Golf Gypsy at Triple Threat

 First event with MaryLee Evans, and  Letty Watt.  

   

We began our morning smiling and laughing, so glad to see each other again after the winter days and miles apart.  We dressed for a cool spring May morning in layers that would quickly change as the sun rose in the sky.  Even though Mary Lee and I love to laugh and even giggle, we sometimes are a truly focused duo, and May 9 we started the season out at Prairie Trails Golf Course in El Dorado  chasing that white ball down the middle of the fairway in as few strokes as possible.



We even talk golf as we ride along, sometimes questioning why the ball went left or right. I can hear Mary Lee fussing out loud, "What am I doing wrong??? Guess I hit too much grass!!"   When looking at our putting line we jabber on about where the ball will go.  Then our Harvey Penick or Johnie Stapp comments follow with sage advice for us to follow, if we'd just listen.

The first event of the 2012 Kansas Women's Golf Association tournament schedule was the "Triple Threat."  It is a two person partnership that automatically creates all sorts of emotional outburst of laughter and a few chosen words.  The first six holes we played a four ball format (no we didn't get to hit four balls, we each played our own ball but counted only the lowest score of the two of us), the next six holes we played a scramble format (for non golfers just imagine the scramble of two women deciding which ball to hit or which ball gives the best opportunity for the next shot, then double that in a foursome and you have madness or hilarity), and then we finished the last six with alternate shot (the true test of friendship).  Strategy is the key to the game IF partners want to use their "mulligans" wisely, but strategy is a big word, and I have enough trouble concentrating on playing the game of golf.

We golfers use such terms as "ham and egged it" to explain that each of us stepped up to the hit the ball well when the other partner was lagging.  Yes, Mary Lee and I ham and egged it very well in the four ball and scramble format.  We just didn't strategize well in the alternate shot format, but we did well enough.  Today two happy women finished winners--Low Net in the "Hitters" flight.   Now how cool is that?

Winners received Wilton Armetale bread platters and a jar of "Pepper  Belly's" Dirty Jalapeno Olive Relish w/Garlic. Wow, not only a fun event but filled with tasty memories.

P.S.  Thank you KWGA members for supporting this event; Bev Hickey and Tash Fife for hosting the event; and Darlene Allen for taking the great photographs of the players.

Letty Stapp Watt
historian, golfer

Beauty Contest -- Henbit

I recently entered a writing contest for fun, and to challenge myself to see what I could write in 100 words or less.  Perhaps I didn't create all of the elements of a story, but I had fun with words and pictures in my imagination and for me that's what writing is about.

Lindsay Lohan weeds.

Her roots run shallow and plant themselves wherever they can.  Her wild purple blooms fill yards, fields, and gardens with unwelcome beauty.  Like a mint that could be refreshing instead becomes overpowering and invasive.  She grows where she's not wanted causing distress for the gardeners who so patiently dig and pull year after year only to have her return.  Yard treatment seems to have little effect as the winds of spring and summer plant her seeds wherever they find ready soil.  The master gardener knows her as Henbit, but I call her my "Lindsay Lohan Weeds."

Beauty Contest -- The Dandy Lion

Dandy Lion resting in bed of flowers.

Puff ball.

It's the time of year when as a child I looked forward to picking a snow-white feathery ball atop a stem, making a wish, and blowing it's white fluffy seeds into the sky.  Thanks to children's wishes and the winds of spring those seeds grow a deep thick fleshy tap root that branches year after year.  The leaves form a rosette from which a yellow flower will bloom.  This year as I sprayed that noxious weed, and dug it from my gardens I thought not of it as a Dandelion, but as a puff-ball commentator known as Rush Limbaugh.