Pinbuster, two big handed "kids" were playing deep, the house pro and I were playing 11 at the arrows out to 8, the other six were throwing the ball in the general direction of the pins. Nobody was really outside of where Rich and I were and we both were having out troubles; I could smash the non-hooking lane but had to be careful of going high on the other and Rich was the opposite - he was killing the hooking side but having some trouble on the left side.
I think your second idea is what was happening, but there could have been some "lane memory" involved as well. We bowled on a very tough pattern on the same lanes two days before, with not much play on them in the interval, though they had been stripped and reoiled.
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