Well, my season never actually started but that is beside the point.  I have been having knee pain for about 3 months and I finally went to the doc.  Turns out that I have torn ACL in my right knee.  I am scheduled for surgery on Feb. 7th.  I will be on crutches for a week or so.  The really bad thing is no driving for 6 weeks.  That is going to REALLY suck.  My knee should be healthy enough to be able to go to Nationals Memorial Day weekend.  They are doing a newer procedure on my knee that is supposed to be much better than the surgery they did a few years ago. 

Now, I am just biding my time until Feb 7th.  I get 4 more scars from the surgery (1 cut and 3 holes).  Fun Fun.

It has been a while since I posted.  Main reason?????  My wife just had twins on November 25th.  Here is the skinny on them.

Harrison Darby Gilbert, born 5:06am.  19 inches, 6lbs 4ozs

Maximus Darby Gilbert, born 5:07am.  20 inches, 6lbs 2ozs

Mom and the babies are doing great.  They both left the hospital weighing 5lbs 14 ozs and were at 6lbs 5ozs by their first doc appointment. 

Not sure when I am going to get back to the lanes.  My life is pretty busy right now.  I have subbed 3 times and practiced twice since August.  Oh well, there is always next year.

I think that I have mentioned on here that I am not bowling this year.  My wife and I are expecting twins in December so we decided that I should take at least this year off and re-evaluate during the summer.  Can I just say that not picking up a ball in 3 weeks sucks.  I was supposed to be the Secretary/Treasurer this season so I went to the league meeting 3 weeks ago to hand off all of the stuff to the person who is replacing me.  I threw 3 games after the meeting and that has been it.  It's weird.  I have bowled at least 1 league every fall/winter season since I was 6.  Not going to the lanes on Wednesday nights is odd.  I am going to try to sub a few times and get my 21 games in so I have an average for next year.

On a side note, I have spoken with some of the people from the league.  They already want to impeach the person who replaced me.  I guess that she wants the league to buy her a printer so she can print all of the reports.  Also, she doesn't fill out the recap sheets with all of the names/averages/handicaps.  She says that she doesn't have the time.  But, she still wants to get paid the full amount.  It should be interesting when I actually get a chance to stop in at the alley.

Well, my summer sport league is over.  It was a fairly fun summer and I got to work on a lot of different parts of my game.  We ended up winning the league, high team game and series, and I had high game and series.  Not bad for what I was using as practice time to work on my game. 

I was looking forward to bowling this winter but that isn't going to happen.  My wife and I decided that I need to take the season off.  She is expecting twins in December.  It is going to be a busy year and we don't know how things are going to play out.  We are going to re-evaluate next year and see how things are.  I have been asked by about 7 different people to sub this year.  I want to get out about once a month or so and sub.  My goal is to get at least 21 games in at least one league so I can have a book average for the 2008-09 season.  My ending average for 2006-07 was 213.  My goal this year is 220.

My game last year was pretty strong but I improved on my spare shooting dramatically this summer.  My 10 percentage used to be about 70% and now I am up over 90%.  Going to a straight ball for all of my single pin spares and 2 pin spares.  Spare that are 3 pins or more I am still using my strike ball but throwing the ball a little harder to cut the hook.  I am hoping to make a video sometime in the near future so I can work out the kinks.

This has been an interesting summer.  For the first time in a long time, I am actually bowling in the summertime.  Most summers, I spend most of my free time working on the house and yard, or, if I am really lucky, hitting a little white ball around someone else's yard for 5 hours.  This summer, I decided to try a Sport League.  Because of where I live in the Chicagoland area, there are basically no Sport League.  This is my one opportunity to bowl in one.  Let me just say this, I have bowled on tough shots before but this house takes the cake.  This place tells us the pattern for the week and if you go by what bowl.com tells you where to play, your in trouble.  Everyweek, I play basically the same line with a different ball.  The big difference each week is where the pool of oil is on the lane.  Even on the Cheetah, the ball would start hooking and hit an oil slick and slide for 5 feet.  That was a fun night.  The ball went like this.  Skid, hook, skid, hook.  Lining up that night was a joy. 

 I have been messing with my game most of the summer.  I was told by a buddy of mine in Reno that I really control my arm swing.  I read a book (Bowling Execution) and went on a few other tips and changed my arm swing.  Boy did that mess up my timing and my revs.  I went with it for 5 weeks.  My game sucked for those 5 weeks.  I could care less about what my average is this summer but I would like to feel comfortable with my game.  I didn't.  I felt really weird throwing the ball.  Add to that, I have always finished my slid about 12-18 inches behind the foul line.  I started try to get closer to the line.  It sounds easy but that was a chore too.  I take a 4 step delivery and start with my toe behind the second set of dots.  Now, I start with my heel on the second row of dots.  It is amazing how much extra power the ball has with my only getting the ball an extra foot down the lane.  2 weeks ago, I decided to scrap my "style change" and go back to what was confortable with taking little things of what I learned and keep them into my game.  Getting closer to the foul line is something that I am keeping.  I support my ball a little more with my left hand at the start.  I also have better timing to the line now than I did before. 

 My first week back to my old style was horrible.  This past week, what a difference.  We were bowling on the Shark pattern.  From everything that I have read, you are supposed to play inside.  I played about 7 board at the arrows out to 4-5 at my break point.  First game, eh, 177.  I had 2 opens.  1 was a pocket 4-10 (we were getting horrible racks on the left lane all night) and a 4 threw the nose (the right lane started hooking a lot more than the left and got pro-gressively worse as the night went on).  Next game, I started X 9/ (4 pin on the left lane) the 9 strikes in a row.  I pulled the hell out of my last ball for a 277.  Last game, I never missed pocket and had a 227.  I kept leaving 7 pins the last game.  So, I shot 681 on the night.  Back to the league in general.  There have been 5 600 series in the league (there are multiple 210 plus bowlers in the league and a Regional Pro in the league, yes it is that tough).  I now have high game and high series.  I am just hoping to keep up what I have learned over the summer and keep my game going in the right direction.

 On a personal note, just before Mother's Day, my wife and I found out that we were expecting.  Just before Father's Day, we found it is going to be twins due in December.  This has been a crazy summer and is going to be an even more crazy fall and winter.  Bowling has kept me sane for the most part (considering now we have to get a f&$%king mini-van).  At first, we were both in shock but now we have both accepted that we are going to have 3 kids instead of the planned 2.  Oh well, that is the life of a parent.