Fear and Bowling in Las Vegas

In 1975 the band Supertramp released an album called “Crisis? What Crisis?”. That particular album title was running through my head as I rode the slow shuttle from McCarren Airport in Las Vegas to my hotel, The Golden Nugget, on Fremont Street in “old” downtown Vegas. The shuttle was not slow due to any severely restricted speed limits. It was slow because of the thousands of vehicles and pedestrians that were clogging Las Vegas Boulevard, a.k.a. The Strip. If there is a nasty recession going on in this country, a large chunk of Vegas doesn’t seem to be participating.

I was in town for the 2009 U.S. Bowling Congress National Tournament. Every year, somewhere in the country, 80,000 of my closest bowling friends will cycle through during a five-month (or so) window hoping to tally some singles, doubles, and team scores that will give us a dose of feel-good bowling ball-tossing pride as well as a few bucks to go along with it. I’ve been going for a few years now as part of a group of 20 combatants who are brilliantly organized by my friend Brian from the South Puget Sound. More on that in a couple of minutes.

After finally arriving at The Nugget, I went to check into my room, only to see somebody else opening the door. He had been there for a couple of days so I was clearly the victim of a check-in desk mistake. No harm, no foul as I got a new room.

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2009 Miss USA Contestants: Sorry ladies, I'm married

I headed to the Sports Book to meet my friend and co-worker Tony (who wasn’t in Vegas to bowl, but could have been here to fit a snitch with a pair of cement shoes). We had beers for $2 a piece as we watched the end of the Masters golf tournament and decided which games to put a few dollars on in the next couple of days.

Much to our surprise, all 51 of the Miss USA pageant contestants (the big show was last Sunday) made an appearance at the pool of the Golden Nugget. Being a married man, however, BowlingJoe had to disappoint all of them by saying 51 times that he couldn’t be their date for the evening.

After a ten dollar prime rib meal it was time to take a cab to Caesar’s where Elton John was headlining. We were in the “cheap” hundred dollar seats in the comfy 4300 seat venue. I really didn’t know what to expect but I’ll say this about Elton John: he can still deliver the music at the age of 62 (although he seemed to get a bit winded whenever he left his piano to walk around the stage). The sound quality was excellent and he had his original drummer and guitarist with him. And the hits, from “Bennie and the Jets” through “I Guess That’s Why They Call It The Blues”, kept on coming. The giant inflatable boobs on stage were a bit weird but, hey, it is Vegas after all.

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BowlingJoe with what could be the worst looking Elvis in Vegas

We caught a cab back to the hotel and watched The Fremont Experience, a huge music and video show displayed on the inside of a two block long canopy. It was time to call it a night at around 12:30am.

I got up at around 7:30am and at around 9 I called Tony, hoping to meet him at the buffet or somewhere for breakfast. There was no answer so I immediately wondered if somehow HE was the one who was “sleeping with the fish”. I had one of the all time best omelettes ever and he finally did show up as I was about to leave.

The team event was that afternoon, Brian and his wife Kim were kind enough to pick me up at the hotel and give me (and my bowling equipment) a lift to the Cashman Center where the tournament was being held. As it turned out, I didn’t bowl particularly well but was surrounded by some awesome teammates who did, and we’ll certainly cash in that event. Sometimes you help carry the team and sometimes you’re the guy riding in the back of the rickshaw, as it’s unusual for all five bowlers to be firing on all cylinders all the time. At any rate my Boys Night Out #2 team of Darrin, John, Conrad, and Jim were talented and a lot of fun to bowl with.

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A fine team....that even has matching red shirts!
After another cheap steak dinner, I looked over at Tony, and his tank was clearly empty after two nights in a row (he got there the day before me) of the Vegas experience. If it were a boxing match I would have given him a standing eight count and stopped the fight. He went off to his room and crashed hard, while I did some souvenir shopping for an hour and did the same.

Tuesday's singles and doubles events were pretty much of a bowling train wreck except for a lone 256 game that I managed to roll and save a semi-respectable three-game set of 550. Nic was a fine doubles partner but both of us struggled in two of our games and we both vowed to make up for it next year.

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BowlingJoe dreaming in color
In singles, well...there are probably some physics and kinetic reasons that I tallied an embarrassing 424 series, but to simply say that I missed a lot of easy spares and generally bowled like doggy-doo pretty much tells it all. It was so bad that I briefly considered renaming this blog to "BlowingJoe".

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At that point it was back to the hotel to meet the recovering Tony and hail a taxi back to the airport. Like many who have tried before me, including Hunter S. Thompson, I went to Las Vegas looking for the Heart of the American Dream and came up empty.

Perhaps I'll find it a few hundred miles north next year when we return for the 2010 tournament in Reno.

BowlingJoe on the approach with much of the "crew of 20" in the background: things went well that day until I released the ball. (Thanks, Kent, for capturing the shot)