USBC Open in Reno

I meant to blog during my trip to Reno, but the time I ended up spending on line was mostly spent cleaning up work e-mails. I'm sitting at the gate awaiting my flight to Salt Lake City en route to Minneapolis/St. Paul.

So I'll keep it short. My bowling sucked mostly, save for a decent stretch in the team event from frame 4 in the first game to frame 8 in the third game. I shot a respectable (for me) 581, after starting with 32 after the third, and then finishing the 9th and 10th in game 3 with back-to-back 4-10 splits. Ruined a possible 600-620 series with those dang splits.

The bright spot was our team rolled 2919, which will probably get us about $100 back. The dark spots were plentiful. My final tally: 581, 482 in doubles(my first 400 in ages, but my partner only shot 500, so I don't feel too guilty), and 512 in singles. I totalled 1575 for the nine games, for a 175 average.

Something to improve upon for next year, I guess.

No excuses. Carry could have been better today, but that's not what did me in. I didn't make shots, and was poor on some easy spares. So I will go on record as saying I absolutely must commit myself to three things:

1) Spare shooting
2) Consistency in my strike ball
3) Committing to the shot

There was a decent enough shot on the lanes, but the mistake I made over and over again throughout the weekend was being afraid of getting the ball out too far and thus having it not come back. So I went through the nose time and again. When I didn't leave splits, my spare shooting was poor as well.

So that's the trip report in short. I'm more upset at myself than humbled. I KNEW I was only a house bowler going into this, but I performed very poorly even taking that in consideration.

Good thing I get 100 free games of bowling for joining my sport shot summer league. I hope I take the time to use them, and use them wisely.

Bin Laden Dead

I just updated my Facebook page status with the below story, trimmed to the maximum 420 characters. Here's what I originally tried to post:

Just a few short days ago, in a motel in Tomah, WI, my young boys saw some military men, probably visiting from nearby Fort McCoy.

"Who are they?" one asked.

"They keep us free from the bad guys," I said.

"Like the police?"

"Yeah, sort of."

"But who are the bad guys?" he followed with a look of concern.

They still won't quite understand, but tonight's news has allowed me to explain just a little bit more what those men (and women) do for us, and perhaps help my boys sleep a little easier tonight.

Reunion Tours

In a post entitled Time Passage, I talked about the phenomenon of time passing faster the older you get. A perfect example came up when I found out the Monkees are reuniting for a tour this year, as well as Deborah Gibson and Tiffany.

It was 25 years ago when I saw the Monkees on their reunion tour at the old Carlton Celebrity Room in Bloomington, Minnesota. A whopping 18 years after their TV show was canceled, I was a 20-year-old marveling at how long it had been since I had seen the show on re-runs (a whole 9 years or so!), and getting a kick out of me seeing them and others (Herman's Hermits and Gary Puckett included) play the moldy oldies.

Now, some 23-ish years since Deborah and Tiffany were staples on pop radio, it seems like nothing. And they still seem young. Crazy.

I look at photos of the Monkees (again without Michael Nesmith, who perhaps doesn't need the money as much), like the one here, and can't believe how old they are. Peter Tork looks every bit of his 69 years, although I'm sure I thought he looked an ancient 44 back in '86. Hell, I'm 44, turning 45 in three days!

I'm sure 25-years from now, I'll marvel at how quickly time has flown again, and Deborah Gibson, in her mid-sixties, will still be that kid who just can't shake my love.

What Are They Teaching Them?

Tonight my wife and I took our five-year-old to his kindergarten school's open house. He was very excited to see what a "big kid" school looked like. Everything looked tiny to me (classrooms, gymnasium, cafeteria, etc.), but to a child of five, it must have looked larger than life.

There was a lot of artwork on display as we toured the hallways. We saw students' pictures of the Titanic, Japanese culture, and more. One of the first class projects we saw on display was skyscrapers. Accompanying the childrens' pictures were factual tidbits.

One student's drawing was of the Eiffel Tower. According to the student, the Eiffel Tower was completed in 1889, is 1063 feet tall, and is the largest man-made structure in the world.

