Hello, Philly Pinoy bowlers and friends! Welcome to the BowlStar Blog. Here, BowlStar Jing will chronicle for you the ongoing saga of her incrediBOWLicious (and incredibly bodacious) team, the BowlStars, as they strive for bowling glory at the 2013 Philly Pinoy Annual Bowling League, playing at the Palace every Friday night at 9-12 pm this winter.
As you will discover, I am a bowling addict and this league started it all. I was a sub for my GoPapa Joel's team, the Seminoles two years ago, and last year I was a core team player with my average hovering near the hundred mark. My burning desire to improve my game spurred me to join a USBC sanctioned all women's Wednesday night league last summer with my BFF's Mitchie and Chelo - together we were the IncrediBOWLs, and boy did we have FUN!!! I had so much fun I continued playing with our all women's league on Wednesday nights this fall, and that league will continue until the summer starts. I have documented my saga with that league in my blog at JingGal Bowls! And so I am quite excited to be back to play at the Philly Pinoy league, and am hopeful that my game has improved enough for my BowlStardom to win me a berth in the AllStar games. After all, BowlStar, AllStar, what really is the difference...I'm a super star, baby!
Last Friday night was a practice night at the Palace. Tonight was THE big night, Game 1 in regulation. Starting fresh and ready to set their averages tonight, team captains from the 10 teams drew lots before 9 pm to determine their team numbers, which become the basis of the match-up schedule and lane assignments for each league night. Commish Jay (Sports Committee head and Bowling Committee head) has this process down pat from previous years. But this year he is being ably assisted by a growing band of bowling addicts, who form the Bowling Committee: Mitchie (our Madam President and also my BowlStar anchorwoman extraordinaire), Angie and Edmer from the Hall of Framers, Desi and Dennis from the Bowleros and Blue and Romy from the Bowlinators, and of course I am part of this crew! As the BowlStar team captain and lider baboy, I drew the number 7 (BowlStars are Team 7!), and so was assigned to play Team 8, the Hall of Framers on lanes 27 and 28.
We started slow, with the Bowling Committee (Romy and me) needing to set-up the league forms and team payment envelopes and each team pausing to have team photos made. And what lovely shirts folks had! Lots of ube purple this year from the BowlDawgs (formerly the Chester Splits) and the Bowlcoholics (formerly the Seminoles). The Lords of the Lanes, our "partner" team (hubbies of the BowlStars!) led by my GoPapa Joel, were in light blue. The BowlStars had their bloody red shirts on. I will be introducing you to all the teams and their team members as the BowlStars play them each week.
My BowlStar team has me as team captain and third player, my incrediBOWLicious team mates Mitchie as anchorwoman and Chelo as starting player, Liz (in absentia, we missed you!) as second player and String/Chona as sub (our second player tonight). The Hall of Framers are the Sotomango family, a formidable bowling dynasty comprised of mom Angie, dad Edmer and brothers Andrew and Angelo: have mercy, have mercy! But bring it on = we want everybody to play well!
We started out good, we were getting hot! But I think we got so darn flaming hot the motor on lane 28 burned out in the middle of game 1, after String had thrown her first ball for the 5th or 6th frame. So we ended up moving to lanes 31-32. We got closer to the music and the dance floor, so siempre, we all started dancing!
We were BowlStars but Angelo was X-rated, throwing strike after strike, ending with a 230+ score, what a show! I was somehow on fire and got a 180 (patay kang bata ka, ang taas! my USBC league average is 130 only). All night we were dancing and laughing and bowling up a storm. Boy, did it feel like Sunday afternoon practice. We would be jumping and cheering and dancing (String's hypnotic dance) with each strike and spare. The Sotomangos were killing us but we still felt like winners! Like, it's the 10th frame and we are ONLY 150 pins behind, so "we can do it, team!" like we had a chance...
So we still don't know how we fared but Mitchie had a great night with an average in the 170s, Chelo lay low with an average in the 120s (she is my secret weapon, coz when she is ON, she can score in the 200s!), Chona did well with a 118 average, and I somehow ended with a 162 average. What a night, what a start! We are BowlStars, baby!
Many, many thanks to Alice Mercado for selling the 50/50 raffle tickets tonight = she did so great, we were able to give $35 cash prize to tonight's winner, Alice Deo. Looking good, folks!
SO the saga begins and we are off to a good start. Let's see how next week goes. For those who are interested, there are 6 lanes reserved for bowling practice at the Palace on Sunday at 5:30 pm. The Philly Pinoy bowling association (!) meets there regularly but anyone is welcome to join us. You will typically see most if not all of the bowling committee members there, together with the Bowlcoholics (mom Joy, dad Raul, son Paolo, and friend Bicoy), the BowlStars (BS) and the Lords of the Lanes (LOL). Join us for some fun practice!
Till next... Bowl, baby, bowl!
No comments:
Post a Comment