Apparently it was all fun and games on the Romney and Ryan press planes on Saturday. When the press was wondering if Rob Portman was going to help Romney with his debate preparations, they resorted to orange bowling to get their answer.

Politico's pool report explains the hijinks: 

The press then decided to write a note in sharpie on the orange reading:

"Gov. are you going to let Portman play Obama? Come Chat!"

After a waiting period when a campaign aide said Romney was busy reading something, the press enlisted NBC correspondent Peter Alexander to walk closer toward the front to roll the orange to Romney.

Romney got up from his seat to receive the orange then sat back down to write his response

Romney crouched in the aisle as he rolled the orange back toward Alexander

His note read:

"Shh! ... Don't tell Sununu! But yes ..."

Sununu, in case you're wondering, is former New Hampshire Gov. John Sununu. Yahoo's Holly Bailey Instagrammed a picture of the defaced orange, which we've used above. (Thanks Holly!) When reporters on Paul Ryan's plane told him the score of yesterday's Ohio State-Miami University of Ohio season opener, he rolled the orange back with "They were winning when I was there," written on it. 

As Buzzfeed points out, orange bowling is becoming more and more common among pool reporters. Things get boring on those planes and you can only read so many Grisham novels. In August, Romney and Marco Rubio joined the pool reporters while they tried to bowl an orange from one end of their plane to another. West Wing fans will particularly like the orange communiqué. In a season six episode, reporters use a message written on an orange to bait Josh Lyman into answering questions about polling results. And you just know that's what every pool reporter on that plane was thinking about yesterday. 

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