Wisguy

NFL: Da Bears - they have fans like Bearsfan above. They're about the only fans dumb and mean enough to bitch about everything to do with the sport, including their QB's bad play when it was obvious to everyone the guy was injured. If I'm driving on an interstate in Wisconsin and I've got a jack*ss riding 3' behind my bumper, odds are at least 3:1 that he's got Illinois plates (literally, no exaggeration - Chicago drivers are genuinely that awful). I used to hate the Cowfelons, but they're kind of insignificant right now. MLB: Yankees - a bunch of overpaid, prettyboy whiners NCAAF: 1) Michigan - they get too many undeserved, lucky wins against the Badgers. 2) SEC - Gotta love all that wonderful "tradition" (i.e. all decent players in the conference are not just scholarship players but are salaried) NCAAB: 1) Duke - the last half dozen Duke fans I've met have been obnoxious 2) Purdue - Badgers cannot seem to beat them in West Lafayette. Soccer: ALL. It's a dumb, boring game, period. Too many players doing nothing more than scurrying around meaninglessly on a too-big field with nothing ever happening. It's about the only sport where the fans will say a 0-0 tie is "BRILLIANT!!!" - it's not, it means that nothing whatsoever happened, as opposed to the other matches where nothing at all of consequence happens more than 99% of the match. Try to comment negatively about soccer and the standard retort is "You're just ignorant about the sport!" this coming from a group who (outside of the U.S. at least) who make Bears fans look like intelligent, well-spoken, polite people. When said players actually get a 10 second portion of the entire game when they are not just scurrying (sorry, but grown men should not engage in scurrying) and are near the ball, there's a 50% chance that they're going to fall over and "dive" (whiner soccer player pretends he got hurt by a "foul" and does crybaby act trying to convince ref to throw a penalty flag). Really swell sport, guys.

I hope it's a short-lived fad. With all of the reality TV crap on nowadays instead of shows featuring acting or programming on history and science, I sure as hell hope that our sports programming doesn't get watered down any further with more soccer. If anyone thinks that more soccer is what he or she needs in his or her life, here's a suggestion: Take a small object (a coin or golf ball will do), go stand in front of a mirror, and throw the ball from your right hand into your left hand, then throw it back to your right. Do this for 100 minutes. If you can get to 200 tosses without dropping it, scream "YYYYYYYYYYYYYYYEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEESSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!" and run around like a ninny with your hands in the air for five minutes. If you drop it with your left hand, exclaim "Brilliant defense by the right! BRILLIANT!!!!!" or vice versa if your right hand drops it. There you have it - you have exactly replicated the entire experience of a soccer match, without needing to inflict an activity less exciting than watching paint dry upon the mostly sane inhabitants of the United States.

Try Golf Pad. I could never get Golf Logix to go more than about 12-14 holes before it killed my battery on my old HTC Android phone and even on my newer HTC One V, and I like Golf Pad better - I might be able to play 36 holes before it drains the battery.

No, your joke was a good one, hardly a fail, just because it went over the head of a Euro or two. You have to try to be understanding, and realize that this fellow likely thinks that soccer is an exciting sport, so you can't have too high of expectations when it comes to anything relating to entertainment - Hell, he probably lives in a country where Jerry Lewis or David Hasselhoff are worshipped with near-godlike reverence. Wonder what that GolfSnowMan guy did to get himself banned after only 6 posts. EDIT: n/m - I saw a few of his posts and good riddance.

It only happened once, when he posted a silly hypothetical on a golf website. I figure that he really only needs three fingers on a hand to grab a bag or a club and now he won't waste so much time on a computer keyboard.

eBay, especially now that the season is winding down. You can buy a decent set of 1-2 year old irons for under $200, maybe even under $100 this time of year. Don't be lazy with punctuation, spelling and grammar - it's childish. Adults write properly and expect other adults to do the same.

How often does that happen? Probably more frequently than most women encounter on average in their jobs, but it can't be any worse than a waitress at a bar. A little can of pepper spray visibly dangling from one of those stretchy bracelets will deter all but a blind drunk or serial criminal. And aren't golfers more gentlemanly than the average bloke, anyway?

