It’s a sad indictment of the times that we Ballbashers find ourselves in that Nick’s very elegant latest Apple watch first of all focuses on telling him that he is still alive and secondly gives him the distance to the next green. I am not sure if it also tells the time but, if so, that probably comes relative to the next scheduled Pilates lesson rather than Greenwich Mean Time. A useful extra for Nick would be if it automatically sent a message to the Temple kitchen to put today’s cake into the oven when he is on the 14th tee.
Following on from my round yesterday, the Apple watch would sell itself instantly to me, if it could somehow rectify the problem that I was having on every green with playing the shortest shot in golf with the smallest club. I must have missed at least 12 routine putts always by the smallest of margins and always because I did n’t hit the ball in the right direction. At one stage, one of my playing partners, Mike W, stood behind me and told me after I had yet again missed a 4 foot putt, that I was lined up left and my putter was pointing left. You will quickly guess that I missed the next one on the right-hand side.
Other than that small wrinkle, yesterday’s game was a relative pleasure with no frost in sight and buggies and electric trolleys all allowed. The chilly wind reminded us that it was only the 1st February when, in times long gone, our PE teacher, being of the standard masochistic variety, would send us on a long cross-country run across iron-hard fields in old leather football boots.
The balls fell so that MikeW, Nick and myself went out as a 3-ball followed by Roger/Bill and Alan/JohnT. Of our trio, only Mike played with any real quality and that was after a shaky start with 2 points after 3 holes. He finished up with 37 points which was a clear 9 points ahead of his nearest challengers which happened to be Nick and me who finished on 28 each. All of the elements of Mike’s game were working well – perhaps he was just feeling super-relaxed, knowing that he was about to depart to Costa Rica for 3 weeks in the sun, nowhere near a golf club.
Against the backdrop of Mike sinking putts with gay abandon, I was running through the full gamut of Anglo-Saxon expletives as each putt missed each hole. So much so, that I am ashamed to report that Mike questioned whether or not such phrases were permitted in polite Ballbasher golfing circles.
Of course the Great God of Golf, keen not to lose one of his playthings, allowed me to sink a long’ish putt on the 18th for a birdie, knowing that, fool as I am, I will be thereby back for more punishment next week.
We finished in 3 and a half hours and retired to the clubhouse for lunch where we waited for another hour before the 4-ball arrived by which time Mike had left to search out his bathers for his upcoming trip. It still enabled us to have our regular medical update on the current crop of disadvantaged Ballbashers, which with Apple watches in our midst, can now be virtually in real-time – we were certainly able to see that Nick’s pulse was ticking along nicely, in expectation of eating the slice of cake in front of him.
The team results turned out to be:
Mike/Nick/Richard 18 + 21 = 39 (scooping all of the BashCoins, thanks to Mike)
Roger/Bill 14 + 19 = 33
Alan/JohnT 16 + 15 = 31
The league results were:
Mike (37), Nick & Richard (28), Bill (25), Roger (22), Alan & John T, 20.
