This past weekend I drove down to Arkansas to see my cousin compete in an NCAA Division I bowling tournament. On the way down, we drove through a place called Goobertown, and Will narrowly escaped a fistfight with a one-armed man. True story.

Emily bowls for the Lady Red Wolves at ASU and although she’s really good (high game 298) the coach only let her bowl the last game of 5 on Saturday. Which means we all sat around the bowling alley for 6 hours watching strangers bowl and eating fried food. It was an exhausting weekend. There were several highlights, though. Aside from Goobertown and the one-armed man, there was also a team competing from Fontbonne University. FU. That was their cheer, and that’s what it said on the scoreboard. Awesome.

Additionally, during the second day of competition, Will and I were standing on chairs, watching the lanes. This is pretty common practice during a tournament, since the girls are all standing right by the ball return, and the audience needs to get high up to see the pins. Anyway, Will and I were standing on chairs when one of the Fontbonne players waddled over to us. I’m not 100% on the age rules for NCAA bowling, but this woman had to be in her 40s. In addition, she was about 200 pounds overweight and had a gray crewcut. Hotness. The woman staggers over and comes quite close to my chair. Looking up at me, she mumbles this joyous little piece of existential food for thought: “somewhere, I had animal crackers.” I figure I must have been slightly brain dead at this point, having endured 5+ hours of bowling already, because I managed to keep a straight face as I told this large, scary bowler woman that I hadn’t seen her animal crackers. I wanted to add that I don’t even like animal crackers (I really don’t. they’re gross) but I kept my mouth shut. Nevertheless, despite my protestations, she stared me down like I had crumbs on my lips. Will said later that he thought she was going to punch me. I was spared, though, and after a 10 minute long trip to the bathroom (“Maybe she’s looking for her crackers.” – Will) the FU lady wandered over to another table and found her damn animal crackers. She didn’t apologize to me for the baseless nonverbal accusation she’d pelted me with, but I didn’t press the issue. Considering everything we’d already been through that weekend, getting punched in the face by a 300 pound, 40-something-year-old college bowler from FU would have just crossed the line of credibility.