Shots of Me

As 2010 putts out on 18, the old Shot Taker gets a little reminiscent about the year that was.  For a decent part of the year you can say that lady golf promised to blow me but decided to use a little more teeth for effect. My plan was to make 2010 “my year”, my big coming out party as a serious contender in golf tournaments. We all know how that master plan turned out.  From a confident beginning, to a near death experience going up a par 5, to a disastrous middle of the season, to a limp to the finish fall, I’m glad this piece of shit year is over.

NOW, C’MON 2011 PUCKER UP!  BIG DADDY’S COMING!!

I have an entire winter to work the plan that the Coach is laying out for me and I will use the cold weather months to reduce the Shot Taker’s body by about a kindergartner. This all points to 2011 The YEAR OF THE SHOT TAKER. I can hear you giggling, ShotNation.

So let’s have an installment of Loose Impediments to close up the book on el crapo and kick off 2011. Just some random thoughts rattling around in the Taker’s head……….

I saw on the TV Guide Channel that the #1 moment of the television year was the Chilean miner story. I hate to admit this, but I really ignored this whole fucking thing.  I didn’t know what they were talking about until a day or so before the retrieval.  I, honest to God, thought for a long time it was in Kentucky. How bad could it have really been for these guys? They were obviously still getting paid for just sitting around.  They were sending free food and drink down there and one guy was training for a marathon! It sounds a lot better than what I was dealing with (except for the marathon training, which had to suck).

So the New York Jets coach has a foot fetish. Would someone please tell me how in the hell this stuff gets out?

We know how much Sergio loves the Ryder Cup.  While it was a nice gesture, and I’m sure it was great for him to be around the squad; wouldn’t you have felt like a douche if you were serving as a “special assistant?”

You only need to see one shot from last year’s major championships. Lefty’s 6 iron out of the pine straw, through the trees and on the green was as good as it gets. It also gave us one of the best quotes of all time.

“A great shot is when you pull it off. A smart shot is when you don’t have the guts to try it.”
                      — Phil Mickelson

3 things that consistently make the Shot Takers old eyes dust up a bit:

1.) Movies or real life stories depicting bad situations for old people. I avoid these at all costs. If it’s a movie, avoiding it is really easy. If it’s real life, avoiding it can be viewed as cruel but not helping is much more comfortable for me.

2.) Movies or real life stories depicting bad situations for the mentally challenged. The Coach hates the word retarded so the previous line didn’t get the laugh that it could have……. but my sensitivity training is really working!  I WILL NOT watch another movie after I strained my whole body trying not to cry for two hours while Sean Penn served Starbucks coffee and tried to raise a child in that movie, whatever it was called. NEVER AGAIN. Sorry, I know you think I’d like Radio with Cuba Gooding playing a dense football manager, but it’s not going to happen.

3.) Craig Morgan singing “Almost Home.”  I’m not the biggest country music fan in the world; but I’m not like Jiggy of the MisHit Mafia. I can listen to it if the song is right. This tune depicts a dude waking up a homeless guy who is sleeping behind a dumpster in a snow storm. The homeless guy was dreaming about being a kid and running home to go fishing with his dad. My GOD, when you start thinking about it, how do we go on?  This fucking guy just wants to hit the rewind button and not be a wino sleeping in a freaking alley!!  I CAN’T TAKE IT.

I will never. NEVER record a football practice, from a crane, in high winds. And you can put that in ink.

You can tell my 4 year old daughter has grown up in the MMA generation. When she and my son were spending some “Daddy” time and getting their first indoctrination into professional wrestling, she said, "Dad why are they wearing shoes?"  "Oh, so if they wear shoes they can’t kick right?"

Speaking of rasslin’ I look back fondly to Saturdays of my youth, especially winter time when we were inside all day. My brother and I used to spend all day either watching or talking about sports, but mostly we focused on the action inside the squared circle.  Our T.V. schedule went something like this.

  11:30 catch the end of Bandstand while eating one of two meals…..two hotdogs with chips and Prarie Farm french onion dip or a can of Chunky beef soup.

