I recently received a copy of The Rules of Golf in Plain English, written by Jeffrey S. Kuhn and Bryan A. Garner. For all of my lawyer followers, you will recognize Bryan Garner as the author and lecturer who has written numerous books on plain English for legal writing. We send our associates to his lectures and use his materials as excellent examples of legal writing for our internal training programs.
As the authors note in the preface, the original rules of golf written in 1744 included 13 rules and 338 words. Later, the predecessor to the Royal and Ancient Golf Club of St. Andrews, printed 17 rules of golf in 541 words. The Rules of Golf in Plain English is 115 pages, including 2 appendices, and approximately 20,000 words!
Rule 1 provides that you must play the ball as it lies except if the rules say otherwise. For the life of me, I never understood the English grammar rule about "lie" and "lay", but I digress! Surprisingly, you cannot agree with your playing partner(s) to ignore a rule or penalty or you will be disqualified. Since it takes at least two people to agree, I assume that "you" means both (or all) players agreeing would be disqualified. Then, I love the legal catch-all, "If any issue is not specifically covered by the rules, the Committee will make a decision based on fairness."
I am dead in the water before teeing off on the first hole! Before sticking my tee in the ground, my first comment on the tee box is "two off of the first tee" and everyone agrees. Disqualified! But ... If we agree that you can hit two shots off of the first tee, but each player hits such a good drive that no one hits a second shot, do you get a pass or is it like a conspiracy where you do not actually have to commit the act, but simply agree to commit the act?
Assuming that I have not yet been disqualified, my ball is in the center of the fairway but it is sitting on a dead patch of grass so I gently roll the ball a few inches (but no closer to the hole) until it is sitting up on a nice tuft of grass. If I do this unseemly act on my own without the agreement of my playing partners, it is a two stroke penalty or a loss of the hole in match play. If my playing partners explicitly or implicitly agree, then we are all disqualified!
I think it is fundamentally unfair that I hit the ball in the fairway and I do not have a pristine lie (or lay), whether because my ball is in a divot, I have an uphill, downhill or side hill lie, or a cat used that portion of the fairway as her personal litter box killing the grass. In those circumstances, the Committee (me, since I would not want to agree with my playing partner and risk disqualification) should employ the "catch-all" and determine based on fundamental fairness that it is permissible to move the ball to an appropriate pristine lie in the fairway (but no closer to the hole)!
After all of that I miss the green and three-putt for a double bogey anyway!
Thursday, October 8, 2009
Wednesday, October 7, 2009
Bucket List
This is an e-mail I just received from a friend with whom I went to high school entitled "Bucket List":
I summited Mount Whitney on Saturday in the middle of an 18 hour and 22 mile ordeal. 6 out of 8 of us made the summit. Left trailhead at 8300' under full moon and headlamps at 4 AM and returned at 10:30 PM under similar conditions. At 14,495', Whitney is the tallest peak in lower 48 states. 40 mph wind gusts and temperature in 30's. Most difficult physical and mental challenge I have ever encountered. Hadn't climbed a tall mountain since I was 21. Not in the mood or any condition right now to climb any others....
Wow! That is pretty impressive!
I am not sure of the derivation of the term "bucket list". The first time I heard it used was in the movie, "The Bucket List" with Morgan Freeman and Jack Nicholson. It is one of the great phrases in the American lexicon. I assume that it comes from the term "kick the bucket".
My golf bucket list includes the following:
1. Play St. Andrews.
2. Play Augusta National.
3. Shoot par (or my age, whichever comes first).
4. Make a hole-in-one.
5. Attend the Masters.
6. Attend a Ryder Cup.
7. Win the purple jacket.
I summited Mount Whitney on Saturday in the middle of an 18 hour and 22 mile ordeal. 6 out of 8 of us made the summit. Left trailhead at 8300' under full moon and headlamps at 4 AM and returned at 10:30 PM under similar conditions. At 14,495', Whitney is the tallest peak in lower 48 states. 40 mph wind gusts and temperature in 30's. Most difficult physical and mental challenge I have ever encountered. Hadn't climbed a tall mountain since I was 21. Not in the mood or any condition right now to climb any others....
Wow! That is pretty impressive!
I am not sure of the derivation of the term "bucket list". The first time I heard it used was in the movie, "The Bucket List" with Morgan Freeman and Jack Nicholson. It is one of the great phrases in the American lexicon. I assume that it comes from the term "kick the bucket".
