Now you have heard my many absurd stories on golfing. But what about bowling? Even with a bigger ball controlled by my hands (okay, get your mind out of the gutter!) does not guarantee success; it’s just more damage. I can shank and slice a bowling ball. Luckily there is a gutter to catch my runaway catapult projectiles.
In 1978 I took bowling as one of the 4 mandatory physical education courses in college. Why did I choose this sport? Because bowling alleys have bars. A nice cold beer to go along with your game is always required for intellectual stimulation. The problem is that at bowling alleys you can never find that perfect ball. You know the ones that your finger fit perfectly in and release when launching said catapult projectile. One day the only one I could find was pink, yes pink! I did well that day, 118 and 6 beers equals a score of 124. That’s how I handicap bowling. Besides you need the anesthesia qualities of beer when you smash the ball against lateral collateral ligament. Luckily I haven’t had an OMG (Oh My Groin) moment with bowling.
In 1978 I was heavy into weight lifting, so I and my best friend used those 8 pound bowling balls as shot put training. This is why I call my shots catapult projectiles. The goal was to see if you could launch the ball to the second markers in the lane, halfway to the pins and see how loud the pins exploding could get. But if you didn’t find the right ball, you would find yourself flying to the markers with your ball leading the way. Sometimes your shot would wind up in the gutter – on the lane next to you. This would get me a few dirty looks until they realized how tall and muscular I was. I’d look back at them with a Clint Eastwood smirk and squinted eyes and say, “I know what you are thinking, will this ball slip out and hit you in the groin? Ask yourself one question, do you have the balls? Well do you, punk?”
Other days we’d just get silly to see how high we could score by various new approaches including under the legs and around our backs. Some of the college girls we had in class were in tears with laughter and we scored a few dates with them. But our professor wasn’t so amused…until he joined us one day and shared a few brews. Soon, we thought, we had earned his respect. The semester ended and we looked at our grades. We both got a “B” in the course. Well that’s okay, because B is for Beer. The next semester we enrolled in weight lifting.
I haven’t been bowling in years. Besides the higher your score in bowling the better it is and you are limited to a maximum of 300. Maybe it’s time to give it another go. It can’t possibly suck as much at it as I do at golf. Can I?
