Yours truly, working the course and coming up with infomercial ideas.

First there's denial. You don't want to admit it may be over. You hold out hope trying to convince your friends against the absolute obvious to no avail. Soon your conversations with your friends start sounding like Andy's letter to Red in Shawshank Redemption: "Remember, hope is a good thing, maybe the best of things. And no good thing ever dies." Well when freezing rain enters the picture it marks the official end of another golf season, hope can only carry you so far. Each year I fight the end of the golfing year because it means far worse weather is on the horizon. I don't live in an Arizona/Florida type climate where the golf season is like Mark Messier's career and never ends.

	Minus the flowers, water, sand, and nice grass it looks about the same.

I first picked up golf while in high school. I remember having 1st period spare in Grade 12 or 12th grade depending on what part of the country you're reading this from. Anyways during spare we'd bring pitching wedges and play out on the soccer field. We'd use one of the posts as our flag pin and the field played as a Par 4. So while other kids were stuck in Math class, staring out the window and daydreaming they would see us playing our own private version of Augusta National. Despite my high school games I didn't really start playing until 3 years ago and in that period I've progressed to the point of shooting in the high 90's. Ideally in the foreseeable future I'd like to be shooting in the high 80's/ low 90's in the foreseeable future. My goal for this year was to reintroduce my driver into my game. After countless rounds of watching my driver shots take a Paul Tracy type sharp turn off the tee I decided to ditch all my woods last year in favour of my irons. While the strategy added some NASA type accuracy to my game I was sick of compromising the distance so once again I brought out my woods. The strategy paid off as I was much more accurate and longer off the tee but yet my scores failed to drop significantly. Which lead me to my next thought, should I take lessons?

There's a big dilemma for me with lessons because while I would enjoy learning ways to lower my score. I'm not ready to give up my amateur status. Once you take lessons you waive your status as a casual bad golfer. I feel without lessons much less is expected of me. Plus there's some definite satisfaction in shooting the same or less of a score than those who have taken lessons.

"What'd you shoot?"
"A ninety-one."
"Have you taken lessons?"
"Yeah."
"Oh, then that's not a big deal."

My last round of the year left me with the perfect golf infomercial product. Our playing group had a 9:00 am tee time. When we arrived the course was covered with a dense blanket of fog, the kind of fog where your ball vanished into the dewy mist much like the Field of Dreams players disappeared into the corn stacks (Imagery. I guess my high school English teacher was right, I will use this later in life). Anyways, playing groups were starting to pile up because the visibility was only about 75 yards. After that it was a best guess to figure out where your ball ended up. Our playing group decided to play through the fog figuring it would lift. It did eventually after which we had already played 5 holes. Funny thing was through the fog we were playing terrific golf and none of us lost a ball or even hit a hazard. My thinking is by zoning out the hazards and leaving our minds void of the negative we could focus solely on the positive of hitting good shots….there's your free Zen lesson for the week. So hence the infomercial product idea, get Ron Popeil behind it and it's a license to print money….

"Sick of ruining your round with an array of poorly hit hazard shots? Do you psyche yourself out before hitting the ball? Worried how you'll carry that drive over the water? Worry no more as the fog goggles are here. Simply put the goggles on and let the magic of the permanently fogged lenses go to work. No longer will you need to worry about trees, water, bunkers and the humiliating jeers of your playing group because with the fog goggles you won't even know that the hazards are there." As for product design picture the old Horace Grant goggles in an assortment of colours.

Hitting a putt or chip that's going to be short is the worst feeling because you know right away and you feel like scrambling and picking up the ball the minute it leaves your club. Of course you can't so you can only pull out the old line from Swingers and yell: Get there! Perhaps my favourite line from the movie…if you're not clear on the line, watch the movie and watch Rob's putt. The thing is not even close to the hole. This is also something great to say when a guy strikes out with a girl that's out of his league at a bar.

I won't be able to play until at least April of next year, which kind of hampers any development I picked up from the year before but that's the whole aspect of Canadian golf that makes it an eternal struggle. I'll end with things I learned from this year:

· When you don't know what your handicap in golf is it becomes a disability.
· I'm confident that the literal translation for Municipal as in Municipal golf course means decrepit, unkept and waste of money.
· A ton of bad jokes: You're standing too close to the ball…..after you hit it! I think the problem with your game is LOFT…..Lack of Friggin' Talent. Somebody hits it into the trees you say: Nice shot. What was that, your tree-wood?