My golf bucket list includes the following:
1. Play St. Andrews.
2. Play Augusta National.
3. Shoot par (or my age, whichever comes first).
4. Make a hole-in-one.
5. Attend the Masters.
6. Attend a Ryder Cup.
7. Win the purple jacket.
Tuesday, October 6, 2009
World Of XXVI - Day 3
I woke up on Sunday, Day 3 of World Of XXVI, to (drum roll please!), more rain. However, the World Of had never been rained out two days in a row and we were determined to play golf today. We were supposed to play 36 holes at the Grand Bear, a Jack Nicklaus-designed course, but when we called the course we were told that it was closed because it was underwater (great drainage, Jack!). We called our private golf club, the Preserve, and luckily it was playable and open. My roomie, Crimson Tide, had food poisoning and stayed in bed with his snuffleupagus breathing apparatus all day watching football. He alternately blamed the Po Boy sandwich he ate in Baton Rouge or the roast beef sandwich that I carried around since Friday morning that was sitting in the water in the beer cooler. We had a leisurely Sunday buffet of light southern food (that is an oxymoron!), biscuits and gravy, grits, potatoes, pancakes, french toast, scrambled eggs, omelettes, etc. and headed to the golf course.
We arrived at the course and it was drizzling. As we drove into the parking lot we wagered how long it would take the staff to get to our car and take our bags. The guy was at our car to get our golf bags before we pulled into the parking space! Except for the staff, our cars were the only cars in the lot. I was paired with Smooth in the two-man game, which is generally the kiss of death. Since Smooth gets no strokes and the rest of us round up a bit on our handicap, Smooth has to shoot in the 60s to even have a chance of winning the two-man game. It is a pleasure to watch Smooth play golf (as long as you avert your eyes on the greens!). He is long enough and accurate. He rarely makes a mistake. I was putting like Ben Crenshaw and Smooth was eyeing my Ping Craz-E putter the entire round. Smooth shot a 68 and I made enough pars so that we ended net 9 under and tied for low two-man score. There was some discussion with the Mouth about "World Of" tie-breaker rules, but Turtle proclaimed that a tie is a tie and we split the meager pot between the two winning groups. Then the fun began ...
It is a "World Of" tradition to, first, play a late Sunday afternoon scramble in a single group (no matter how many players), and, second, play until it is too dark to see the ball. So we headed back out to the No. 1 tee with our four carts. Since Crimson Tide was still in the hotel room watching football, the teams were Smooth against Turtle, the Mouth and High Right (oh yah, the three worst golfers, me, the Natural and WOF (World Of Friend)tagged along with Smooth). We rode Smooth hard and put him away wet, with the Natural making all the birdie putts. After eight holes we had won the first bet going away and were even on the second bet. We knew that Turtle and the Mouth would not let us quit and still pay the bets. Before No. 9, Turtle pressed for the second time. No. 9 is a long 421 yard uphill par 4 with a wet fairway. All 7 World Of participants teed off into the darkness. We found 3 balls from our group (I think my ball must have been further up the fairway, but no one believed me!). Turtle, Mouth and High Right continued to look for their balls as Smooth bunted his ball into the cup to complete the hole. Well after the 5-minute lost ball rule expired, lo and behold one or more of the lost balls appeared and a "gentlemen's disagreement" ensued. In the interest of our our 28+ year friendship I magnanimously agreed (without the consent of my team members)to call the third bet a nullity, thus halving the second bet, and we headed home for a shower and dinner, each of the winning team members $3.75 richer.
We arrived at the course and it was drizzling. As we drove into the parking lot we wagered how long it would take the staff to get to our car and take our bags. The guy was at our car to get our golf bags before we pulled into the parking space! Except for the staff, our cars were the only cars in the lot. I was paired with Smooth in the two-man game, which is generally the kiss of death. Since Smooth gets no strokes and the rest of us round up a bit on our handicap, Smooth has to shoot in the 60s to even have a chance of winning the two-man game. It is a pleasure to watch Smooth play golf (as long as you avert your eyes on the greens!). He is long enough and accurate. He rarely makes a mistake. I was putting like Ben Crenshaw and Smooth was eyeing my Ping Craz-E putter the entire round. Smooth shot a 68 and I made enough pars so that we ended net 9 under and tied for low two-man score. There was some discussion with the Mouth about "World Of" tie-breaker rules, but Turtle proclaimed that a tie is a tie and we split the meager pot between the two winning groups. Then the fun began ...
