Billy Banks here. Chief Torpedoman, U.S. Navy, retired. I went into submarines in 1956 at nineteen years old and came out in 1978 with a chief's hat, two bad knees and a cribbage habit I have never once tried to quit. The first half of that was diesel boats and the second half was nukes. I won't tell you which boats. It doesn't matter for cribbage, and some of it still isn't anybody's business.

What matters is this. On a submarine there's no room for anything, and no daylight, and nowhere to go, and you're with the same hundred-odd men for months. There's a table in the crew's mess and a deck of cards and a board, and cribbage is the boat's game. Always has been. A cribbage board takes up less room than a sandwich and a game takes about twenty minutes, which is how long you've got between whatever you just did and whatever they want you to do next. I learned it my first week aboard my first boat, from a first class torpedoman who beat me eleven straight games and then told me I was hopeless. Took me two months to beat him once. I've been chasing that feeling for forty-three years.

After the Navy I worked nineteen years at the shipyard here in Bremerton, and now I'm retired from that too. My wife Joanne says I'm the only man she knows who retired twice and still can't sit still. I make boards in the garage, I play Thursdays at the VFW, and my grandson put me on the Internet. Here's what I know about the game.

After the pegging, every player counts the four cards in his hand, plus the starter card that got cut and turned up on the deck. The dealer counts his hand and then his crib. Here is everything that scores, and you count it in this order, out loud, every time, because that's how you keep from missing things:

One more, which isn't part of the hand: if the starter card that gets turned up is a jack, the dealer pegs 2 right then. That's "two for his heels."

Here's a hand counted the way you'd count it at the table:

At the table you'd just say "fifteen-two, four, six, eight, and a pair is ten, and a double run of three is sixteen, and his nobs is seventeen." Say it fast enough and it sounds like one word. That's how you know a man's been playing a while.

Those two runs of three are what we call a double run: whenever you've got a pair inside a run, you count the run twice, plus the pair, and a double run of three is 8 all by itself. Learn these by heart, they come up all night:

That's before any fifteens. A double double run like 7-7-8-8-9 has four fifteens in it too, 7 and 8 four different ways, so it's 24 altogether, and you will see it about twice a year.

The best hand in cribbage is 29, and there is exactly one kind of hand that makes it: three fives and the jack of the fourth suit in your hand, and the fourth five turned up as the starter, the one that matches your jack.

I have held one 29 in my life. March of 1968, on patrol, in the crew's mess, about two in the morning. The jack of spades was in my hand with three fives, and the starter came up the five of spades, and I sat there and didn't say anything for a while because I thought I was dreaming. The cook came out to see what everybody was yelling about. Seven men signed the back of that jack of spades and I still have it, in a picture frame, in the den. Joanne says it's the only thing in the house I'd run back in for. That's not true. I'd also get her.

Now, the 19. You can't make 19 with a hand. You can't make 25, 26 or 27 either, but nobody talks about those. So when a man looks at his cards and there's nothing there, not one point, he says "nineteen." It's a joke. It's the oldest joke in the game, and you'll hear it every Thursday at the VFW, usually from me. Here's a nineteen:

Muggins. If a man counts his hand and misses points, and you catch it, you call "muggins!" and take the points he missed for yourself. Some people play it and some don't. At the VFW on Thursday nights we don't, because half of us can't see the cards that well anymore and it isn't sporting. In the monthly tournament we do, so count careful. On the boat we always did. Nothing teaches you to count a hand right like losing three points to a machinist's mate who's laughing at you.

The skunk. A game is 121 points, twice around a standard board and into the last hole. If you win and the other fellow hasn't gotten past 90, he's been skunked, and it counts as two games. Most boards have a line or a mark between 90 and 91 for this. That's the skunk line.

The double skunk. If he hasn't gotten past 60, it's a double skunk. Some count it as three games and some count it as four. At our Post it's three. Either way you don't hear the end of it.

1. Know whose crib it is before you throw. If it's your crib, you want good cards in it. If it's his, you want garbage in it. Everything else follows from that.
2. Never give a five to the other man's crib. There are sixteen ten-cards in the deck. A five in his crib is two points sitting there waiting for any one of them. Give it to your own crib any time.
3. In his crib, throw wide. A king and a two. A queen and an ace. Cards that are a long way apart and don't add to anything. Don't throw him a pair. Don't throw him two cards in a row.
4. In your own crib, throw close. Pairs, fives, cards that touch, like a seven and an eight.
5. Don't lead a five. If you lead a five and he's got a ten-card, that's fifteen-two for him. Lead a four or lower. Nobody can make fifteen off a four with one card.
6. Watch the count at 21. If you make it 21, a ten-card makes it 31 for two. Same with leaving it at five.
7. Keep your hand together. When you're deciding what to keep, keep the cards that already score together, and think about what the starter might do for you. A 5 and two ten-cards are four points before the starter's even turned.
8. Count the board, not just your hand. Late in the game, remember who counts first. The man who didn't deal counts his hand before the dealer does. So if he's sitting a few holes from the finish and you're dealing, you'd better do your damage in the pegging, because you may never get to count.