for 23 June 2000. Updated every WEEKDAY.
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Golf War
Syndrome Dear Mr. Dery, From your article I get the feeling that you've never played a game of golf. I'm 23 and I'll certainly cop to being white and affluent, but that has nothing to do with the hardest, best game ever invented. Playing golf one learns about himself - it's a game of insight where winning means not putting up a better score than the people you play with, but rather playing a better game than you did last time. If you picked up one of those many books on golf (I suggest Harvey Penick's Little Red Book ) you'd understand that something people love so dearly and honestly can't be as vile as you make it out to be. As for that horrible sign you mentioned - there are a lot of ignorant people in the world and some of them play golf. That doesn't mean golf is a bad game. Thinking otherwise is like thinking that golf and murder are somehow causely connected because you see OJ Simpson with a three wood in his hands. Trying to break eighty, Todd Knudson <tknudson@bellsouth.net> Todd: Enable Irony Filter humor site. You know, the thing that happens when people winch the corners of their mouths up and make those staccato, aspirated sounds? I certainly didn't mean to defame the game of golf, which is at least as interesting as watching the skin on gravy tighten, and no less edifying. Then, too, its social benefits are legion, and universally conceded. Fore, M. Dery  I'm definately with you regarding your contempt for the noble game of golf. At its highest levels, it certainly reeks of the caste system, with naught but the upperiest of the upper class hobnobbing (whatever that is) over perfectly manicured greens and mint juleps (whatever they might be, they sound gross). I have to say that I used to play the game, and mostly played on public courses, with an occasional glimpse of private course life through a couple childhood friends whose parents managed to get rich. I decided about two years ago to quit cold turkey for a number of reasons. 1) I suck at it, terribly, and every second on the course was miserable and embarrasing. 2) The people, with of course exceptions, that play the game are a bunch of miserable annoying assholes, who I wouldn't be caught dead with in any other circumstance. Its actually worse on public courses, because these wannabes still try to cop a royal attitude even though they are often anything but. 3) The amount of competitiveness manifested in golf is ridiculous; most of these people suck as much as I did, but would argue about every arcane rule in the game and make the whole experience miserable(that's my third use of the word miserable, god I hate golf). I had to quit because it was actually more stressful than work, and absolutely no fun whatsoever. I'd rather just go walk around in the woods and throw rocks at squirrels or something to blow off steam. Anyway, what I'm trying to say is, fuck golf, damn it straight to hell, let's turn every one of those fertilizer and goose shit stinking superfund sites back to their natural state and let people go hiking on them or something. I could go on with my hatred for the stupid game, but you did a really good job,especially with the excusivity angle, so I'll go back to work. Take it easy, Jeremy Pianka <jeremyamypianka@prodigy.net> Happy to hear that my little bit of spleen-venting was cathartic for you, as well. Regards, M. Dery Whoaa, we're talking big-time responsive chord here. More fun with this article than I've had in a long time. Never could stomach the goddam sport, although I've played maybe 10 times in the last 15 years (like with drugs: peer pressure made me do it), and this puts the finger — the middle one — right on it. Pastel People indeed. A hole-in-one! Thanks, Mark. Eric <corpstratcom@cantv.net Eric: You flatter me. I'll think of your note next time I'm driving straight down the fairway...in my humvee. Best, M. Dery And, in another bright moment for us golf loathers: Jeffrey Wright's fine performance in Shaft as a slick/skeevy Dominican druglord, asking Christian Bale (still in American Psycho fig) "Do you golf? Golf is phat!" There's also a golfing pimp in American Pimp, though whether he gets invited to the country club or not is another matter; supposedly in Hawaii the links are taxed as agricultural lands. I think fire ants are the answer...fine piece... Richard Von Busack <regisgoat@earthlink.net> Fire ants the insect or fire ants the autonomous robot equipped with lethal firepower, last seen under development, under DARPA's watchful eye, at Sandia Labs in New Mexico? I prefer the latter. M. Dery I take it you have some problems with golf. Dave Ready River Falls, WI <davidr@ twinmodal.com> None whatsoever, actually. I simply pull the pin on one of those old World War II-issue pineapples, drop it onto the green, and send it rocketing toward the next hole with a stout whack from my five iron. Levels the playing field (literally) and weeds out the competition for scarce space on the links. M. Dery Hit & Run 6.15.00 From one of the sites hyperlinked to this week's hit'n'run: "I like that weird feeling you get when those balls get into your mouth," 7 Eleven customer Tiffany