Day 175: Oh Momma, Golf.

Update: 206.2 lbs, 50 lb Goal Reached Day 124. 8 lbs to 60 lb goal.

Note: I fully expect a few 'I don't feel sorry for you,' responses, but mine is a story that needs to be told.

I've been playing golf for 26 years, but pretty much at a casual level. A couple years ago, we only got out twice the entire season, but on other years we've played a couple times a month. My business partners and I like to take a trip over to Sunriver once a year and do a couple marathon days of 36 holes on the courses over there, which include the amazing Crosswater course, but still I have never felt like we've been golf fanatics. This summer however, may reach an entirely new level.

In the past two weeks, from Tuesday to Tuesday, I think I've played 13 rounds of golf...yes, 13. Out of those 13, only 5 were 9 hole round, all the others were 18 holes. Three of those rounds were played with 3 hours of sleep or less because the tee times are at 6:30 in Woodburn, and I basically have to be up at 5 to get ready and go. Two of those rounds were played in the same day, one in the morning with one group, and one in the evening with another. Most of the rounds are played at our 'home course,' The OGA Course in Woodburn, but I also had rounds at McNary, Meadowlawn, and Salemtowne. (I also had a round in at Battlecreek with the other two Lopi Bro's, but that was outside the two week blitz I'm specifically talking about here. We also just missed a round at Mallard Creek in the past two weeks.) And mixed in with the actual rounds, were a few trips out to the Windsor Island driving range.

There are a few contributing factors to the Summer Golf Fest that I find myself in these days. Business partners with annual passes who golf, a wife who's just taken up golf after 16+ years of wedded bliss, and friends from in and out of town who all also love to get out and "ruin a good walk," as Mr. Twain so accurately put it all those years ago. Don't get me wrong, it's a great situation to find one's self in, it just kind of hit like a hurricane all at once.

If someone would have told me 16 years ago that some day my wife would not only go out, gear up and play a round with me in the morning, but then say "you deserve to go out again tonight to focus on your own game since you helped me with mine today," when a friend suggested a second round for the day...I would have never believed such a fantasy existed in the real world. As a result of all this golf nonsense, I've shot some of my best rounds in my life, including an 85 at the OGA course..which rivaled the 83 or 84 I had about 15 years ago, and a 3-over round at Salemtowne on Sunday. Those are clean scores too, every single stroke counted, and penalty strokes appropriately alloted - I'm sure my previous 83-84 had some Mulligans or 'winter rules' helpers along the way.

Anyway, today we have our oldest baby coming home from Texas, and our youngest baby has his 3rd birthday - and getting lots of cool Transformers, I might add. No golf scheduled for today, or even for tomorrow, as of yet. My bike misses me, and the feeling is mutual...I gotta get out and put some miles down, so perhaps I'll get out and do a quick loop after posting. Either that, or crawl back into bed and catch up on some sleep...

Hasta!