Monday, June 23, 2008

The Human Torch is, um, on Fire!

If you're not familiar with the geography of the Pasadena area, it's at the edge of a valley and about 20 miles in from the coast. This occasionally produces a weather phenomenon known as getting hotter than five blue hells.

To be fair, yesterday was more of a 'four blue hells' kind of day, with the temps barely cracking 105. Every few years, we get a flare up that goes even a little higher than that, and let me tell you, Poppin' Fresh stays out of town for fear of crisping.

You know what else was hot yesterday? Human Torch. We played the truly beautiful Brookside Golf Course in the even more beautiful Rose Bowl.

Why don't we pause a moment and orient ourselves to the setting? Yes, I think we should. There's the stadium in the foreground, and all the green space behind it. If you look, there's a channel running through the valley, and the golf courses are all around it. If you look even closer, you'll see me at the edge of the channel, fishing my ball out and waving at the camera.

Anyway, Human Torch, responding to the heat the way a Radiation-themed Superhero would respond to a giant radioactive meteor or the way an undersea, Aqua-Man like Superhero would react to being through in the ocean, had a great game.

You'll recall that he and I typically go toe-to-toe and shoot within a shot or two of each other. Not so much yesterday. He shot an 18 hole 99, which is 22 strokes less than he shot at Shadow Ridge (and a few strokes better than me.) He was just consistent all day...few if any flubs, good targeting, even decent putting. In celebration of this tremendous achievement, the following Tiger Beat-y salute to Human Torch:

Human Torch is Dreamy!















(Dang, where are the Junior High School Girl fun fonts when you need them, Blogger?)

Anyway, nice round, HT! Mercuryboy played gamely, even though there are no true junior tees at Brookside, so he was hitting farther back than he usually does. It'd be like a grown up shooting at a 500 yard par 4. Like Barry Bonds having to hit 800 home runs without the benefit of enough steroids to float a donkey. Like Nelson Muntz having to pass a test without previously whaling on a nerd or stealing the key from the teacher's desk to get the answers. (BTW, I am willing to go on record as saying that I still think Edna Krabappel is hot stuff, despite everything that's happened between us. Don't ask.)

I had precisely two highlights: first, I birdied a 300 yard par 4. The recipe is this: 280 yard, dead-straight drive, chip shot onto the green, 1 putt. That's the first time any of our little gang has done that on a par 4 or higher. Woo hoo! I also hit my ongoing goal of 2 putts per hole. Small victories, people.

Ok, so tomorrow, we'll move on to the subject of The Slowest Golfers In Northwest LA County (and perhaps beyond). No, it wasn't us.

5 comments:

Tommy Mac said...

Ahhh yes, the birdies were teasing us all day, and one of us finally managed to trap one!!!

I definitely felt great about the game yesterday, but I was in my element. If only it could be 105 degrees on every golf course we play... :)

I did take a picture of the 500 yard Par 5 that I landed the green in 2, or wait, was that just a really long Par 4? In any case, I'll get that picture to you as soon as possible...

On an educational note, I DID use some spray-on sunblock yesterday, and, while I may have been on fire, I did not burn. Always wear sunblock kids!!!

HT out...

AmyJokerette said...

how do you have time to golf so much!? thats awesome

Anonymous said...

this has nothing to do with the blog, haha! but i would totally play golf everyday if i had my own personal hottie for a caddy, ANNND gimme my cake!

Jim McCarthy said...

We golf so much by neglecting our responsibilities. Joking. We golf so much by delegating our responsibilities to others and following up via cell phone during golf. That's it.

Tommy Mac said...

Great explanation Jim... lol