Leary said. How did you resist? I bet you thought no one read the linked pages - but I'm sure you're not surprised that, if anyone did, it was me. Yrs, Colin <crankine@sensenet.com> You kiss your mother with that mouth, Colin? This is a family publication. We don't need your filthy innuendoes. Sucksters Subject: you better read this i've put off mentioning it for awhile but suck is getting really lame and i predict it's gonna die within a year or two because it's becoming so bad. i mean the way it has all the financial crap and interview crap and new media insider crap and policy wonk crap and just the general overall vibe of a reactionary boy with penis-adequacy issues. this is not a cheap shot, it is the honest truth and you'd better pay attention because there really HAS been a major change in suck as of late, which is going to correspond, sooner or later, to a major change in readership. if you even survive like this it's gonna be in a really lame context, like some kind of whore political lobbyist stroke-mag like "reason" or "fairness and accuracy in reporting" or "consumer reports". gee, wouldn't that suck? i don't know how else to account for it except that someone, almost certainly the editor is laying his INCREDIBLY BORING personality and idiosycracies all over the fucking place and everyone else is dumb enough to play along? the tone of the place, esp. some new writers, and the letters page, my god, it's getting to the level of alt.philosophy.objectivism (or salon for that matter). try to think back to the old suck and the one thing that made it bearable in face of all it's patheticness: a *modicum of grace*. GRACE. without grace you turn about as attractive as the literary equivalent of the beurocratic minutia of the american ham radio association. OH YEAH: that fucking article about "fang" and the SF newspaper scene was the SINGLE most sickeningly boring thing ever committed to paper in an entertainment (as opposed to technical writing, or pornography) medium of any kind in the history of the universe. that is the exemplar of what i'm complaining about. if you don't KILL that vibe, instead of letting it get bigger and bigger (as you seem to be doing!) until it totally consumes you you are going to turn into this evil boring stupid blech cesspool of "cogent rational argument" (with STATISTICS) and lose all your readers and DIE. warning you man, demmy <root@treehouse.dyndns.org> Thanks for the warning, Demi. Although our records indicate you've been sending us Suck-is-headed-for-the- crapper emails (along with the occasional followup email denying that you are the author of previous emails with your name on them) for at least three years now, this one really set us back, and we're going to work overtime to get a modicum of grace back into our patheticness. But you know, Demme, real grace only comes through Our Lord Jesus Christ. Do you know Jesus? He's more than just your savior. He's the best friend you'll ever have! He loves you all the time, He's always there for you, and He'll never let you down. And when you don't love Him back, when you break His rules, when you take His name in vain, when you don't think about Him on His birthday, that breaks His heart. But He forgives you. All you have to do is take one step toward Jesus: "I tell you the truth, today you will be with me in paradise." (Luke 23:39-43) Ask yourself each day, "Was Christ in my heart today?" And you'll find he's there! He's the only friend you'll ever need. He even gave His life for you! How well do you know your best friend? Do you think that honoring Him is just a lot of "square Christian stuff"? Think again, Demmy. Open up your heart and let the Son shine in! Sucksters Subject: Why bash Safire? What was the reason for saying Safire doesn't know "dick" about Assad or Syria? Is it just that you don't like his political views? Richard Sol <rsol5@yahoo.com> Although we're sure that Safire's unique perspective — sitting in Chevy Chase and talking shop with apparatchiks and think-tank washouts — gives him great insight into the workings of countries he's never visited, we can't abide his tendency to mangle the English language. Sucksters Sucksters - Sorry to blather on about my own little self, but anyone who mentions Orbitz to me is forced to hear this cautionary tale. Back in my even-more- stupid-than- I-am-now days, I decided that a good idea for a drink would be a Yuri Gagarin: Orbitz and vodka. And of course, since I was in college, the vodka pouring hand was heavier than the Orbitz pouring hand. Sadly, adding the vodka screwed up all of Clearly Canadian's intricate specific gravity calculations, and all the floating gel balls fell to the bottom. However, the gel balls did provide me hours of entertainment when I was doubled over the floor, counting them after they hit the ground. Fortunately, there was someone there to prevent me from playing in my own filth for too long. -Probably Polly's Steve, even though I never met her Steven Kiefer <smkiefer@cyberspace.org> Do you know that if you had eaten Mike & Ikes with that drink you would have exploded? It's true. That's what killed the actress who played Punky Brewster. Sucksters |
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