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November 13, 2006
Back to Baltimore (a minor theme on duck pin bowling)
Each year we gather at Silk's, a bar on the east side of Baltimore, to watch the Ephs of Williams college take on the Amherst Lord Jeffs in a contest of American football. The bar purchases the game via satellite TV. Alumni of both schools gather and pretend to get along. Our friends Emily and Christian are alums of Williams, as are Robbi and I. We all had a good time in college, and enjoy manifesting our pride for the alma mater by cheering lustily for bad things to happen to the Amherst team. Interceptions of the Amherst quarterback's passes, for example, are great. Tackles of the Amherst running back are also welcome, especially when a loss of yardage results. Any Amherst player may fumble the ball at any time, especially when a Williams player recovers the ball and runs it in for a touchdown. But I'm getting ahead of myself.
Emily's dad, George, is also a Williams alum. He is in charge of organizing the event for the Baltimore alumni association each year.
Here is George with Christian.
Emily's Uncle Art is part owner of Silk's. As such, he was present when we arrived, about 90 minutes before game time. We were there early to help set up. Art asked if we'd rake the leaves on the sidewalk outside the bar. Of course, we would do anything for Uncle Art.
We got to work.
Chris at one end of the sidwalk.
Robbi at the other.
Here are Christian, George, Uncle Art, and me.
And our female counterparts.
Our raking done, our photos taken, we went inside, sat at the bar, drank cokes, and waited for the game to begin. A few minutes before it started, our good friends Dahna and Sarah arrived from DC. Although another alumni gathering takes place down there, they were good enough to join our festivities. It seems they enjoy our company. And we theirs.
And so I took this group photo, to commemorate the festivities.
But was not satisfied to be left out.
The game began. A bit of background. The Williams/Amherst rivalry is really old. It's the 2nd oldest in college sports. Or something like that. Anyway, they first played in 1884. Williams leads the all-time series 67-48-5. The Ephs won in Williamstown last year, 34-23 and the Lord Jeffs won in Amherst in 2004, 13-10. The last time Williams won at Amherst came was 1998, 35-16.
There was a stretch of 13 years, I think, (during our time at Williams) in which Amherst never won a game against Williams. There was one notorious tie, the infamous "mud bowl," which was aired on ESPN. The conditions were so terrible that the game ended in a 0-0 draw. And ESPN hasn't come calling since.
The past 7-8 years, the home team has won each time. And today's game was to be played at Amherst. I was worried, in spite of our 7-0 record. In spite of their 5-2 record. In spite of their being a second-rate academic institution attended by the intellectually questionable and morally bankrupt.
The game began. We scored a quick touchdown. This was very good. Our good friend Lauren Singer arrived.
I hugged her immediately. I've learned from experience, if you want to hug Lauren, you'd better do it while you have the chance. She's a medical student and incredibly busy. We chatted for a while about a recent surgery she'd performed on a living pig. Apparently Hopkins is one of the few schools that maintains a "pig lab," in which real live pigs are anesthesized and operated upon by medical students. Better than practicing on a real live person, I suppose.
Anyway, I chatted with Lauren, catching up on the months since I've seen her. Still very interested in the progress of the game, I asked Dahna to let me know when something exciting was about to happen. Much to my chagrin, I kept learning about Williams' many touchdowns by a general roars of concurrent joy (from the Williams folks) and despair (from the Amherst people) instead of with my own two eyes. I chided Dahna. But try as I might to persuade her of the importance of letting me know BEFORE the big play happened, she seemd unable to predict the future.
The good news was that Williams was creaming Amherst. On Amherst's field.
Christian, who was watching the game attentively, was simply beside himself with joy.
Good things kept happening. There was little suspense after a while, the drubbing was so complete. But we tried to manufacture a sense of anticipation.
Just then, Emily noticed that Lauren was there and immediately hugged her. Like I said before, with Lauren it's catch as catch can.
