B-days & Trophies on course

Forgot to mention in my last post that another birthday has come and gone.  I think the universe is giving me hints to just stay at home more these days.  Started when my golf partner decided he could not get together for a golf birthday bash with me; he did call to sing Happy Birthday (much surprised) and promised he would "make it up to me."  Hmmm not sure about that one coming from a guy, especially since he still owes me for the last round of golf we played :) but hey I am an optimist!  I decided to play a round that day since surely the golf gods would smile on such a special day for me.  The gods were hit and miss!  Arrived on a Friday morning to a really quiet course!  The early morning retirees were already half way through and there was just no one else around.  So as is unfortunately becoming my norm, I played alone.  Did shoot a 77 so that was good.  That evening again my karma began to hit a wall.  Ended up with just one other girlfriend going out; she did her best to find a happening place to have fun, but -- and I am not kidding here -- all the places we went were DEAD!   Even a local well known nightclub known for its nightlife was almost empty, probably good since I'm not really nightclub person.  Had some good but expensive drinks though.  We decided to just stick with our local OTB where the bartenders know us and the shaken margaritas are GREAT and affordable -- plus chips and salsa always a hit :)

Haven't played as much golf lately and some frustrations when I have.  My golf partner/swing czar has been very, very ill this past weekend and in the hospital (here's hoping better soon), but now out and hopefully recovering.  Will be at least 3 weeks before ready to play again and know he will be chomping at the bit to get back out there.  I was VERY worried and concerned and just distracted me from wanting to play plus led to lack of sleep.

With start of semester and friend's illness I just have not been in right mindset to play as much.  When I have played... well it has been interesting....Let me start here by saying that some folks just need a slap to the back of the head occasionally to rattle their brains.  Two very recent experiences are examples.

One was a day I went to play and the course was not very busy and so off I went (yes on my own again LOL). I started catching a twosome ahead of me even though I was playing two balls; it was clear that I was gaining on them.  Soon I was forced to wait longer and longer for them at tee boxes and in fairways and they were in no hurry.  They also had NO intention of letting me play through although there was NO ONE in front of them for at least 2 holes.  In fact they would deliberately turn away and hurry to the next tee box if I came up to the green behind them.  Very, very frustrating and the round just slowed to a crawl. Now I must admit I do not much care for slow golf and this rudeness just began to make my temperature boil.  I ended up behind them the rest of the round and had other groups then waiting behind me.  If you are slowing other folks down and there is space ahead of you, then let folks play through. Now my golf partner has frankly told me that part of this is because they just do not want to let a woman play through; if true, really sad :(

The other little topic I just must mention is men who bring their "trophy" women (wives or girlfriends) to the course on BUSY days like weekends in primetime.  Now my golf partner uses this term quite a bit and I think most of you know of which I speak here.  But last week must have been "bring your trophy day" to the course -- it was loaded with men (mostly older) with young ladies who had NO clue about golf.  It is great if you want to bring your lady to the course and help her learn but not during the peak hours of the weekend; and this should especially be true if the trophy is not at LEAST a "7"!  So the rest of us had to endure these spectacles of clueless ladies who mainly did not play but would every other shot or so be given a "hands on" lesson.  This greatly slowed down the pace of play.  The gentlemen with whom I was playing were clearly aggravated by this and began to make comments.  With so many of them (I counted 5 such twosomes that I could see alone), I started aggravated but then just found it funny and sad.  You could see the guys were trying to impress the other men on the course with their women (again I reiterate they need to be at least a "7" for that to be the case) and they just loved being able to put their arms around the ladies or give them a pat on the fanny when they had swung the club -- even if the lady missed it! The guys were also trying to show off for the women.  What I found particularly humorous was when a couple of the guys were trying to appear to be really great golfers but kept duffing shots!  LOL [Hopefully he did not need to be a good golfer to impress the woman!]  One guy in my group, after watching a real spectacle on the green ahead of us as we had to wait endlessly in the middle of the fairway, turned to me after the trophy hit a putt into the hole from about a foot and had jumped up and down and then hugged and smooched her man before they finally got off the green, and said "that just gives women's golf a bad name; why don't you go give her some lessons?"  I just smiled and said "that is not women's golf and why don't you go give him some common sense?"  We all burst out laughing.  At the end of the round when I had shot a 79, my golfing group all shook my hand and told me how much fun they had playing golf with a really nice lady who sure knew how to golf and they were sorry it had taken more than 5 hours although they enjoyed the company!  So what a day it was on the course!