It is a "World Of" tradition to, first, play a late Sunday afternoon scramble in a single group (no matter how many players), and, second, play until it is too dark to see the ball. So we headed back out to the No. 1 tee with our four carts. Since Crimson Tide was still in the hotel room watching football, the teams were Smooth against Turtle, the Mouth and High Right (oh yah, the three worst golfers, me, the Natural and WOF (World Of Friend)tagged along with Smooth). We rode Smooth hard and put him away wet, with the Natural making all the birdie putts. After eight holes we had won the first bet going away and were even on the second bet. We knew that Turtle and the Mouth would not let us quit and still pay the bets. Before No. 9, Turtle pressed for the second time. No. 9 is a long 421 yard uphill par 4 with a wet fairway. All 7 World Of participants teed off into the darkness. We found 3 balls from our group (I think my ball must have been further up the fairway, but no one believed me!). Turtle, Mouth and High Right continued to look for their balls as Smooth bunted his ball into the cup to complete the hole. Well after the 5-minute lost ball rule expired, lo and behold one or more of the lost balls appeared and a "gentlemen's disagreement" ensued. In the interest of our our 28+ year friendship I magnanimously agreed (without the consent of my team members)to call the third bet a nullity, thus halving the second bet, and we headed home for a shower and dinner, each of the winning team members $3.75 richer.
Monday, October 5, 2009
Back to the Driving Range
After Saturday's debacle I was back at the range Sunday banging the Top-Flites. I decided to take my Taylor Made 580 cc driver to the range. It has a 9.5 degree loft and is 1" shorter than my Ping driver. The first couple of balls I hit with the Taylor Made driver were hit right on the sweet spot and the ball traveled on a lower trajectory with a slight draw. I also was swinging with a more fluid and easier motion. Then, I worked on hitting my irons through the ball and taking a divot in front of the ball and also cocking my wrist and loading my right side. I hit my mid-irons really well and then moved to the dreaded pitching wedge that gave me so much trouble on Saturday. Lo and behold, I was hitting down and through the ball and taking a divot in front of the ball and my pitching wedge was traveling 120-125 yards and straight and true! I also tried the same swing motion with my hybrids instead of sweeping the ball and that also worked. It was probably the best driving range practice session I ever had! I can't wait to play again!
Sunday, October 4, 2009
No Place to Go, But Lower
I finally played my first round of golf since beginning the blog. On Saturday, I played with my friend Digger. Digger has been a long-time client and friend. He is a new member at Moon Valley Country Club. Since Digger joined the club, the course superintendent has been purchasing extra grass seed because Digger's divots are as big as tiger pelts. Generally Digger hits a big fade (some might call it a slice) and I hit my duck hook so we are not good cart buddies. When Digger is playing well he compensates for the fade and hits the ball into the fairway.
Moon Valley Country Club was originally built and owned by the Solheim family, the owners of Ping. It was the home of the LPGA Standard Register Ping Tournament from 1987 to 2003. It is an urban course that meanders through the local neighborhood. Driving to the course, you pass Winged Foot Road, Medinah Drive and Pine Valley Drive. From the tips it is over 7,200 yards. We played from the gold tees, which are 6,584 yards. The slope rating from the gold tees is 120. The slope rating for a course of average difficulty is 113.
Let me begin by saying that I stunk! I started off well hitting two of the first three greens in regulation and it was all downhill from there. On No. 4, a 511 yard par 5, I was hitting a pitching wedge and thinking birdie when I skull-hossled my third shot over the green and out-of-bounds for a 7. I hossled another pitching wedge on No. 9 and made the turn at 46, thinking that I could still shoot in the 80s. Other than the two pitching wedge disasters, I actually hit the ball pretty well on the front side.
My partner Digger was driving the ball brilliantly but the rest of his game was a disaster. For some reason he was not taking his normal tiger pelt divots from the fairway (I think the course superintendent may have talked with him!). More sand was added to the greenside bunkers since the last time we played and Digger hit a couple of really nice sand shots, but it was too little, too late. Digger also made one of the most remarkable shots I have ever seen. No. 6 is a 393 yard par 4. Digger hit his drive right down the middle (again!) and was 165 yards from the pin and 15 yards directly behind the 150 yard pole. He hit his next shot low and straight and the ball hit the 150 yard pole and ricocheted never to be found. I know that if Digger and I tried to do that 100 times we would not be able to hit that pole again!
