Winter 2023-24

It’s Saturday. Finally! The weekend. I can sleep in. But I don’t. I read the news and did Wordle etc before I made my oatmeal breakfast. Coffee with Baileys. Nothing much going on today. The pimped-up carts of golfers were pulling up to the forward tees all morning. No golf for me today, though.

I read for most of the day. Got interrupted a few times — Arlene booked one MORE golf game for us before they pack up the motorhome and head off to Phoenix on Friday. So the calendar now has Sunday, Tuesday, and Wednesday booked for golf.

I had a salad for lunch, then back to my book. I’ve got two big ‘new’ hardcover Trump books that I picked up at a thrift store in Bisbee when Naomi’s brother Wes and I were waiting for the tire shop to repair a flat tire for Wes’s camper. I don’t know if I even expected to read them, but here I am, twirling down into the sewer hole of Trump’s destruction of America. By early afternoon my arm was tired of holding the big tome, so I went online and found a Kindle version. Well, then I had to charge up my Kindle so I could continue on with my reading.

I’d bought a couple of gluten-free frozen pizzas, so for supper I unboxed one of them, added a layer of razor-thin pepperoni slices and another of shredded mozzarella, baked it on the rack in the oven, and washed the finish ‘product’ down with a glass of red wine. Not bad. Not great either.

Got a text from Naomi while I was baking the pizza — she needs a place to get some quiet time in between all her busy-ness with children and grandchildren. Well, there’s always MY house… I texted Alex who dispatched Tim to go over to my place and turn on the water and the heat. Actually, nothing is ever quite as easy as just turning something ‘on’ — but Tim managed to deal with a couple of leaky taps and even went back after his delayed supper to check on the place one more time before the end of the evening. My kids are so good to me!

I watched the local evening news on TV, wasted another hour skimming through all the uninteresting options on Netflix and Amazon Prime and anything else I could find — and finally settled on listening to some music while I quickly wrote this post before returning to my ‘book’. And that’ll be it for today. Looking forward to golfing back at Eagle Falls with Robert and Arlene tomorrow.

Woke up early, just as I always do — I think it was about 5:30 — still dark outside. I lay there quietly, trying not to wake up Naomi. It took me a few minutes before I realized that she was gone. Oh yeah… Naomi flew home yesterday. She’d texted me late last night that she was back in her ‘Victor Street’ house, safe and sound.

I spent far too much time lying in bed, reading on my phone. When I finally got out of bed, it was time for me to ‘hurry up’ and get ready for the day. It was cold this night, and for a while I thought I might actually wear long pants for today’s golf game. But by the time I’d had my oatmeal and banana, the sun had warmed things up considerably, and I left the house at around 9:20 in shorts and a golf shirt and only a light sweater.

The drive to Big Rock Golf Course was about 20 minutes. I’d golfed it with Robert & Arlene twice before, two years ago. I arrived and checked in. Soon the Dycks were there as well. We explored the clubhouse and the attached pub — the place is decorated with autographed guitars and posters and even a couple of ‘stage outfits’ worn by some of the rock stars whose signed guitars hung on the walls and ceiling. The Eagles, B.B. King, Metallica, Bob Dylan, Tom Petty, Bob Seger, etc. Fascinating! The guy behind the counter explained that one of the two owners was a big-time collector of the rock and roll instruments and signatures, and that all the items were for sale with the proceeds going to a cancer charity.

We putted a bit on the practice green and then headed off to the first tee. We were about to tee off when the started announced that we would have a fourth join our group. Tom, from Santa Monica, would be riding in the cart with me for the round.

My tee shot bounced through an iron fence and into the garden of one of the homes that lined the left side of the first fairway. Not an auspicious start. Meanwhile, Tom’s tee shot went straight and (very) far right down the middle of the fairway. We pulled up to where Tom said my ball had gone into the year; Tom stretched his arm in through the fence and managed to retrieve my ball. I set it on the fairway and with my next swing of the club, hit the ball across the fairway, into a big pond. I fished out the ball and took another whack at it. Sculled it right. The ball sailed across the pond, landed on the far shore — and then rolled down the hill and back into the pond. After a third swing I was finally on the green, lying seven!

Well, I won’t bore you with a play-by-play of all SIXTY strokes I took on those first nine holes.

The day turned out to be a very pleasant golfing day. Not hot, and not cold. And Tom was a fine golfer and a great cart partner — always positive and encouraging.

Before loading up the clubs and heading for home, Robert and Arlene invited me to join them for supper and a Jets game at the motorhome. I stopped in town to return a pair of shorts that Naomi had picked up for me to try on yesterday. Showered and changed and headed to the Dycks place for a 5 o’clock happy hour. The hockey game turned out about as good (Jets 3, Panthers 0) as the pork chops and Brussel sprouts Robert barbecued for dinner (i.e. superb).

When I got home I plunked myself down on the couch and watched a bit of TV until it was time to stumble off to bed.