And the Winner Is.... Me

My church's silent auction dinner tonight went much better than expected. My expectations were to make around $800 to go toward mission trip. At best I thought we might clear $1000. When it was all said and done we pulled in $1199 and everyone seemed to have a really good time. But having our most successful fundraiser ever isn't the only thing I'm excited about.

Our crown jewel of the auction was two 7-day passes to the Crown Plaza Invitational at the Colonial Country Club. This, of course, is a leg of the PGA tour featuring some of the top golfers in the world. Last years winner Phil Mickelson will be back again this year to defend in what will likely be an exciting tournament. The listed value on the tickets was $360, but I knew they would sell for much lower than that, giving someone a great value. I hoped they would sell for as little as $150 which is the most my mom was willing to spend on them. But when I glanced at the auction sheet in the middle of the night and saw it was already up to $160,I couldn't help but be a little disappointed. After I called the close of the auction, the sheets were collected and brought to me to read off the winners for each price. "Winner of 4 passes to Rave Theaters... Winner of 2 fun family packs at Putt-Putt... Winner of a $25 gift certificate to Mexican Inn..." and so on and so forth. Obviously I would wait until the end to announce the winner of the Colonial tickets, building as much suspense as I could. In fact my plan was to read all of them, except the Colonial tickets and fake as if that was it and I was trying to secretly steal the 7-day passes. But when it came time for my little rouse, I glanced down to see who the winner really was, and I was completely caught off guard by the name I saw. "Carol Howton - $210" I proudly read off the winning name and followed with an enthusiastic, "Thank you mom!"

So now I am the proud owner of two 7-day passes to a PGA event. Of course the main event is Thursday - Sunday, but there is something going on everyday starting Monday, May 25th. Monday and Wednesday both feature a pro-am event, Tuesday is reserved for the pros to practice (which should offer some uncrowded picture taking opportunities), and then Thursday begins the Tournament proper. Initially I thought I would be giving away half of my passes, but as I think about it, this definitely seems worth it to take off work for an entire week. I can easily see myself hanging out for 12 hours a day being a golf groupie... but now the question becomes, which golfer am I going to follow and obsess over?

A Fun New Game for the Pool

As many of you may know, my sister, Denise, plays golf with the Special Olympics. No, she is not very good. In fact she's pretty lousy[1], but she has a lot of fun playing and isn't that what it's all about[2]? Yesterday she had golf practice and her partner had something come up at the last minute. Fortunatly I was free and able to fill in. However, Denise doesn't really like playing with me very much because she says I'm too serious when we play. She is probably right. Regardless, we joined up with another pair and set out at Meadowbrook Golf Course to play a round of nine.

If you've play Meadowbrook before then you are well aware of the 8th hole. It's a truely unique hole. About 220 yards off the tee you'll encounter a 90 degree dog-leg to the right. You'll then have to hit the ball anoth 150 yards up a very steep hill. The difficulty of this hole is rediculous. I drive an excellent tee shot here. The hit was a little off line from what I intended but the ball carries quite well off of a tree and I end up in a pretty good spot to try and hit up the hill. As our group is rounding the dog leg we here some noises coming from one of the houses that border the golf course. It's sounds like kids playing, possibly swimming. The trees are thick and we can't really see through, but the kids are loud and easily heard. It's sounds at first like they are playing the classic game of Marco Polo. But then we realize Marco Polo isn't the name they're chanting. We listen for a second and then we realize what they are saying... Barack Obama. They weren't playing Marco Polo at all they were playing Barack Obama[3].

I found it a little hard to concentrate after that, mainly from the laughing. Not that it would have mattered, Denise and I were getting beaten badly by the other pair playing with us. But that's okay, we had fun, and that what it's really all about[4].


1. But aren't we all.
2. Actually that's not what its about. The inventors of the sport never intended for it to be fun or enjoyable.
3. I wonder what you call instead of "fish out of water"?
4. see number [2].