I doubt it. If you could consistently hit the shots I saw Choi and Chang play last summer that I described, under tournament pressure, you wouldn't be spending 10+ hours a day on this internet forum you created, you'd be out on the PGA Tour making seven figures a year. Like it or not, that is the honest truth, unless you're the 1-in-10,000 (hell, maybe 1-in-100,000) golf pro who genuinely never dreamed of being a successful tour pro. This is a big, old thread, I didn't re-read all of it, and some of the negativity I recall seeing on this forum toward LPGA players may have been in other threads, but there are definitely posts on this forum that use a very condescending tone to discuss the skills and competitiveness of LPGA players. I concede that based on the objective statistics, the LPGA players are not the equal of the PGA and European Tour players in terms of skill, obviously strength, and depth of field (and have never contended to the contrary), but so what? Why is it important to the several people in this thread to point out "Women aren't as good"? People have commented that Sorenstam choked [not even a whole lot], under enormous pressure, in the one PGA event she played, as if that one incident somehow proves anything. She also shot a freakin' 59 on a better day, something that very few men have ever done even on their very best practice rounds under no pressure. Annika Sorenstam was an extraordinary athlete and anyone contending otherwise is ignorant. And she's not the only one who has ever played on the LPGA tour, even if that tour has had less competition and fewer legendary athletes than the men's tours. I personally don't feel any need, that some people do, to strike up these debates comparing the genders. I can appreciate, applaud, and be entertained by a golfer's skill regardless of whether or not a skirt is allowable work attire for that athlete. But hey, if you feel better making the argument that "Men are better," then good for you, go pat yourself on the back.

I've also noticed fewer beer carts on the courses over the past few years than there used to be. I don't understand this. If they sell only 4-5 beers per hour, typically at 200-400% markup, they are more than breaking even on cart fuel and wages. A reasonably assertive beer cart girl can sell a heck of a lot more beer and other beverages with a cute smile and a nice tan than will ever be sold by leaving it up to customers to approach the bar before the round or at the turn. Quite a few posts back a new member posted claiming that she is a beer cart girl and making a vague comment about how tough she has it. Let's review the life of a beer cart girl: - Spends 2 minutes wiping down a beer cart, about what an average restaurant server spends busing 1-2 tables if there are no busboys. - Spends 5-10 minutes schlepping ice to the cart and stocking the cart first thing in the morning, then a total of maybe another 10 minutes refilling it throughout the day, plus another 5-10 minutes dumping the ice and cleaning out the cart at the end of the day. So we've got a total of no more than half an hour of actual labor over the course of an entire work day. And if she's cute, manipulative, and there's a high school or college kid working in or around the clubhouse, she may very well ask him (or maybe it's even in his job duties) to lug the ice and beverages to the cart for her. - Sits on her cute little arse on a comfy, well-cushioned beer cart seat about 85% of the workday. - Works on terrific tan that makes all of her sorority sisters jealous back at school in September. - Says "Can I get you anything?" or "Need anything?" a dozen or two times an hour. - Leisurely gets up off said perky, cute little arse, walks two steps to cooler, reaches inside, pulls out beverage, hands to customer, and pretends, with difficulty, to calculate change hoping to keep whole amount tendered. As opposed to walking briskly back and forth 40-100 feet from dining area to kitchen dozens of times per hour, sometimes carrying up to 15 or so pounds of food, plates, drinks, etc... sometimes for 2-3 hours without more than a 30 second break other than to take an order, which is what a typical restuarant server does (in my youth, I got more backaches as a waiter than I did working construction, notwithstanding the up to 1000% greater weight of stuff I carried on a construction site). - Gets typically a $1/can of beer tip. So say that's the usual "keep the change" when handed a $5 bill on a $4 beer, that's a 25% tip, for doing very little in comparison to a restaurant server, who typically will be getting an average of 15% plus or minus a few percent on tips. - If she's cute and a bit assertive, she's flirting with many of the predominantly male golfers on the course and getting significantly more than a 25 % tip. - Once or twice a day she may have to smile demurely and deflect an aggressive pick-up line from a customer who she's successfully sold multiple drinks. - Even if it's 100* outside, she's wearing a tank top, shorts, and sandals plus gets a cool breeze most of the day driving to and fro. - And if she likes golf, she probably gets free range balls and free rounds every day after work. Yep, that's one grueling job for a college girl to perform. They do about 20% of the work of a restaurant server for 1/3 (or more) better tips. I bet I'm not the only guy on this forum who watched a hot beer cart girl working a foursome for generous tips and said to himself "In my next life, it definitely would not suck to be reborn as a beer cart girl."

