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Attention golf enthusiasts: I have just returned from a guys’ golf trip to Orlando—and can now impart valuable advice that will help you improve your game. So, take notes and learn from my 10 Points of Super-Wise Golf Wisdom.
1. When you duff your drive, it’s important to really glare at your club. Personally, I also like to rub it a bit—to suggest to the others in my group that, clearly, a microscopic piece of debris was responsible for my ball taking that sharp left turn and landing softly on the ladies’ tee. Alternately, I find that a timely wince or moan can suggest that a tweaked muscle is to blame—and not the fact that my backswing possesses all the elegance and precision of an epileptic chicken.
2. If you’re not playing well, it’s important to start drinking as early as possible. Take it from me: Drinking has the potential to really improve your score, though mostly by making you forget what just happened.
What did you have there?
—Put me down for a five.
Didn’t you go into the water? Twice? And also the parking lot and then that second parking lot?
—Fine, a six.
On the courses we played in Florida, the cart girl began making her rounds at 8 a.m.—though possibly that’s because she got tired of me standing outside her house and screaming, “When are you coming to work, Amber?”
3. When faced with a crucial putt, it is important to display confidence by cockily offering to double the agreed-upon wager. This way, you’re certain to lose twice as much money! (In addition to being terrible at golf, I am also a lousy gambler. And no, I’m not free to play in your foursome.)
4. When cash is on the line, things can quickly get competitive. But remember: The strictures of golf etiquette make clear that it is rude to talk when someone in your group is beginning his or her backswing. There’s nothing in there, however, about farting or klaxons.
5. Loud utterances of profanity tend to carry across a golf course, so please take others into consideration and be sure to select a really graphic and amusing expletive.
6. Some situational tips: When you flub an approach shot, pretend you were laying up. When you overshoot the green, pretend you’re happy to have avoided the bunkers. When you five-putt from 12 feet, pretend there is a God and that life on Earth is not some cruel, pitiless endurance test devised by a cold, uncaring universe.
7. It’s important to have the latest equipment. Based on my own experience, I can attest to the fact that today’s modern irons really deliver on distance, travelling at least five yards farther when hurled through the air in frustration. And the newest TaylorMade clubs stick nicely when tomahawked into a fairway!
8. Remember: The inventors of the game of golf long ago passed on. You cannot murder them. You can, however, find solace in dreaming of one day encountering them in heaven and kicking them right in their angel nuts.
9. If all else fails, know this: At a time when you could otherwise be working or enduring life’s many stresses, you are instead on a golf course. There are soft breezes and nice bird sounds. You are immersed in the beauty of the landscape and the many wonders of our natural world. And if you’re lucky, if the Fates are with you, a meteor will streak through the sky, crash into the clubhouse and burn the whole godforsaken course to the ground so that you never, ever have to play this stupid game again.
10. Do not drive your cart into a sand trap. Just don’t, OK? Take my word for it.
Scott Feschuk is a columnist for Sportsnet magazine