Golf Fore the Good

Yearly muni membership: $618

Blowing off work to play golf: Calling in one favor, $0

Greens fees: $0

Weather: Not nearly as nice as predicted.

Taking the first match of the season from my husband: priceless.

I don’t have to travel too far to play extreme golf these days. It’s right down the street at my home course. Sure, the course is open most days, but with weather just above freezing and that ever present north wind, it still takes a leap of faith to get out to play eighteen holes. A few of my friends have braved the links a couple of times lately; me, I’m still huddled in front of the fireplace, reading golf magazines. The good part is, I haven’t missed a putt or dumped a chip.

If braving late winter weather to play golf in southern New England doesn’t offer enough of a challenge for you, try these suggestions for playing extreme golf. Read more…

Dear Mr. So_and_So,

I was walking with my owner at the golf course yesterday, enjoying the quiet of the winter fairways in these days just before the course reopens. We were having a grand time chasing geese – or I was, anyway, while my owner tagged along carefully, doing her best to avoid everything that the geese had left behind. I cleared a large flock from the eleventh fairway and then went after a group on the twelfth tee. Then I chased after a few stragglers I had missed, a half dozen or so birds pecking about midway down the fairway. Why, you are wondering, should you care about my goose hunting abilities? Bear with me.

I dashed ahead, scooted away the last of the geese and, with my duty done, bolted into the woods to finalize the rest of my business. That’s when we found your golf club. More specifically, that’s when I found your club - actually, half of your golf club. It was like I had discovered the world’s best stick, and I emerged from a tangle of brambles with a two foot length of a golf club in my mouth, tail wagging with joy. Half shaft, half grip, could there be anything in the word more fascinating to a dog than something that looks like a stick and smells like a rubber ball? Apparently you are no longer as enamored of the stick as is am I, or you wouldn’t have left it there in the shrubbery of the twelfth hole. Read more…

Finally, there is light at the end of the tunnel. Really. I know this because the days of having my breakfast coffee in the pitch black are behind me for the season. The sun is actually peeking over the horizon even before the dog wakes up, and it stays light enough in the afternoon to take a half way decent walk in the afternoon. Yesterday, I pulled on my mud boots and headed to the golf course, to the absolute delight of the dog. Read more…