Here's a couple of motivational topics you can bring up: tell your kid that golf is the only sport where one can come pretty close to replicating or even very occasionally doing better than a pro. Also, tell your kid that if he/she works especially hard on putting and chipping, they might be able to beat dad. In no other sport can an elementary school-aged kid take on an adult and genuinely have any chance of beating them head-to-head, as one could with a chipping or putting competition. Most kids get wide-eyed at the thought that they could compete with and even have a chance to beat their parents at anything, let alone a sport. I've had my daughter in First Tee programs on Thursday evenings or Saturday mornings the past two years, as pretty much every other juniors golf program in our area assumed that only one of the kid's two parents worked and had lessons typically schedued for 10 a.m. on weekday mornings. As someone else mentioned, the program is for all kids, not just disadvantaged ones. A good thing about the program is that they have a number of kids sets of clubs available to use at no extra charge, although almost every kid in my daughter's sessions has had his or her own clubs. Last year's lessons were pretty uneven because the instructor loved the game of golf quite a bit more than he loved teaching the game to kids, but this year the lessons with two other instructors have been excellent. Things to look for in a good kids golf program: are the kids paying attention or always looking around? Do they have a bored look on their faces or are they smiling a lot? Does the instructor seem to be having a good time and is he/she enjoying being around the kids, or is the lesson a chore? Are the kids getting good encouragement and positive feedback? Are they playing games and contests to make things more fun? Hi-fives are one of the best kids teaching tools ever invented, but beware an instructor who wants to have contact with a kid that's more than just a quick hand slap, shoulder pat or adjustment of hands on the grip - at a golf expo this winter to which I took my daughter, an assistant at one course's booth started trying to hug my daughter and pet her hair, so we got out of there fast and I e-mailed the head pro about it, as it was inappropriate. Be patient and careful you don't try too much coaching, as most kids seem resistant to taking much, if any, advice from mom or dad. Be super supportive and enthusiastic about as much as you can - if the swing was smooth, compliment that even if the ball didn't go very far. Emphasize that it's a hard sport even for adults and it requires a lot of patience, but eventually good shots will happen. Watching your kid make progress is terrific. I took my daughter out a number of times last year and she had a number of 40 yard shots, a few 50 yard shots and one that went 80 yards. Two weeks ago I took her out again on a quiet afternoon on a 9-hole muni course and she had at least 5 shots over 70 yards, she hit one green from 80 yards out and ended up putting from 10" off the back fringe (legitimately beating me on that hole by 2 strokes after I hit my tee shot off the toe so badly it ricocheted off two trees and ended up going backwards) and on a 93 yard par-3, she had a tee shot that was pin-high and just left of the green.

I'd encourage some of you sneering at LPGA players to go to an LPGA tournament the next time one is nearby. Some of the criticisms are definitely true - they take too damn long having their caddies line up every putt for them, and those having a bad round are likely to be playing much worse golf than a typical PGA player who's not going to make the cut. However, follow one of the last half dozen groups on a Saturday or Sunday and you are likely to see some sensational shots, ones that most male scratch golfers are not going to be able to pull off. At the 2012 US Women's Open, I watched Na Yeon Choi and Amy Yang hit hybrids to clear a creek surrounding the front of the green over 200 yards out, both dropping their shots closer to the pin than most of the people on this board would likely hit with a wedge from half that range. I am confident that not a single person on this board could have pulled off that shot more than once in five, maybe ten times and most would have put their balls into the creek. I took my daughter to a local kids event this summer featuring Sherry Steinhauer and even the course's assistant pros (guys half her age) were looking enviously at her hitting balls on the range, commenting "That's a beautiful swing." LPGA golf is a lot more comparable to the men's game and a lot more entertaining than, say, Div. I women's basketball compared to Div. 1 men's basketball. There are some guys on this board who express contempt and bitterness toward LPGA players that seems unjustified and rather puzzling. Maybe one of you guys posted after getting home from a blind date that ended suddenly after the woman got a mid-date call from her "sister" and she had to end the date early because "her mom is sick" or another one of you stomped off to his laptop after his significant other asked "I know it is supposed to happen to all guys occasionally, but is it supposed to happen this often?" I really don't understand the urge some of you have to bash female golfers. I guess when I was a kid my mom gave me enough praise and hugs so I don't feel a need to cop a Taliban-like attitude toward women.

