Bowlarama, or Bumpers are Evil

So as I may have mentioned a few days ago, Friday was Miss Maya Chicken's birthday. Well, since having a birthday party on the actual birthday is apparently not possible (well, not when you're having it somewhere other than the house and don't figure out where that will be until 3 weeks before the party...) we had the party on Sunday. At the Lynnwood Bowl and Skate.

9 6- and 7-year-old girls, several parents, pizza, cupcakes, and roller skates. So naturally I did what any good father would do, took my son and his friend bowling. 'cause hey, it's a bowl and skate.

Now back in the day I did my share of bowling (not in Lynnwood...at the mighty Sun Villa Lanes in Bellevue). And back in the day if you didn't roll the ball down the middle of the lane it went in this thing called a "gutter". Hence the term "gutter ball". As a result, many of my bowling games had scores in the teens.

Well, now they've got these new-fangled things called "Bumpers". Which is another way of saying "cheater rail that keeps the ball out of the gutter". Which is another way of saying "my 10 year old can beat my ass at bowling because he has no risk of missing with his first ball."

That said, it was fun. Especially when Logan and his friend Kyle decided to see who could roll the ball the slowest (another great technical marvel: radar guns on the bowling alley). That record was set by Kyle, who rolled an impressive 1.6 mph ball. And, thanks to the bumpers, scored a 7.

Anyhow, after the skating was over Paige and Miss Maya joined us on the lanes and they all proceeded to kick my ass. And no, I didn't record the final scores. But I think it was something like 101 for Logan, 95 for Maya, 93 for Paige and a whopping 85 for me.

Next time, no bumpers!