"Is?," I asked myself. Um, teacher?

Perhaps they just need to update the encyclopedias in the "big kid" library.

Four Times Better Than a PGA Tour Pro

In the Valero Texas Open PGA Tour event today, Kevin Na took a 16 on the par-4 ninth hole. The company I work for had its national sales meeting at the JW Marriott in San Antonio, where the TPC Courses are located. One "networking" activity was a golf scramble, during which I played the same TPC San Antonio course Na and the rest of the tour pros are playing this week.

I don't remember much about hole 9, but I do know my scramble team started on hole 7 and we were even par through several holes. So we parred hole 9, and I think we may have even used all of my shots, at least up until the par putt.

So at the very worst, I can say I would have scored no worse than a bogey 5. Of course, we played tees some 50 yards closer, but still...

To Na's credit, except for that hole, he was -4 for his round, which, had he parred the ninth, would have left him one stroke behind the leaders on the difficult new Greg Norman design.

I remember a couple similar rounds I've had in the past, although both were only 9-hole rounds. Once in Carroll, Iowa, I shot 42 on the par-35 front nine, which included an 11 on the par 4 fifth hole. It was a horribly windy day, and I managed to play -1 for the other eight holes.

Similarly, in a work league a few years ago, I took a 12 on the par 4 sixth en route to something like a 43 on the par-35 front nine at Southern Hills in Farmington, Minnesota. I was either even or one over for the other holes, and it too was a windy day.

I only bring up those memories to remind myself how much better Na handled his 16 today. If you haven't seen it on the sports highlight shows, here's a hint: Much better than I. (And I didn't handle them well.)

Bowling Chick Flick?

For the last five years or so, I've wanted to write a screen play. I have yet to start it, but my idea is around a junior bowler, and it is not a comedy. I know, how boring. And geeky.

Geeky is good...see Star Wars, for one. But the junior bowling geek niche might not be quite strong enough to make up for the potential lack of appeal to the general populous.

That's OK, though, because a good story with characters you care about can be about Tiddly Winks and still be successful.

Now, I hear about this movie in production, entitled Split, and am concerned that someone might be beating me to the punch, even though it is a romantic comedy. Then again, perhaps it will be the start of a new genre of bowling-themed movies, and thereby create a demand for my masterpiece.

At the very least, I hope it's done well enough to represent the sport and its enthusiasts well. Regardless of whether it does either, I can just about guarantee it will feature, at some point in the movie, a bowler getting a Brooklyn strike, and acting like he meant to do it.

As I've written before, I can tolerate bowling movies where the actors are clearly poor bowlers, but Brooklyn strikes shown as the norm? I hate when that happens!

(P.S. After writing the above and then Googling to find a hyperlink to information on the movie, I found an informational trailer, which showed part of the in-progress production. Sure enough, it shows a bowler throwing a Brooklyn strike, not even a solid one at that, and then acting cocky afterward. Arggh!)

Van Hallen?

There was a friendly debate happening on a friend's Facebook wall, on whether certain bands/artists belong in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. I won't bore you with all the details. I just wanted to post a comment which I typed up, then decided not to submit. I'd hate for no one to ever see what I had to say on the subject.

Although, by posting it here, I'm almost guaranteeing it.

Anyway, one guy was making the case that Van Halen is not Hall-worthy. Here is how I almost responded (typos included):

"On whether they advanced any cause of music...yeah, probably not. :) But they were very influencial as well as popular. One needs not like that which was influenced...see Grandmaster Flash, after all. While Eddie VH was no Hendrix, he influenced a heck of a lot of other guitarists. And as one who went to high school after Xeppelin but before Def Leppard, VH was teh rock band that filled the gap. Yes, they are no Zepp (nor is DL in the same league as VH). But should such popularity and influence not suffice? Maybe if Roth never left. But they sure made a lot of teen boys learn how to finger tap scales on a cheap Squire guitar. :) Perhaps Eddie should get in alone."