Judd Alsup - Realtor

She hit a strike on her second roll! THE ROOM WENT WILD.

Our small church group met up at Hyjinx the other night. Our kids played on the giant indoor playground while we caught up.

As usual, the dads started trash-talking each other. Before we knew it, a game of bowling had been bought and were lacing up.

Very quickly, we all realized that we were all trash and the game became very docile. Our competitive nature was gently hushed by the public humiliation that comes with excessive gutter balls.

Neither here nor there…

Slowly, our kids started to filter in from the playground into the bowling lane area.

My oldest daughter ran up to me and asked if she could bowl. I looked around and all the other kids were begging their dad’s to bowl too.

So, we set up the lane right next to us and got their game started.
We left the rails down but got them the fancy little ramp to guide the ball.
Ellie was up first.

I took her up there, with her little purple bowling ball, and told her what to do.

She tossed the ball on the ramp and off it went!

Things were looking pretty good until the ball took a last second slight turn and left some pins up. We were able to line up the ramp with the remaining pins and knock them all down - she got a spare!

She was so excited!

Before she knew it, her second turn was up. She knew what to do this time!
She put the ball on the ramp. Pushed it with everything she had. And…
STRIKE!!!

Everyone cheered and you would have thought, by the smile on her face, that she had just won the lottery!

I love that little girl. This won’t be our last trip to the bowling alley!

They kept telling me not to do it, but I did it anyway.

When I was pretty young, like 7 or 8, I was obsessed with jumping off of things.

The couch was my go-to launch pad.

My parents had told me time and time again, to STOP JUMPING OFF THE FURNITURE.

But naturally, I didn’t listen.

To be honest, it wasn’t from a place of wanting to disobey them, but the couch was in front of the TV. Get some TMNT or Power Rangers rolling on the tube and I was acting it out.

This means, all the explosions and action scenes had me jumping onto or off of the couch! Naturally.
One day, there must have been a super sick, Michael Bay style explosion because I LEAPED off the couch. When I hit the ground, I landed on my arm super awkwardly.

Snap.

My arm was broken.

I would learn later that it was a small break - nothing crazy. But broken nonetheless.

I tried to hide it; my parents picked up on it fairly quickly though.

Some tears, spankings, and x-rays later… I got a cast. A camo cast. It was legit.

Fast forward 25 years or so. My kids are great kids, but they repeatedly do things I tell them not to. Let’s just hope we don’t have another camo cast in our future.

What is it they say? “You pay for your raising!”