We walked in and immediately could tell something was wrong.

"It's too light in here," Jess said.

"There's no music," Casey pointed out.

"It doesn't reek of smoke and beer," I added.

"You know," Casey announced, "this is the cleanest bowling alley I've ever seen."

We might as well have been on the set of Ed, this place was so clean, but we weren't -- it was a real, live, open-to-the-public bowling alley Will had suggested for 14 of us to meet for some brew and bowl. "It won't be as crowded," he offered, correctly, comparing it to the one closer to our homes which we'd visited several times over the years.

While some of the cleanliness could be attributed to it being 9:30 on a Saturday night (still a little early), I think it generally was a super-clean establishment. Still, it felt wrong.

"It's like a Bizarro bowling alley," I said.

But it didn't stop there. We bought the Saturday night special -- $40 per lane for two hours of bowling and shoe rental included, so with six people to a lane, we made out pretty well. Even with the special, we still sought out a staff member when the orange pins found their way to the head pin slot -- a strike under those circumstances earned the bowler a free game, if the staff witnessed it. The main man roaming the alley whom we were supposed to call was in fact named Ed (or so they said) and because he was special, the cashier referred to him as "Special Ed" when he took to the mike to signify the start of Cosmic Bowling at 10 p.m. With that, the lights went down, the black lights came on, disco balls shot flashes of light across the lanes and carpet, smoke was released between lanes 4 and 5 (casting a fog over our lanes 9 and 10 moments later), and the music began. Every time an orange pin made its way to the front, Will's friend Matty shouted in no particular direction, "SPECIAL ED!" Eventually, Special Ed hated us, but not before Will's brother Richard nailed a strike and earned himself a free game.

Some of us bowled spectacularly. In the first game, Dave nailed five consecutive strikes starting with his third frame and finished with a lifetime best 190. He beat that in the second game by 9, missing 200 by a single pin. But sometime during the second game, we began to notice some things weren't right. Some scores seemed ... inaccurate, even with the automatic scoring. Our suspicions were confirmed when Jess rolled a gutter ball, and the screen above the lane put a 5 next to her name. This skewed scoring continued throughout the night, yet no matter how wrong it was for the first set of pins in a frame, it always seemed to right itself after the second ball. For example, if it registered 6 pins when only 3 were knocked down, and the second ball knocked down four for a total of 7, a 1 went up in the box for the second set. If a 5 was posted for a zero and no pins were hit on the second ball, a 5 remained. The only exceptions were if the second ball produced a total less than what the score for the first ball was, and for fake strikes. You see, in some instances, if a first ball knocked down 8 or 9 pins (especially if the lone remaining pin was the No. 5, the center pin), sometimes a strike went up on the board. So that's when we lucked out.

I didn't notice if any other lanes were having the same "problem" (or if they were drinking as much as we were), so I wondered if the employees felt we needed the reassurance of fake scoring. Maybe it's bowling for people with low self esteem. It was like there were invisible bumpers in the gutters, only we were still getting actual gutter balls, if not numerical ones.

"Even I could bowl a 70 like this!" said Casey, while shakin' her ass to "Family Affair."