Well, you're twisting things a bit to make fun of the high handicapper and make him seem ironically dumb. I never said there wasn't value to the points that Floyd makes in this book - of course there is - he gives good advice that would be very good for a beginner to learn and for a more experienced golfer to remember to implement. But >95 % of his advice is golf common sense and is fairly obvious if the reader has been playing for long. I just don't understand how it is that someone who could be playing this sport for however long it took to be a sub-5 handicapper could find much, if anything, in this book that he didn't already know. You'll note that in 5 months, no one can articulate a reason why they found Floyd's advice so profound or helpful. Actually, looking back on this thread, I think it's funny how a TST Forum Leader can overlook at least four prior posts on this thread where I've said the advice was good sound advice and then mischaracterize what I wrote. I don't think I'd want to do business with someone like Turtleback who is too lazy to read what is plainly written or lax with accuracy and candor on a whim like that. Good thing this is just an internet forum.

Well, right now my favorite golfer is my daughter. She's been taking lessons for two years and has had some occasional highlights, including an 80-yard 7-iron as a 6 year-old last summer and a comment from one of the highschool kids who served as assistant coaches in a local kids golf league that she was hitting the ball better than some of the 10 year olds, but an inconsistent back swing that often gets pretty vertical and a tendency to aim way to the right have hindered her progress a bit. As is the case with many younger kids, she is also very resistent to any sort of advice, coaching or other input from mom or day on any sport, too, so it's hard to help her improve her play. I took her out to a local muny par-3 last night that offers free golf for kids on Sunday afternoons. On a 170 yard hole my tee shot was so bad it was comical, coming off the toe , ricocheting backward twice and coming to a rest under a tree slightly behind the tee box, completely unplayable. In contrast, she hit a 50 yard hybrid, a 40 yard 7-iron, both in the fairway, and as we stood in the fairway 80 yards out, I told her "You can definitely hit the green from here - I know you can do it!" Surprisingly, she let me adjust her aim about 30 degrees left, asked me if her practice swing was round instead of too vertical, then swung a terrific swing with a crisp click on the clubface. Her ball arced down the fairway, hit the front of the green, and came to rest 9 inches off the green in the back. She missed her bogey putt by only 3" and ended up beating me, legitimately, by two strokes on the hole. Altogether, she had seven shots of 70 yards or better, she let me give her a few pointers without complaint and even asked me for advice a few times. On the last hole we played, a 90 yard par-3, she was pin-high just off the green with her little hybrid. I managed to have two pitches and 9-iron (which honestly looked like it might have gone in the hole) to within 10 feet which impressed the heck out of her and we exchanged a bunch of high-fives. At the end of the round I asked her if it was fun hitting so many good shots and she nodded her head vigorously and gave me a hug, saying "Thank you Daddy for taking me out today! I loved this course!"

Several people here have said that Tiger would have cashed that check instantly - why? On what basis do you make that prediction? Changing topics, from what I've heard, betting during practice rounds is pretty much standard for most tour players, but are there any well-known players who have a policy of not gambling?

If someone like this wanted to gamble, I would say "Only on par-3s - we'll play closest to the pin and the only shots that count are tee shots that hit the green." That pretty much eliminates any potential for cheating unless someone says "Say, is that a bald eagle" and points away at the sky, then kicks his ball closer to the hole when everyone is distracted. I think that only works on bad sitcoms, though.

If I was to make as many generalizations as you do, I would say that someone making as many inaccurate, ignorant statements about golf could not be a 6 handicap golfer and may not even be more than an occasional golfer, but is more likely a bored individual who likes to troll internet forums. However, assuming you are who you claim to be, you are nonetheless obviously very much lacking in knowledge about how most people play golf. By your standards, 80+% of golfers must be idiots or morons. I can assure you that golfers who keep the ball on or near the fairway nearly every shot are in a fairly small minority. You have a very naive, black-or-white view of golf - there are those who think as you do and the rest are imbeciles in your very narrow world. The juvenile name-calling and extreme opinions make it seem as if you are compensating for some sort of inadequacies in your life. The reason I've only broken 90 once isn't because I lack skills to hit various shots, it is because I am inconsistent, largely from lack of practice. I've had a busy schedule this summer and have only had clubs in my hands once in the past month, at a range. It's not unheard of for me to have pars or bogeys on half the holes in a round. But I seldom go a round without a few blow-up holes that sky-rocket my scores. I think a lot of golfers who are scoring in the 90-105 range are similar - I don't think I stand out as some sort of anomaly on the golf course. One of the things I like the most about golf is that unlike just about any other sport, every so often, I can sometimes hit a shot that is so good that that I could beat a pro - if I took the ten best golfers in the world, dropped their balls from the same spot and gave them each 2 tries, my shot still might be the best of the lot. A few years back I sky-ed a 5-W off the tee, landing it only 140 yards out in the fairway on a short par-4 with a 90* dog leg right with trees just blocking my view of the green. I was about 190 yards out, the green was about the smallest I've ever seen, with a pretty steep hill banking the left side, and the "smart" play would have been to hit wedge, wedge. But instead, I visualized a fade into the hill, banking the ball onto the green. I loosened up my grip, opened up the clubface, aimed left of the green and swung my 4-iron. The ball gently curved around the corner, bounced off the hill, and came to a rest less than 3 feet from the pin, exactly as I visualized it. Even though I might have to hit ten more shots from that spot before I even got another ball on the green, I remember that shot. I don't remember shots where I successfully laid up in front of a creek instead of going for the green. I'd rather shoot a 99 but have two memorable holes than shoot a 91 but not remember a single shot the following week. So even though it may cause some internet golf opinionboi to call me an "idiot" or "moron," some of the time I'm still going to try to hit the 280 yard draw out to the middle of the fairway, the 205 yard 4-iron onto the green, shots I know I'm capable of hitting because I've hit them before (in the real world, on a golf course, not an internet exaggeration), even if I recognize that odds may be less than 50% that I'll nail that shot.

