.), chance does play an acknowledgeable role in the game.

Now that I've proclaimed my love, I have 2 confessions to make:

1. I own my own pool cue and am very hesitant to use it. I feel like a real "tool" taking my own stick into a bar (even if they do have 6 tables). There is also a part of me that is afraid that I'm not good enough to have my own cue. Is that bizarre or what?

2. My thoughts about pool have exceeded the limitations of the table. I think about how things would bounce off each other constantly now, though mostly still in two dimensions. For example, when a car in front of me nearly rear-ended the one in front of him I couldn't help but to wonder how those straight line vectors would affect the "object balls" nearby. If he hit him while breaking would the victim car keep going while the hitter would stop? (In pool, this is known as a stop shot, kill shot, or dead-ball.) Oh, I was worried about actually being involved in the accident too.

Thanks for listening to me rant. Anyone have some quarters?