How You Dress.

According to the vaunted Wikipedia, bowling is the most popular participation sport in the U.S., with more than 43 million people going bowling at least once yearly. Bowling is popular because it has to be the easiest sport ever invented. Plus it doesn’t break the bank. More about the former later. If you’re serious about this “activity,” you might invest a couple hundred bucks for a ball and shoes. Otherwise, you just rent some “house” shoes and a “house” ball. Notoriously the worst dressed people (while they’re bowling) on the planet, amateur bowlers don’t have to invest in special attire or style. In fact, they do just the opposite. Just throw on whatever you ordinarily wear to pressure wash the deck. Then definitely find some ugly shoes. Bowling alleys are relatively clean places; but beer, chicken wings, pizza and other similar delicacies have a way of sullying decent apparel. Professional bowlers do wear special clothing — brilliantly colored microfiber shirts that resemble the skin of Nascar autos decorated with at least a dozen sponsor logos. Despite being easier than curling and croquet, bowling curiously makes it on nationwide television. Recently, the world’s best competed in a round robin PBA World Series before a thunderous crowd of, say, at least 50-75 family members and close friends. Staged in what appeared to be a spiffy looking warehouse, this is the sport’s premier event, mind you. Eight professionals seemed almost as bored with the proceedings as did the audience who clapped politely when they weren’t snacking or staring at TV monitors. By comparison, televised bass fishing is electrifying. To be fair, what ostensibly “captivates” a typical television audience is the expectation of witnessing a perfect game. Every bowler — pro or amateur — wants to roll a perfect game. PBA televised events pay $10K for this rare achievement — so rare, in fact, that last year a mere 42,163 perfect games were recorded in the US. You can go to any Podunk bowling center in America and see the names of dozens of 300 rollers. They come in all ages, sizes and shapes. You can see them in League play. The game is simple. You play it on an “alley” 60′ long from the foul line to the head pin (that’s the pin in the middle, closest to you). The alley is 42″ wide. The pins (10 of them) are 15″ tall, arranged in a reverse triangle that puts them 12″ apart, each from the other. You take an 8.5″ diameter ball and roll it toward the head pin (the nearest pin). Children can do it. Recently, a 15 year old boy in the Junior Division rolled a perfect game on national TV. He received a $1000 scholarship. What generosity. Senior bowlers — grandmas and grandpas — most disabled by age to some degree — descend on alleys all over America, regularly bowling 200+ games, some flirting with perfect games. The “sport” is so easy, the perfect game has lost its luster. You can witness the apathy for yourself. Someone two lanes over may have nine strikes in a row — just three short of perfection — while others in the building pay scant attention and certainly don’t gather round. If it does happen, you have handshakes, high fives and an announcement over the PA system. Then it’s on to the next game. The good news is — bowling is lots of fun for family and friends who can socialize for a couple of hours, have some laughs and get in a little exercise — on the cheap. The bad news? As a professional sport, the game is dull as dirt. The organizing bodies better come up with some way to make the game more difficult —  to add challenge — to add personality, danger or some other unexpected element. The Nascar audience would drop precipitously were it not for the danger — the possibility of massive pile-ups, cars cart-wheeling down the track, cars on fire, a driver shoving a rival into the wall and drivers punching each other after the smoke clears. Of course, Nascar is trying its best to ruin the sport by over regulating gratuitous violence. They, like the NFL, are trying to do to Nascar what Bowling has already managed to achieve. As social recreation, bowling is alive and well and will remain so. Anyone can do it; and with very little practice, can do it relatively well. Ultimately, you can eat and exercise simultaneously. And nobody — but nobody — cares how you dress.

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