12:00 pm Evansville Wrestling. It was actually out of Memphis but it was on an Evansville channel so that’s what we called it. Lance Russell and Dave Brown called the action, and MAN what action.  Jerry Lawler, Superstar Bill Dundee, Austin Idol (Las Vegas Leglock!), Handsome Jimmy Valiant and his brother Johnny, a young Jimmy Hart, I could go on and on. Wow. I couldn’t wait to see who turned bad that week or started a fight while Lance and Dave were trying to conduct an interview.  On a side note, when I was in Memphis a few years back I noticed Dave Brown  doing weather on a local station. A massive career decline, in my book.

4:00 pm – 6:00 pm  World Championship Wrestling When we got WTBS out of Atlanta, our entertainment satisfaction went through the roof!  At the time, this was the Granddaddy of them all. The Road Warriors, Tommy “Wildfire” Rich, Dusty Rhodes, The Four Horseman, and the illustrious Fabulous Freebirds. Most weeks, this was the highlight of the whole weekend. I learned from the great Gordon Solie what a “pier sixer” was.   The feelings of anger, anguish, and turmoil all rolled up into two hours of action. If only as an adult we could get that kind of intense feelings over something so trivial. (ShotGal would say not much has changed)

10:00pm – 11:00pm    WWF.  Thanks to the addition of WWOR out of New York we got an hour of WWF when it was still a local promotion. This is when Vince Sr. was still calling the shots and Vince Jr. was a lowly ringside announcer.  It was good, but not near the product being produced down south. Also this led me to my first glimpses of televised harness racing. Tape delayed races from Yonkers always preceded the wrestling and still provides a good joke when Mook and I go to the OTB for our racing fix. After pointing to the screen one of us will say, “Must be about time for wrestling.”  Ok, it doesn’t translate into print, but trust me it’s a funny moment.

11:00pm – 12:00pm   Some cheap ass wrestling out of St. Louis, and I’m not even sure what channel we got it on.  10, I think. Anyway, it was bad even for my standards. The one thing that sticks out in my mind, though, was it had a very young Randy “Macho Man” Savage and his brother, “Leaping” Lanny Poffo.  There was also some strange character called “The Miser” with dollar signs all over his green tights.  Not much to report on this and quite frankly I’m a little embarrassed I brought it up.

Sunday mornings we’d halfway watch the promotion out of Indianapolis with Dick the Bruiser, Haystacks Calhoun, and Bobo Brazil, but I never cared much for it. I much preferred the WGN lineup on Sunday mornings of:

Abbott and Costello

Our Gang / Little Rascals

The Lone Ranger

The Cisco Kid

These were cool shows for a couple of dopey kids in the early 80’s. That and we were a little punchy from all of that wrestling on Saturday.

Ok, Assholes. If I say the word “shank” that doesn’t mean you are about to start hitting hozzel rockets. Get over it.

Why is it that we as golfers will openly admit, when we are sober, that we aren’t really that good but add about 9 beers and suddenly we are talking about how we can hit a draw around trees on command and putt like a young Ben Crenshaw?  If we could only make a drink that could actually have you PLAY like that instead of TALK like that we’d be rich.

My character on the Wii Fit game looks like a damn weeble wobble.

Hey, I’ve got an idea. Let’s play an entire football season and then decide the best two teams that will play for the national championship. THEN, let’s make the two teams wait over a month to play the deciding game. This will ensure that they will be really rusty and quite possibly have lost a player or two due to bad grades, team violations, or incarceration. What’ya say?

2 things that you must have either one or both of for a situation to be labeled a party:

1.) Cocktail weenies

2.) A tent

On the golf course it is strictly and I mean STRICTLY prohibited from driving your cart near the green when you get out to go chip and putt. Then, why is it that when you spray a shot near a green on a different hole than the one you are playing…… its ok to practically drive your cart on the putting surface? You see this all of the time.

I see where Elton John and his partner have a new baby. I guarantee that you will see or hear someone call this kid his “Tiny Dancer.” Watch for it, it will happen.

Next up on A SHOT OF GOLF……my initial thoughts on goals for 2011

Until next time, Swing Hard Shot Nation!

(And Happy New Year)

“Ohhhhhhh, Cisco                Ohhhhhhh, Pancho”

The Shot Taker