Convention Crashing: International Billiard Home & Recreation Expo

Monday, June 25, 2007 | 7:17 a.m.

Perhaps, like many Americans, you have a mate.

If so, life is good, yes, but it is not complete, for you do not have a pool table.

Perhaps, seeking to reduce the world's ills by some small measure, you say to your mate, "Mate, how about a pool table?"

And then your mate says that you can either have a pool table or a dinning room table, and says it in a tone of voice that heavily implies this is not a choice so much as a very easy intelligence test.

What to do, what to do?

If you were at the International Billiard & Home Recreation Expo on Friday at the Sands Expo, you could be pretty sure that you wouldn't be getting a Brunswick Gold Crown V, a sleek job of nickel-trimmed mahogany, a design that exudes cool like a '59 Cadillac, a table that surely awaits in the great juke joint in the sky.

But it's big. And it costs $9,599, retail. This is the wrong answer on the intelligence test.

Well, there's always thinking outside of the house.

For between $3,000 and $5,000, retail, you can get one made by Gameroom Concepts of Longwood, Fla. Both the welded, powder-coated aluminum frame and the acrylic fabric can withstand snow and high temperatures. Just hose off to clean.

So why not an outdoor pool table?

Well, the neighbors probably wouldn't be thrilled if you decided to work off your insomnia by practicing caroms at midnight. Also, there's a small but not to be ignored chance that it might not be regarded as a handsome back yard addition by certain interested parties.

But what if the dining room table was the pool table?

The problem is, usually when people try to do this, it looks a board laid on top of a pool table. Some quarters do not regard this as stylish.

Then there's the new line of Fusion tables from Saluc. The table bed, with the covering on top, is only 4 inches deep, and you can't see the pockets because they're elastic nylon that hold flat without balls in them. With the top on, it stands 30 inches high and is indistinguishable from a regular table. With its mix of wood and metal, the whole thing looks square, sleek and Swedish. (Close: Dutch.)

But, pop the three-panel top off, and you'll find a full-size pool table underneath, with balls, cues and triangle stored on top. Moreover, you can raise the table to a 33-inches playing height by lifting its ends and letting the legs extend (this is easier than it should be with a 550-pound table, thanks to spring assists in the legs).

It's a dining room table and a pool table. It's yin and yang. It even looks good. It's perfect, it's, it's between $4,999 and $6,599, salesman Philippe Durieux says.

"I would like to have one, too," Durieux says. "Someday."