The highlighted portion of your statement above is simply wrong (well, to honest, most of what you are saying is wrong) and it puzzles me why someone who claims to have as much experience as you allege can be so oblivious to the realities of playing golf - in the real world, there are more factors that influence scoring than having precision in ball striking, as you assert. Course management (i.e. hitting dumber, riskier shots instead of safe ones) can easily be responsible for a 10+-shot swing in score on a bad day for a higher handicap player and will account for at least several strokes even on a decent day. KW, the problem with your argument is that it makes a number of inaccurate assumptions. It assumes that higher handicappers have the same problems with all of their clubs and that those same problems would lead to the same bad results no matter what. As Dave mentioned above, no one is slicing a 7-iron two fairways over, as they might do with a driver. A typical higher handicapper might very easily, on a bad driving day, slice 5+ balls into the woods, in a lake, or OB using a driver but would make fewer bad shots with an iron and with those iron tee shots that are poorly struck, he would be able to find and play most if not all of them. Five lost balls - that's a whole lot of strokes lost, far more than would be accounted for by having to hit three shots to get on a par-4 or four shots to get on to a par-5; higher handicap players are only hitting at most a few GIR a round, so they'd still likely be pitching or chipping their third or fourth shots anyway. Plus, for every ball sliced 150 yards to the right that is playable and not lost, figure at least one extra shot to get it back in play; if the fairways are separated by a line of trees (very common on most of the courses that I've played), that could easily add up to several more shots dealing with shots into trees. Think about the times you hit to lay up versus when you are going for the green on a long shot where you'll have to hit hard - which one do you hit more successfully? I bet I am at least 3x more likely to hit an easy swing shot 100-150 yards out onto the fairway in my target layup area than get within easy chipping distance when the green is over 200 yards away. Playing mid-irons off the tee would be the same thing, a nice easy swing is a more accurate swing. Have you ever seen a shot dispersion study? The longer the club, the farther it will be hitting from center of the fairway on average. You are also assuming that all par-4s are much longer than they tend to be playing from the white tees - I'd say the average par-4 is about 360yds, not 400 yards, and the average high handicapper is hitting a 400+ yard hole in regulation no more than once out of four or five tries at the most, anyway. Two reasonable 7-irons in a row will put me about 300-320 out, with a 40-60 yard pitch, not a difficult shot (at least not difficult to hit a green - getting it within one-putt range is a different story with a less-than-full swing).

Wear shorts instead of pants - that will make it feel at least 3-5 degrees cooler, at least to your lower body. I remember watching a John Deere Classic some years back during a heatwave. Robert Damron, not one of the more flat-bellied players on tour, was up there on the leaderboard and they kept showing him sweating through his pants. It really looked damn silly, hardly classier than if he had been wearing shorts. The mens' tours should have a shorts-allowed-for-heat-index-above-85-degree-days policy.

I think I bought this same putter about six years ago at Farm & Fleet on clearance for $12 while wandering around the store waiting for an oil change - does it look a bit like a Federation starship, with a white insert that doesn't actually soften the impact much? I think I made some longer putts with it, did worse with mid and shorter putts, took it out of my bag in favor of my old putter after a few uses, and it has disappeared to that same place that single socks go when you put a pair of them in the washer and dryer. I was looking for it earlier this year to give to a friend and have no idea what I did with it.

