Bowling vs NaNoWriMo
Tomorrow on the start of NaNoWriMo, I will bowl in my Tuesday Night League. Although scoring well will be challenging, I will find it less so than writing 1666+ words a day for 30 days to win the writing challenge. I have bowled well before. I have never participated in NaNoWriMo so I am less confident.
But let’s talk challenging bowling. I have bowled regularly for over 46 years. My first time bowling was an extracurricular high school bowling league. I bowled one match before suffering a shoulder separation while playing intramural football. So went my high school bowling career. This was 1961.
Fast forward to 1970 in Wahiawa, Hawaii. The department participated in the command intramural sports program. The only sport that did not conflict with my work schedule was bowling. I became part of the team.
Lanes At NCS, Wahiawa
The bowling alley had four wood lanes. There were sliding windows on each side of the building at lane height. The windows allowed a breeze to blow through the building directly across the lanes. Did I mention it rains a lot in Wahiawa? Some days a warm breeze blew over the lanes, other days a warm moist breeze blew. Sometimes, the management opened the windows part way which mean only part of the lane received the breeze.
Ancient Lane Maintenance
Lanes were dressed with bowling alley oil using a hand sprayer. The sprayer resembled an old fashion pump bug sprayer filled with dressing oil. There were two processes for dressing lanes. Both involve the lane man walking down the lane pumping the sprayer to leave a coating of oil. The lane man then took a cloth mop as wide as the lane and drug the lane. The primary difference in processes was the direction the lane man walked as he delivered the oil and the way he drug the lane. Some drug the lane from pin deck to foul line and some from foul line to pin deck. Some lane men became proficient at providing the same condition week after week. Others were less proficient, making bowling more challenging to say the least.
Modern lanes and equipment
I will bowl tomorrow night’s on climate controlled lanes dressed by a modern lane dressing machine. The machine will put down modern lane dressing oil formulated for the modern lane surface material. Modern bowling balls have scientifically designed ball cores matched to formulated cover stocks.
I will use my high tech, scientifically engineered ball precisely drilled to fit my unique hand configuration with a layout to ensure I can score on these modern lanes with modern oils. The major variable is me. That is still the draw for me. No matter how good the equipment or the lanes, it is up to me whether I perform my best or do not. Wish me luck bowling. While you are in good humor, wish me luck with writing a 50k novel in 30 days.
Are you participating in NaNoWriMo? Are you a bowler? I would love to hear from you on either topic. Use the comment form to share. Click the follow button to learn me as I journey through the Fall of My Life.
Writing has kind of changed over the years, as well. I mean, it will be easier to write 1666 words a day if you use a computer/word processor rather than pen and paper that we had back then. Your hand would ache something terrible by the end of the week if you were to write that much longhand.
You are correct. My fingers sometimes cramps when I type for a long time. I have arthritis in both hands. Fortunately, it doesn’t bother me to bowl but trying to open a jar can be very painful. I bear the pain rather than take pills. They are for future years like when I am 75 in a few years.
I would never make it with pen/pencil and paper.