On the par 5 13th hole I hooked my drive into the swale and wedged out into the middle of the fairway. I then hit my best shot of the day, a 3 hybrid 190 yards that cozied up to about 7' from the hole. I putted well all afternoon, but in this case I pushed the putt right and had to settle for a par. On No. 14 for some unknown reason I changed my driver set-up to hit a high draw and instead badly duck-hooked the ball. Frustrated, I told Digger that I was taking my traveling mulligan and I hit a beautiful high draw that just caught the lip of a bunker on the right side of the fairway. I bogied the hole, but the golf gods did not take kindly to my use of the traveling mulligan and I fell apart on the last couple of holes and shot a generous 48 on the back for a 94. Being the eternal golf optimist, I actually did some things pretty well, especially my putting. After watching Tiger Woods and vowing to get my putts to the hole, I only left one putt short all day (I three-putted that hole). I made a couple of nice putts and lipped out one or two other putts. I felt like I hit the ball better than my score indicated (don't you always feel that way!). There is no place to go, but lower.
Moon Valley Country Club was originally built and owned by the Solheim family, the owners of Ping. It was the home of the LPGA Standard Register Ping Tournament from 1987 to 2003. It is an urban course that meanders through the local neighborhood. Driving to the course, you pass Winged Foot Road, Medinah Drive and Pine Valley Drive. From the tips it is over 7,200 yards. We played from the gold tees, which are 6,584 yards. The slope rating from the gold tees is 120. The slope rating for a course of average difficulty is 113.
Let me begin by saying that I stunk! I started off well hitting two of the first three greens in regulation and it was all downhill from there. On No. 4, a 511 yard par 5, I was hitting a pitching wedge and thinking birdie when I skull-hossled my third shot over the green and out-of-bounds for a 7. I hossled another pitching wedge on No. 9 and made the turn at 46, thinking that I could still shoot in the 80s. Other than the two pitching wedge disasters, I actually hit the ball pretty well on the front side.
My partner Digger was driving the ball brilliantly but the rest of his game was a disaster. For some reason he was not taking his normal tiger pelt divots from the fairway (I think the course superintendent may have talked with him!). More sand was added to the greenside bunkers since the last time we played and Digger hit a couple of really nice sand shots, but it was too little, too late. Digger also made one of the most remarkable shots I have ever seen. No. 6 is a 393 yard par 4. Digger hit his drive right down the middle (again!) and was 165 yards from the pin and 15 yards directly behind the 150 yard pole. He hit his next shot low and straight and the ball hit the 150 yard pole and ricocheted never to be found. I know that if Digger and I tried to do that 100 times we would not be able to hit that pole again!
On the par 5 13th hole I hooked my drive into the swale and wedged out into the middle of the fairway. I then hit my best shot of the day, a 3 hybrid 190 yards that cozied up to about 7' from the hole. I putted well all afternoon, but in this case I pushed the putt right and had to settle for a par. On No. 14 for some unknown reason I changed my driver set-up to hit a high draw and instead badly duck-hooked the ball. Frustrated, I told Digger that I was taking my traveling mulligan and I hit a beautiful high draw that just caught the lip of a bunker on the right side of the fairway. I bogied the hole, but the golf gods did not take kindly to my use of the traveling mulligan and I fell apart on the last couple of holes and shot a generous 48 on the back for a 94. Being the eternal golf optimist, I actually did some things pretty well, especially my putting. After watching Tiger Woods and vowing to get my putts to the hole, I only left one putt short all day (I three-putted that hole). I made a couple of nice putts and lipped out one or two other putts. I felt like I hit the ball better than my score indicated (don't you always feel that way!). There is no place to go, but lower.
Friday, October 2, 2009
World Of XXVI - Day 2
The plan for Saturday was to play 18 holes at the Preserve Golf Club and then head to Baton Rouge for the Vanderbilt vs. LSU football game starting at 6 p.m. It is about 2 hours from Biloxi to Baton Rouge. We woke up on Saturday morning to a complete wash-out! It had rained all night and continued to rain all day. Between Friday night and Saturday, Biloxi got over 3.5 inches of rain. To put that in context, the greatest rainfall in a 24 hour period in Phoenix was 4.98 inches on July 1-2, 1911. Not to be dissuaded, a few of the "World Of" stalwarts (not me!) headed out to the course to check out the conditions. They rode a couple of holes and when they threw a ball out into the fairway on No. 3 and could not find it under the water, even this hearty group gave up and headed back to the hotel.