The same thing happened to me on a really long drive I hit on my favorite hole on a local course, partially cutting a corner on a dogleg, but with a red fox instead of a coyote. He moved my ball about 10 yards back before dropping it. Damned if I was going to let some fleabag steal 10 yards off my drive, so I put it back about where it had been.

Nonsense. What's hard to buy about this? Almost every single high handicapper would score better if he played only a pair of 7-irons on his first two shots on par-4s or would use a 5W/hybrid, followed by a 7-iron and use a 7-iron to wedge for the third shot on par-5s. If I played ultra-careful, completely uneventful golf, I'm sure it would take 3-5 strokes off my average round. A stroke or two a round can make the difference between subsistence living and being a millionaire on the pro tour, but for a high handicapper, the benefit in scoring lower wouldn't be worth the cost in occasional really satisfying shots. I'd save 10 strokes on some rounds if I left my driver and 3W at home, but it's worth the cost to me to be able to have a round when I've got my swing working and be able to draw a drive 260+ yards down the fairway a few times a round. There's a course I play on vacation that has a signature hole, a 285 yard par-4 with at least a 100' vertical elevation on the tee box. I don't remember the 6-irons I hit to the fairway or the many strokes I've lost slicing or hooking my 3W into the woods. I do remember the 3W I hit that bounced off and over the green and the other one that landed a few feet short of it that I chipped to tap-in distance. I don't play golf to methodically move a small spherical object around an outdoor setting in the fewest possible numbers of physical contacts with the face of my elongated playing instrument . I suspect that a lot of other people feel the same way.

There is no way on earth you can possibly putt as well with a $30 putter as you could with any $200 or $300 putter - only a total clown forgets the proven fact that the equipment makes the golfer. I have this on good authority from the marketing departments of a number of high end club manufacturers. And from the people who bought $300 putters who don't want to admit they may have paid too much for their equipment, based on the fact that their PPG average this year is no different than it was last year playing a $30 putter. I wasted some time at a Dick's Sporting Goods practice putting green this spring while my wife was shopping at the mall, discovered I could make a ton of putts with Ping Half Wack-E putter on sale for $89 and declared that should be my Father's Day present this year. Funny thing is that while I'm pretty sure I'm 3-putting less, I'm not actually making any more (maybe even fewer) long and medium putts than I did with my old putter and, as has been the case with every single latest-greatest-guaranteed-to-shave-strokes new club I've ever bought, it does not actually seem to have lowered my scores at all.

Well, when you put it that way, I suppose it is pretty egregious, despicable behavior to spend 4-5 seconds or so looking around for a broken tee, bending over, picking it up and walking a step or two to the center of the tee box. Forget the fact that on a weekend morning, there's usually a five minute wait for the group ahead as it approachees the green and putts out, or if the course is not busy, there may be no one behind us. I'm sure it backs up the whole course behind me for hours every time I commit this unpardonable sin.... Or it could be that like 95% of golfers, I've got 3-4 tees of varying lengths in my pocket so if I can't find a broken one in a few seconds, I grab a new short one out of my pocket at the same time I get a ball. I'd say I find an unbroken tee on at least 3 tee boxes a round as I walk off toward the cart or toward my ball, not because I'm wasting time scrounging around for one but because there are typically so many of them lying about. I think a lot of people also pick up perfectly good tees they find, not because they are so financially depleted by buying equipment that they cannot afford so they have to skimp elsewhere, but because it simply makes sense to bend over to grab an occasional found tee and help clean the tee box of clutter. Ray, have you really ever known a single person with high end clubs who couldn't afford to buy tees, or did you just make that up?

OP, as others have mentioned, how is it any of your (*

OK, so I load the whole family's clubs into the roof rack and am excited to play a round with my wife and daughter from the family tees from Katke, then a round by myself at The Pines at Lake Isabella. But a couple of partial days of rain last week sort of set back other plans and the early week golf round got pushed back to mid week and then late week. Then I take a peek at some rates on Golfnow.com and find that I can get a 9:48 tee time at Tullymore for $37 on Saturday morning. Unfortunately, my daughter really wanted to go canoeing and fishing on our last full day of vacation, so I passed on the golf. Turns out it was the right move - my daughter caught her first fish with a lure, a little 9" largemouth, I caught the fish that won the family fishing tournament (an 11.5" bass, largest of the 20 or so we caught that all were in the 8.5"-11" range) and we had a great time out on the lake. So the clubs stayed put in the roof rack the whole trip. If we end up going back next year, I'm definitely playing some golf, though. It looks like there really are a lot of great courses in Michigan.