Bowling becomes fun again..

Bowling is a wonderful pastime.. sometimes. When it goes well, when you make your shots and get the rub of the lane, there's nothing like it. Watching the ball as it whistles down the pine boards, dangerously close to the gutter, before violently hooking into the pocket to send the pins crashing is an almost spiritual experience. But when it goes badly, it's awful. You miss easy spares, you can't read the lane, and even seemingly perfectly executed shots leave pins standing.

After spending a month in the doldrums, tonight saw some of the better side of bowling. Having not had so much as a sniff in the upper 180s, tonight saw my third best ever score - 216 - and during the game bowling seemed so easy. It made a kind of sense, as if it was somehow my purpose to knock down the pins. I'm hoping this will continue at least until Saturday, when I play 20 games against my biggest rival, Ben, at another alley in town.

Bowling is both the easiest and the hardest thing in the world.. you have to concentrate absolutely, and in the next second empty your mind, much like in golf or snooker. Therefore it deserves to be classed as a serious sport, and not just the beery refuge of fat American truckers..