Tom's Ball Smells Like Apple Pie
by Scott Hardie on August 23, 2014
For the last four months, I've spent Tuesdays at a bowling alley playing in a just-for-fun league. Score was kept, but the mood was friendly and non-competitive, except for one of my teammates who kept competing with us instead of the other teams. :-)
I struggled with it at first, partly because I thought I was signing up for a six-week league and it turned out to be a sixTEEN-week league, and partly because my skills had somehow diminished even though I'm in better shape now. I used to be a halfway decent bowler, earning 120-150 points per game, but in this league I was averaging 70-90 points per game and throwing a lot of gutterballs. It took me a month to make peace with the fact that I was just a worse bowler now, at which point I relaxed and started having more fun with it, although I did eventually get back up to my usual scores in the last few games. Instead of focusing on the points, I set a more modest goal of throwing at least one strike per night, which I managed to pull off every time. My best night saw maybe six strikes. At no point did anyone else in the league approach Chris's level; I think the highest score that I saw was around 245.
It was good to spend time with these guys. It started as a "work league" with two friends from my company, Joandy and Tom, plus Tom's partner Mark as our fourth player. Tom is a more serious bowler who I can tell has played for many years (he's the one who earned that 245 score), while Joandy is a competitive joker who can't help but kid everyone about their scores (and himself on the rare nights when he bowls badly), and Mark is a relaxed and friendly presence. Injuries and a pre-existing condition took a toll on Mark over the season, so Kelly took Mark's place on the team for the final month and was thrilled to get out and get exercise. She would have kept playing with Joandy and Tom in the fall league, but she's going to be busy working overtime. As for me, I'm opting out of future seasons to spend my Tuesdays on long-ignored projects, including a board-game meetup group that I really miss, since I haven't seen them since before the wedding. I had a good time bowling, though, and I'm glad that I did this.
The title of this blog post was my proposed (and rightly rejected) name for the team, which was said aloud on the first night. When Tom originally bought a bowling ball at the pro shop, they offered to make it a scented ball, and for whatever reason, he chose apple pie over other scents. We had fun trying to get Kelly to sniff his ball the first time she played: "No way! I know how guys do that! His ball stinks like sweat or something, and you're telling me that it smells like apple pie so that I'll put my face up to it and sniff, and then you'll laugh at me!" No, really: As creepy as it sounds, Tom's ball really does smell like apple pie.
Logical Operator
The creator of Funeratic, Scott Hardie, blogs about running this site, losing weight, and other passions including his wife Kelly, his friends, movies, gaming, and Florida. Read more »
Unmitigated Gall
Life gets unpleasant quickly when your gallbladder stops working. TMI alert. I spent all day Friday with sharp pain in my abdomen, diagnosed as spasms from my gallbladder trying to expel a stone. Go »WLW: Can't
"Can't" is a word that fat people tell ourselves a lot after so many failed diets: We can't lose the weight, we can't succeed. Hearing it from a doctor would seem inconsequential. But it still hurts. Go »She Can Really Whip a Donkey's Ass with a Belt
I hate the Black-Eyed Peas. You hate the Black-Eyed Peas. But Alanis Morissette really hates the Black-Eyed Peas. Go »Comeback
Kelly shared this news with me: Boomerang returns, even in space. I'm still waiting for scientists to announce, 'Boomerang' Starring Eddie Murphy Still Sucks, Even in Space. Go »WGW: If It's Good Enough for Dan Marino, It's Good Enough for Me
This is more like Weight-Gain Wednesday after a week and a half with Kelly, bouncing around Sarasota restaurants and Disney World. No matter how many thousands of calories I burned walking around that theme park for three days, I'm sure I consumed twice as many, and that was just in fudge from the Main Street Confectionery. Now that I'm back and I've done some very scientific research – asking a friend whether she hated one – I have chosen NutriSystem over Medifast as the exclusive supplier of my every meal. Go »
