Bowler Wins First PBA Title

I'm a fan of the TV show "M*A*S*H." I can't say that I remember every episode or every line of dialogue, but, every once in awhile, I remember a line from that show that seems to be appropriate for the occasion.

Yesterday, a bowler named John Nolen won his first PBA event, the USBC Masters in Las Vegas.

When I read this item of news, I remembered a line delivered by the "Hot Lips" Houlihan character in a "M*A*S*H" episode. I may have the episode wrong, but it seems to me that, in this episode, nearly everyone in the camp was down with the flu so Hot Lips and Hawkeye had to handle all the necessary tasks themselves — including all the surgery on the wounded who were brought in.

Hot Lips, of course, was a nurse. She wasn't a surgeon. She had medical training, but she wasn't a surgeon. So, as I recall, when Hawkeye put her in charge of a fairly routine surgical procedure, she said to him, "I've never done this before."

And Hawkeye, who never seemed to be at a loss for words, replied, "I'll bet you can't remember the first time you said that!"

Most of us probably can't remember the first time we said "I've never done this before," but I'd be willing to bet that Nolen, 29, will remember winning his first PBA title.

"This means everything to me," Nolen said. It also means a $60,000 prize and a two-year PBA Tour exemption.

Perhaps Hot Lips' remark had more relevance than I first thought. Later in the series, fans learned she was an accomplished bowler whose skill saved the 4077th in a bowling competition with another outfit that had reeled off an impressive streak of wins in just about everything else.