We Bowl

No, not "Wii Bowl", but real live "we went bowling!" After church was done, we went out looking for adventure, and we found it. We settled on lunch at Ruby Tuesday, where everyone had something delicious to nibble on, and then we headed to the lanes at Scofield Barracks Bowling Center. We hadn't ever all gone bowling together, so we weren't sure how well the kids would hold up, especially since we were going there at naptime.

Turns out, the kids were great, and we all had a super time. Ben started out using a sort of sideways shotput kind of stance. I tried to even it out into the more traditional bowling approach with some tutorial work, and by the end, he was really doing great.

Nate stuck with the "throw it high in the air" theory, which made us all wince every time the ball would crack down onto the lane with a huge noise (even over the loud background cacophony) One side effect of his technique was that his throws had nice vertical loft, but very little forward momentum. At one point, we had to wait while the nice lady went down and brought it back for him to try again. Oops. After about 2 frames of that, we had him use the special ramp they have for kids. You just put your ball up top, line it up in the direction you want it to go, and then let go (or push it, if you're our kids)

Naomi opted to use the special ramp after the first frame, which speeded things up a lot. She had a great approach to the ball, sort of a kung-fu punch. Watch the movie to see for yourself!

Quinn and I were a bit rusty, but we had just as much fun as everyone else. I think we all laughed the whole time. Ben had been in charge of setting up our lane, part of which included naming all the players, and (apparently) letting the computer know if the rails should be left up or not. He somehow set it up that the "no gutter ball" rails were up for ALL of us, not just the kids. I'm brave enough to admit that it helped me with a shot or two. ;)

In the end, with all our different strategies for knocking over those little white pins, my persistance (and those handy rails) propelled me to a win over some of the fiercest competition I've ever faced!

Good times. :)