Golf day. The parish was holding a, well, parish golf get-together. Good “fellowship” fun. And it gave me a legitimate way to leave Margie with the Squig for the afternoon, saying, “I’m off to do church-related activities, woman.”
Bless her, she didn’t hurt me too badly.
We played at Overland Golf Course, which is a Denver municipal course. Pretty straightforward. Lots of long, straight, wide fairways. Wish I’d been in a few more of them (or at least those of the hole I was playing). Ended up with a 113, which is (so to speak) par for the course.
What was noteworthy was that I actually netted 1 golf ball for the 18 holes. Now, that’s not quite as astonishing as it sounds, since we got three golf balls as part of our admission fee to the soiree. But that means I lost only 2 balls, on 18 holes. There are days and courses where I don’t even get through a single hole without losing that many. Hoody-golfin-hoo.
Golf is one of those sports that really needs to be played to be appreciated. To observers, it is slow, silly, and features folks wearing odd clothing. Sort of like baseball. Actually getting out there, whacking at the ball, and noting its disinclination to go in the desired direction, for the desired distance, instills in one a realization of exactly how talented those folks who do this sort of thing for a living.
As to how my game was — the answer is, uneven. My score actually was worse on the back nine than the front. I had the requisite Great Shots that actually get you to come back (including a gorgeous 175 yard fairway shot right up on the green, woo-hoo), not to mention two pars, and three bogies. I was suffering from a very odd hook this outing. Plus some problems with actually not aiming in the right direction (which is easier to do than it sounds). My putting was actually pretty good — not nearly the normal level of “Three-Putting Your Way To Victory!” that I usually suffer from.
On the other hand, I hit into the fairway from the tee twice. That’s two times out of 18 possible. That’s pretty sucky.
Mercifully, I was not the worst of our foursome, and the group was uneven enough in its play that I won a few holes. Still, there’s a reason I don’t play for money (let alone for a living).