They're baa-aack...
The weather outside was nasty, so Norman and Wesley, geocaching buddies extraordinaire, wimped out of going on a caching expedition. But Norman had another idea. “How about we go bowling? Loser buys the pizza.” Wesley agreed that sounded like fun, so they jumped into Norman’s truck and headed off to engage in a bit of (more or less) friendly competition.
The guys having selected balls and laced on rental shoes, Wesley glanced about the otherwise deserted alley a bit nervously and offered, “You go first.” Norman’s eyes narrowed a bit, and the corner of his mouth twitched as he picked up his ball and focused down the gleaming lane. He proceeded to launch two consecutive balls straight into the gutter.
“Easy enough!” said Wesley, who promptly did the same thing.
Norman guffawed, “You’ve never bowled, have you?! Wesley clenched his jaw, realizing he’d been set up, and well at that. “Sorry, buddy,” Norman apologized, trying (somewhat) to suppress his mirth. “Come on, it’s not that hard. You just try to knock down as many pins as you can and NOT end up in the gutter – like this!” His next two throws cleared all ten pins.
“Oh,” mumbled Wesley, and he landed two more in the gutter. Norman, barely in control of his laughter, figured it was only fair if he explained why there were holes in the ball, then took out three pins and finished the frame with another spare.
“Oh,” mumbled Wesley. His next ball teetered at the edge of the gutter, then veered at the last moment, knocking down three pins. “Got it,” he said determinedly, before taking down the five on the other side.
“You’re on the board,” grinned Norman, giving his best buddy a high five.
Much to Norman’s surprise, Wesley matched his 6/4 spare in the next frame, and when his 4/4 was bested in the 5th by Wesley’s 5/5 spare, he started to worry just a bit. His next time up, he left a 7-10 split on his first ball, but swaggered a bit and pretended like it was pure finesse instead of dumb luck when both pins fell due to a weird bounce on his second throw. Wesley countered by having only one wobbly pin still standing on his first try in the 6th, which he then managed to topple with another of his “almost in the gutter” balls to finish that frame. When Wesley one-upped his 7/1 in the next frame with a 5/4, Norman started to sweat.
Then things got really interesting. Norman bowled a picture perfect strike. “Oh!” exclaimed Wesley. “I didn’t know you were allowed to get them all at the same time." Norman rolled his eyes, and Wesley rolled the ball – and took out all ten pins. And then they both did it again. Norman’s wasn’t feeling the least bit confident about his lead by this point but figured it was too late to try to tweak the score a bit when Wesley wasn’t looking…
Drying his hands carefully, Norman hefted his ball to begin his last frame, and taking a deep breath, blasted it down the lane. Much to his horror, the 4, 7, and 10 pins were left standing, and he was quite sure he’d already used up his day’s quota of “luck” back in the 6th frame. Thinking he couldn’t do it was definitely his downfall, and when the dust settled, the ten pin still stood taunting him. Wesley didn’t taunt – outwardly - but he was grinning from ear to ear as he stood for his turn. He wasn’t grinning quite so broadly when he saw only four pins fall, but he made good on a spare, then to Norman’s chagrin, asked about that other little box on the scorecard. Norman grudgingly explained about last frame scoring, and Wesley, totally delighted, promptly finished the day with yet another strike.
So, who won? Guess you’ll have to figure that out if you really want to know, but I will tell you to keep your eye out for Wesley the next time you go bowling. He’s turned into quite an alley cat, I hear…
You can check your score here if you'd like.
Cache with confidence, as this is placed with PO permission.