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To say I never enjoyed watching tennis would be inaccurate.

Prior to last summer, I had neither liked nor disliked watching tennis.

I had never done it, I had no intention of doing it, and, outside of the prospect of free beer, there was no way I was ever going to do it.

Oh, the siren call of Singha beer.

The temptation inherent in the offer of free beer left me unable to resist covering the Countrywide Classic last year.

Trust me, I realize the level of my degeneration. Most people attended because they wanted to see one of Andre Agassi’s last matches, or because they wanted to see high-level tennis in their own backyard.

I covered it because I got to drink bad (but free!) Thai beer. We all have our priorities.

But, whatever my intentions (and despite my near-constant drunken stupor), I was also able to develop an appreciation for that finest of fine country club sports.

I won’t say I’m a loud fan. I do not scream until I vomit at football games (as with some of my friends). I do not pogo up and down at basketball games.

But, as with most red-blooded Americans, I do, occasionally, get apoplectically angry when the players do not perform exactly as I feel they should, and at that point I cannot be held accountable for either my actions or my words. Sometimes I throw things. Sometimes I curse really loud, because nothing captures the true complexities of a moment more than an F-bomb. Sometimes I write columns about how much our fans suck.

It is the righteous anger of a man railing against the injustices of a world that will not allow his team to perform up to their perceived capabilities.

One can see how this might be a problem for tennis.

A combination of a mildly (oh-so-mildly) inebriated me, my ignorance of tennis, and my general ignorance of acceptable modes of behavior, left me in the unfortunate position of being the only one making any noise during a tennis match early on in the tournament last year.

I was shushed. Literally. A woman turned to me, put her forefinger up, knuckle to tip from lip to nose, and shushed me.

I was egregiously offended. The last time I was shushed was when I opened a cellophane bag of chips during a very nice speech by a very nice man in a lecture hall in high school that I can’t really remember the subject of because I really wanted to get to those chips, and those cellophane bags can be so difficult sometimes.

Shushed again? For dropping the merest of S-bombs?

My natural good sense kept me from engaging in a heated disagreement with her, and it was around then that a) sobriety began to kick in, and b) I noticed that everyone else in the place was quiet.

Tennis is a funny little sport. No one makes noise. All you hear is thwack-grunt, thwack-grunt, point Federer. Then light applause until the judge says, “Thanks,” and everyone politely stops.

It freaks me out.

But, after covering seven days of it last summer, I’ve come to a certain appreciation for it. Yes, some of it is the free beer talking, but mostly, it’s actually a halfway decent sport.

It was pretty great to see Agassi playing some of his last tennis; it was awesome to watch Dmitry Tursunov make an unexpected run to the final. It was fantastic to watch Andy Roddick throw his racket like a little girl who did not get the exact Barbie doll she wanted for Christmas.

Now, if you will excuse me, I have some rocks I need to steer the good ship David toward.