[Shrek] The Unlikely Champions

Earlier this summer I wrote about Fiona's and my first night of the summer bowling league. My plan, although I don't recall if I mentioned it as I was at the time more annoyed with Curt Schilling's sudden loss of testicular fortitude, was to simply stay loose over the summer and to enjoy the company of friends.

I figured we'd be good enough to finish no worse than the middle of the pack, and could hopefully play spoiler for the two teams I thought would be in the running to win the league. Nothing that happened the first couple weeks really changed my thinking, and we were all generally having fun.

Week three changed things.

I had promised Fiona we could go to the free Tornadoes exhibition game, and that game fell on a league night. So the day before the game Fiona and I rolled off ("pre-bowled" for all you ten-pinners), with both of us rolling a little over our averages. Josie and Rich then had to face our (at that point) unknown opponents. It turns out we bowled "the old lady" team that week, who decided they were going to "coach" Josie to make her a better bowler. Rich was able to get her to ignore them, and the two of them with our roll off scores absolutely shellacked the old ladies 8-0.

Rich and I exchanged a few e-mails about what happened, and when we all met up the next Tuesday Josie was still irked. And she took it out against the ghost team, helping us beat the invisible foes 8-0.

From that point on we were in first place, and spent every week after running away from the pack. We actually had a chance to lock in first place in week 14, but the teams chasing us didn't co-operate, but we still clinched first in week 16 as the teams behind us made one last futile push.

That made last night a "victory lap". The girls both had great nights, Rich kind of tossed the ball down the alley getting his boxes over, and I had a couple lobs that made me look like a slo-pitch softball pitcher. Along the way we had a lot of laughs, and for the only time this season, got skunked. Not that it mattered. The beer flowed freely, the pizza tasted great, and the fact how we bowled didn't matter made for a great evening.

I finished with the 2nd high average in the league (a book keeping error had me tied with someone else for 2nd, but it would have been too much effort to fix it so we let it stand), and Rich also got an individual prize.

Josie started week one with a 44 average. She ended the season at over 65. I have never seen anyone improve 20 pins in one season, even those like Josie that had never bowled in a league before.

Fiona ended up a little over her normal 66, and despite saying every week she hated the game, had a good time.

Together we made for some very unlikely champions.