Bowling For Turkey

It’s a cold and rainy day here. Even the surfeit of hot tea doesn’t take the edge off. ‘It’ being a Friday, the students are in high spirits and the faculty seems worn out and ready for the weekend. Me? I had to take an hour-long nap yesterday as we get back into the grind (and I NEVER take naps).

We had planned to go bowling at the mall tonight (it’s not like good ole’ Brunswick Bowling with the sticky concession stand and league trophies and announcements on display) – it is swanky – or as swanky as a bowling alley can be – with darts, pool tables and the rules and ‘how to’ of bowling complete with diagrams posted at every lane. It certainly doesn’t have the soul of some of the bowling alleys I’ve been in. Like the one outside of New Haven going west on 34 (I think…I can see the intersection and the Stop and Shop on my left hand side in my head…). That bowling alley oozed Big Lebowski-ness with more fervor and sincerity than the Big Lebowski. Or the place where I joined a parent-child league with my Dad, oh orange vinyl and Las Vegas psychedelic carpets! I like to bowl.Watching people, particularly men, here, bowl is a hoot. They might read the posted instructions and then ignore them completely, step OVER the line and literally launch the ball, overhand (or sideways I guess given the weight) down the lane and it often goes in the gutter 2/3 of the way down. But it’s usually a family-affair here and everyone seems to enjoy it. Suffice it to say, we aren’t going bowling tonight.

On rainy days like today, it seems better to stay in and watch movies. Maybe knit a bit. Peter is going to make a Shepard’s pie (cottage pie, actually, as I am not a huge lamb fan but I am trying really, really hard to learn to appreciate it since there is so damn much of it here) and I have plans to make Cowboy Cookies from the Moosewood website although I wasn’t able to find chocolate chips in the on-campus grocery. Hopefully, I will have better luck at Real. Otherwise, I’m going to try chopping up Toblerone and using that instead.

Ok, moment of surreal “ I know I am Turkey when…” There is scary scaffolding outside of the window upon which two 2 x 4 planks are propped which is holding up (god knows how) a bucket of plaster and a man singing away in the rain. Where the f*&k is OSHA in this country?