Golf Cart Paparazzi

Before Day Camp, there was Golf (Outing).

Last Wednesday marked the first time that I have ever actually set foot on the golfing part of a golf course. After all, what's the point of hitting a small white ball and chasing it over well-mowed fields. I can't say my opinion has changed much, but a golf cart may be enough reason to try it again. The point of me being out at the course was for the Sheboygan Area Golf Outing for Scouting. Being that everyone who is anyone here golfs, it was a good place to see people and talk with them in a relaxed setting. It was a more comfortable type of schmoozing than other events I have worked. Since the boss had to okay me being there and that I don't sit still well, I was given work to do. Enter the golf cart.

Basically my job was to take a bunch of pictures of people golfing and such throughout the Outing for a slide show set to the song from Caddyshack (timed for 56 pictures). Thus informed, I was given a golf cart and took my camera (far nicer than the council's) and was sent onto the course knowing all but nothing about golf or where I was going. Golf courses are big. The outing was a shotgun start so the teams were as spread out as they could be so I wheeled off in my cart to find the teams in action. This was the first time I had driven a golf cart--the closest I have been before was a Gator--it needed more power. I managed to find some of the teams and began to learn some etiquette mostly by accident. At the second team I stopped to see, I ran into a district committee member who I have gotten to know well since his team mates didn't know me and saw the camera, I was immediately dubbed the paparazzi--a term that stuck throughout the remainder of the event.

A key thing I realized at about the same time was that getting hit by a golf ball while driving the cart would be bad. Getting hit would be bad anyways, but a wreck didn't appeal to me. Thankfully golf course topography (at least at this course) provides plenty of cover with the appropriate maneuvering. After allowing the teams to get their initial shots off, I dashed from hill to hill seeking to keep a hill between me and any potential golf balls. I felt a lot like I was driving a tank in WWII France--neat--all I need next time is a potato gun to shoot back.

Eventually I found my way back to the club house and headed to the resort to get the photos in for the presentation. To my pleasant surprise, they turned out pretty good. It would seem that after over 2000 pictures I am finally learning to use my camera. The local sportswriter that was MC even commented on it. Cool. It was a lot of fun and is something I look forward to doing next year.

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On a separate note, another movie review. Cinderella Man was pretty good. Russell Crowe may have been a chump in public lately, but he played the part of Jim Braddock (a boxer) fairly well. The movie revolved around his boxing comeback in the middle of the Depression after losing everything. It was a Ron Howard film so I was not too surprised that the movie had a bit more to it than boxing. I felt that it did a good job of showing the dichotomy of life in the Depression and a family's life on the not so good side of the times. It went by well and was well cast. I would say it was worth the price of admission, but I don't know if it will join my DVD collection. Coming tomorrow, War of the Worlds.