Good Days, Bad Days: Part One: Novi

These days, I am having pretty good time, especially on weekends. I am totally enjoying myself, and feel rejuvenated.

It started 3 weekends back with a trip to Novi, MI. Some of my Clemson friends (Archie, Suketu, Vikram, Shruti) moved to Novi a few weeks back. I wanted to meet them, but was kind of lazy to be out of Cleveland on weekends. In first week of April, I realised that I hadn't been out of Cleveland since I returned from Grand Canyon trip in January. That thought instantly unsettled me; in next couple of days I was all flustered, demented and, and I was dying to drive out of Cleveland.

Novi is a nice little town close to Detroit. Its much like Ann Arbour or Farmington. Some places in Michigan have this "feel good" factor: very peaceful-n-quiet, beautiful, not too big-not too small. Just perfect. I like that. It gives a good break from hectic and routine city life. After spending good 22 years in hustle- bustle of Bombay; next 3 years in extremely peaceful, quiet, yet beautiful place like Clemson; and now almost 9 months in Cleveland; I have started to appreciate the occasional breaks from routine life. May be that's why I enjoy places like Ann Arbor, Novi, Dayton, etc. Anyways.

It was great to meet Archie, Suketu, Vikram, and Shruti after a long time. It really feels good to meet good old friends, and catch up after long long time. I haven't been in touch with too many Clemson people these days, and I was totally unaware of things happening there. We had nice time in catching up, and remembering some old stories and "hall-of-fame" incidences. In the evening, after having dinner at a Mongolian place called "Sizzling Sticks", we went for some bowling.

Believe it or not, I 'd never tried bowling before. I was under the impression that the bowling balls are made of very lite-weight polymer, and its the throwing speed that determines how many pins one knocks down. Well, I soon realised that I was terribly wrong with my concepts. In first couple of strikes, I tried to throw a very heavy (12 pound) ball at a super-fast speed. According to my concepts of physics, I should have been able to knock down all the pins. But that did not happen.

I guess something is either wrong with my concepts, or I am applying some wrong principles to this. These Newton, Einstein, Galileo guys make things very complicated. No wonder some people prefer to take up sports as a profession than trying to apply the Newton's second law of motion to analyze the projectile of a home run !

My fingers started hurting terribly after that adventure. And it affected my performance thereafter. Obviously, soon it was a comedy show for rest of the audience. My attempts of making a "perfect" strike included throwing the ball backwards (behind me), almost slipping on the on the alley, and consistently rolling the ball in the gutter, and what not. Well, it was not as bad as it sounds. I did have a few good strikes, spares and some good shots. Even though I could not cross the 100-barrier (my highest was 96), had a lot of fun.



It was a very refreshing weekend. Hopefully I can meet my freinds again sometime in summer. I am planning a camping trip in Upper Peninsula of Michigan sometime in summer. It should be fun.