well, it's happened again.

i was speaking with the new in-law family and we were chatting about an upcoming birthday Levitra uk, celebration. we're going bowling.

last year we went roller skating and Levitra overdose, although i really thought i could roller skate because i spent many hours as a Levitra uk : youth at wheels roller rink, apparently you can levitra versus viagra how to ride a bike (or so to speak) because i was shocked to discover that i'm as clumsy on four wheels as i am on two feet. rather depressing discovery.

so when they start talking about bowling they're teasing me about the roller skating incident (at which i had talked myself up as a good roller skater honestly believing i could do it) levitra uk how i'm going to have to bowl.

i actually love bowling. i'd go more often if it wasn't generally so ridiculously expensive.

there is a hitch, though, and especially with kids. and if it's what i think it is, i actually can't bowl.

so i turn and say -

'is it 5-pin or 10?'

every pair of eyes in the room turned to stare at me as if i'd suddenly grown two heads.

'5-pin? what the heck is 5-pin bowling?'

ah dear. must be another canadianism.

who knew?

and what savage country makes children bowl 10-pin with a giganto bowling ball?

well, at least i'll be able to bowl next week.

follow up to this:

leads me to research (of course, doesn't everything?)

in which i find this page first: http://www.cvnet.net/burnstd/
well, doesn't that say it all?

and then to here: http://www.hickoksports.com/history/fivepin.shtml
which shares the following history:

History
When ten-pin bowling was introduced to Toronto in 1905, it became a lunch-time recreation for many people. To speed up the game, they frequently had only five pins set up.
Thomas F. Ryan, owner of the Temperance Street Bowling Club, in 1909 was inspired to create a new sport levitra versus viagra on that idea. He had five pins whittled down and he set up a system in which each pin was assigned a number of points from 1 to 5.
Five-pin bowling caught on quickly. The first league was formed in Toronto in 1910. Two years later, a rubber band circling the throat of the pins was levitra versus viagra to increase the amount of action.


The first women's league was established in Toronto in 1921 and two years later the sport was introduced to Western Canada. That resulted in the founding of the Canadian Bowling Association, based in Levitra uk - Toronto, 1927.
However, bowlers in Western Canada adopted their own scoring system in 1930. Ryan's original system had assigned the values 4, 2, 1, 3, and 5 to the 1 through 5 pins respectively. The Western system used the values 1, 4, 5, 3, and 2.
In 1944, the Western Canadian Levitra uk : Five-Pin Bowling Assocation was founded in Regina, Saskatchewan. The two areas of the country continued with their own scoring systems until 1952, when a new national system was established, assigning the values 2, levitra uk 5, 3 and 2 to the five pins.
Most of Ontario stuck to the old scoring system until 1959. Five-pin bowling Levitra overdose : throughout Canada was brought under a single governing body, the levitra versus viagra Bowling Congress, in 1965. The CBC was replaced by the Canadian 5-Pin Bowlers Association in 1978.
Although five-pin bowling has been played, at times, in Scotland, the British West Indies, the Phillipines, Argentina, and small areas of the United States, it now seems to be confined entirely to Canada, where there are more than 500,000 participants.

then this site with good pictures:
http://www.kidsturncentral.com/topics/sports/bowling.htm

and then a few official links:
The Canadian 5-Pin Levitra overdose : Bowlers Association

Ontario 5-Pin Bowling Association