Since there were two good football games on television that afternoon, we decided to head to Baton Rouge earlier than originally planned. I drove with Crimson Tide in his crimson pick-up truck with the Alabama license plate and Nick Saban bumper sticker (intending to stay under the radar, literally and figuratively!). We stopped at Wal-Mart to pick up $9 rainsuits for the game. We arrived in Baton Rouge at around 3 p.m. and hung out at the Station Sports Bar and Grill, a well-known Tiger game day hangout in Baton Rouge, and watched the other games and checked out the Tiger faithful. Driving through the campus to Tiger Stadium in the crimson pick-up truck, we got some stares and some Cajun yells of "Tiger bait!". When we got to the stadium and finally got to our seats three rows from the top of the stadium (in rows V and U) and put on our oxygen masks the rain had miraculously stopped (actually, we were so high that the rain was below us!). The first thing that we saw when we caught our breath was a 25-yard-long sign "Welcome to Death Valley'', the politically incorrect nickname for Tiger Stadium. In addition to football, LSU is known for its excellent marching band and its real Tiger mascot Mike. The band was marching and playing and 92,000 rabid fans were singing along and yelling "Geaux Tigers" (which sounds a lot like "Go Tigers" unless you saw the thousands of tee shirts with the correct spelling). To my chagrin, Mike was nowhere to be found (we later learned that if Mike does not want to get into his trailer for a game, Mike does not get into his trailer and no one messes with him!).
Once the game started Vandy hung tough with the Tigers. Vandy got a safety in the third quarter and was within a touchdown with the ball in good field position, but could not score and LSU added another touchdown in the fourth quarter to win 23 to 9. The Tiger fans were not happy with Les Miles' very conservative play-calling and the fact that the team did not steamroll the lowly Commodores. It was a rousing moral victory for the 'Dores! We got back to Biloxi a little after midnight and it was still raining and I headed to sleep with dreams of playing 36 holes under par the following day. Some of my compadres played blackjack and claimed that they paid for the trip with their winnings.
Since there were two good football games on television that afternoon, we decided to head to Baton Rouge earlier than originally planned. I drove with Crimson Tide in his crimson pick-up truck with the Alabama license plate and Nick Saban bumper sticker (intending to stay under the radar, literally and figuratively!). We stopped at Wal-Mart to pick up $9 rainsuits for the game. We arrived in Baton Rouge at around 3 p.m. and hung out at the Station Sports Bar and Grill, a well-known Tiger game day hangout in Baton Rouge, and watched the other games and checked out the Tiger faithful. Driving through the campus to Tiger Stadium in the crimson pick-up truck, we got some stares and some Cajun yells of "Tiger bait!". When we got to the stadium and finally got to our seats three rows from the top of the stadium (in rows V and U) and put on our oxygen masks the rain had miraculously stopped (actually, we were so high that the rain was below us!). The first thing that we saw when we caught our breath was a 25-yard-long sign "Welcome to Death Valley'', the politically incorrect nickname for Tiger Stadium. In addition to football, LSU is known for its excellent marching band and its real Tiger mascot Mike. The band was marching and playing and 92,000 rabid fans were singing along and yelling "Geaux Tigers" (which sounds a lot like "Go Tigers" unless you saw the thousands of tee shirts with the correct spelling). To my chagrin, Mike was nowhere to be found (we later learned that if Mike does not want to get into his trailer for a game, Mike does not get into his trailer and no one messes with him!).
Once the game started Vandy hung tough with the Tigers. Vandy got a safety in the third quarter and was within a touchdown with the ball in good field position, but could not score and LSU added another touchdown in the fourth quarter to win 23 to 9. The Tiger fans were not happy with Les Miles' very conservative play-calling and the fact that the team did not steamroll the lowly Commodores. It was a rousing moral victory for the 'Dores! We got back to Biloxi a little after midnight and it was still raining and I headed to sleep with dreams of playing 36 holes under par the following day. Some of my compadres played blackjack and claimed that they paid for the trip with their winnings.
Thursday, October 1, 2009
Indoor Driving Range
To say the least, I have a very large house for an empty nester. I use only a few of the rooms in the house, the master bedroom, kitchen, family room and indoor driving range. Someone could be living in one of the back rooms and I would have no clue. Immediately as you enter the house through the front door, to the left is a long room with a 20+' high ceiling and wet bar and wine closet on one end (I do not drink!) and a fireplace on the far end. If you were an interior decorator (or had any interior design acumen) you might have a sitting area at each end of the room. When I bought the house, the previous owner had a pool table in the room, which he offered to sell to me and I mistakenly declined. I thought it was gauche to have a pool table right off of the front entry. The room sat empty for a year or more until I was at the PGA Golf Superstore (again!) and saw the Izzo Giant Net. The picture on the link does not list the size specifications and does not do the Giant justice. It is huge! So instead of a pool/game room I have an indoor driving range (which is much cooler and not gauche at all). When I can't get to the local public driving range where you hit off of the hard dirt or to the lighted public driving range where you hit off of mats, I have my own private indoor driving range in my house! Generally, I keep the balls within the confines of the Giant, but I have had two accidents with the Giant and the indentations in the walls to show for it.
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