Imagine the shock and surprise when we read your article, "These Romeos Are Definitely a Special Group," in the March 25 Pilot. Our first reaction: "They have stolen our name and pride." Let's take our 80-year-olds over and beat up on their 70- and 80-year-olds. Calmer heads prevailed, and we realized it was only our pride that was damaged.

We assumed that everyone in Moore County knew about us. To set the record straight, Carl Lemle, Ernie Miller, Bob Kendall and Paul Parks started our Romeo Breakfast Club in the early '90s. I, along with several others, were voted into this prestigious group soon after.

The first few weeks it was just a breakfast club. Then, Dave Kinney's daughter-in-law in Ohio suggested we adopt the name "Romeos." Apparently, an older group in her church had a Romeo Breakfast Club.

We now have eight to 12 Romeos who meet each Tuesday morning at a local "gourmet" restaurant. The club has no purpose. We just eat breakfast and talk about unimportant things. We even have blue Romeo T-shirts. The fact that these shirts no longer fit is also unimportant. It should be noted that for the past few years our Friday golf group has also used the name Romeos at Seven Lakes Country Club.

You are correct that the name Romeo stands for "retired old men eating out." Some of our wives think it should mean "raunchy" instead of "retired." Also, you should know that there are Romeo clubs all over America, which we didn't know until we started investigating the name.

We just wanted to let The Pilot know that we were here first!

Hal Hudson

West End