After the game officially ended (it really was over about halftime), we drove a few blocks to the Patterson Bowling Center to see if we could parlay the Ephs' on-field successes into some luck on the lanes. We chose Patterson because of its proximity to Silk's, not because it is our preferred bowling venue. Our preferred bowling venue is in Timonium, because we like to say Timonium with a Baltimore accent. But Patterson Bowling Center is not favored because of the harassment we received at the hands of the ownershp/management last year. Apparently at Patterson it is not acceptable to leave "down wood" on tthe lanes between throws of the small heavy ball. For the uninitiated, I'll explain:
Patterson is a duckpin bowling place. A duck pin (apparetnly invented in Baltimore) is shaped like a regular bowling pin, but a lot smaller. One throws a small ball, about the size of a softball, at the pins. There are no holes in this ball. You hold the ball in your palm, which is pleasing, and roll it toward the pins. If you are lucky, you will hit a few. Duck pin bowing is much harder than big ball bowling on account of the balls being so small. To make up for this difficulty, you get to throw the balls three times each frame. A spare is only counted if you clear all ten pins with two throws. Sometimes knocked-over pins remain among the still-standing pins after a throw. In big ball bowling, a clever mechanized device lifts the still-standing pins up into the bowels of the bowling alley whlile a clever mechanized arm clears the knocked-over pins that remain. This is also supposed to happen in duck-pin bowling but often (perhaps due to the smallness of the pins) this doesn't happen, and knocked-over pins remain. It is extremely tempting to use them as a means to clear more of the still-standing pins on subsequent throws. In yet another type of bowling called candlepin, it is perfectly acceptable to use these knocked-over pins (called "dead wood") in such a manner. In duck pin bowling, apparently, this is unacceptable. And at Patterson Bowling Center, the management/ownership frowns mightily on this practice, apparently due to the tendency for minor chipping to occur when the knocked-over pins are violently struck. We know this because the ownership/management/fascists tore us a new piehole last year when we attempted to use the knocked-over pins/deadwood as a means to knock over more of the still-standing pins on subsequent throws. They spoke with harsh words and firm bile, in spite of our not knowing of the crime in advance. The cost of replacing a pin ($25) was referenced, and our imminent expulsion from Patterson Bowling Center were we to step out of line again made quite clear. We weighed these unpleasant memories when choosing to return to Patterson Bowling Center. Proximity ruled the day.
This year, we noticed an abundance of signage indicating that striking knocked-over pins was unacceptable. We were also informed by the management/ownership/surly/dour as we paid for our shoe rental of the severity of the crime. We behaved. But we were watched with the intensity of a celebrity stalker and felt uncomfortable throughout. We played but one game. And made our exit. And will not return to Patterson Bowling Center. Fun was had in spite.
We took no photographs of the bowling. We feared that taking pictures might result in personal injury. Ad the day was going so well...
After the bowling, we drove back to Christian and Emily's house to walk the dogs.
The dog's frisked and Dahna and Sarah shared a moment as the sun set.
After the walk, Dahna and Sarah said their farewells. They were expected at a swanky party that night. Christian, Emily, Robbi, and I drove to Emily's church for the annual Greek Festival. Greek food is quite tasty, and so the line was very long. At one point Robbi was struck in the head by a Greek prayer book that tumbled from the balcony above the waiting line. A Greek prayer book sale was in full swing, apparently. Some kind people in line in front of us shared some cheese pies.
It was quite pleasant, the waiting.
Eventually, we got to the front of the line. The food is prepared by real Greek women.
As a result, it was real Greek food.
Robbi had the lamb shank, which looked like something one might eat in Beowulf's mead hall after a long battle with Grendel. I had the moussaka. Oh, but it was good.
We capped it off with rice pudding. My favorite.
Greek food is not light. Basically, we got really full.
Somehow we found room for delicious deep-fried, honey-drenched, cinnamon-coated donut things.
They have a real Greek name, but I cannot now remember it. They are perhaps the most perfect thing that one could put in one's mouth. I lack the adjectives to do them justice.
And that was the day. We drove back to Chestertown and went to bed fulfilled. It's good to have friends. We are lucky to have so many.
Posted by bogenamp at November 13, 2006 01:39 AM