Golfism -life is a metaphor for golf » Naturalism

Ferdinand GT3 RS -the world’s slowest Porsche?

docpark — Thu, 17 Jun 2010 09:25:08 +0000

This is a portent of the post-oil world?

Sunrise Golf

docpark — Fri, 28 May 2010 13:55:40 +0000

For several years now I have been asking the club to allow me to play golf at daybreak. It would allow me to get in 9 holes from a cart in way under an hour, 35 minutes was a recent time. This year, sunrise golf has been instituted and it is a roaring success.

Speed golf off a cart is like speed chess, it seems like the same game but different factors come to the fore. first there is the lack of warmup – you knock it down the fairway and play it as it lies. The other is that it simplifies your mental prep – playing alone and fast means I have to find the ball so I become very good at tracking and finding balls but foremost, I try to keep it in the fairway. I count every stroke but will allow a free drop if I never saw the ball in flight -I figure a playing partner if one had been present would have tracked it. The course is mine and that is the most important thing. It’s meditative and calming to be alone in all that splendor.

Golf Passage of the Mysteries

docpark — Wed, 26 May 2010 19:22:09 +0000

A poem written driving from Detroit to Des Moines after we missed a connecting flight, we were returning from a spring golf trip to Hilton Head, myself and several most excellent golfing companions. As we pulled out of a convenience store lot, I had the vision of a wizened old man, a specter, hailing us with the following words…

Five and One man, on a journey!

Heading westwards, on into the night.

Burdens shared, and sleep neglected,

Y’all crossing the river, and arrive at first light.

Great joy you have found, and more do you seek

Onwards and onwards, for promises to keep,

Hammer on the right foot, no shoe on the left

Still many hours, before you shall sleep.

So go, I say go, and listen No More,

I am an illusion, but so is your labor,

That ball is not a ball, that hole is not a hole,

And that last hasty meal, you will not savor.

And when you are home, and you lay in your bed

Alive you will feel, alive with no dread

And in seeking all that golfin’ pleasure,

You realize the truth that the company is the treasure.

Comfort food and Mother’s day

docpark — Sun, 09 May 2010 23:28:55 +0000

I was on call and Jen had to leave the house for the evening, leaving me to my fate with regard to dinner. Being the on call surgeon is an exercise in anticipation. I waited like a fire extinguisher hanging in a glass box for that call -a ruptured aortic aneurysm, a cold pulseless limb, trouble in the body’s pipes. I passed the time watching a show from the History Channel about the universe. I fell asleep and woke at 7, way past my usual dinner time.
I walked out in to the family room and made my hungry face -nothing happened. No food. Just silence. I felt existentially as empty as my stomach. Without Jennifer, there was no meal. Just me in a dark box. I sat there for a while chewing on walnuts, contemplating food, and more specifically Korean food. Food holds a central spot in a Korean household and the mom is the one who makes the food. Korean food is time consuming to prepare because of the way a Korean meal is constructed.
The rice is the foundation of the meal. A bowl of rice is a cornucopia to a Korean -a magic bowl of happiness. The rice is eaten with ban ch’an -small dishes of prepared and seasoned meats, fish, and vegetables, sometimes pickled that add salty, spicy, tangy, and sweet to a bowlful of rice. The variety of side dishes is what is so appealing about the Korean meal and so devilishly hard to prepare. Most of the vegetable dishes are created from roots and leafy greens that distill large baskets of raw produce into handfuls of final items in small dishes on the table. The process sometimes takes the whole day, sometimes two days, and typically 3 or 4 of these vegetable dishes are standard.
The meat was a rarity in premodern times, and was usually reserved for festival days but prosperity has made it common. Fish, too, is standard -usually a hand sized cutlet of salted mackerel broiled in the oven is shared among everyone at the table. This emphasis on intensely flavored small portions of meat or fish allows a small quantity to flavor a mouthful of rice. So imagine a Korean war refugee who came into possession of a can of Spam from a US Army C-ration -it was ambrosia. Spam came into such high regard that even today, giving a carton of Spam is considered a suitably generous house gift.
Spam cooks to a beautiful crispness with juicy tenderness in the center of medium thickness cuts that perfectly flavor rice -especially cold left over rice. I found some rice and a can of Spam in the pantry and all thoughts of going out for a steak were gone. Filet mignon does not compare to a bowl of cold rice topped off by three medium thickness slices of Spam crisped to perfection on a frying pan. And in the near darkness of the empty house, I savored my repast to the last spoonful, feeling soothed, sated, happy. Mothered in fact.

Images of Spring

docpark — Mon, 19 Apr 2010 00:17:01 +0000

Only a month ago, we had 5 foot tall snow drifts. This greenery reminds me to be grateful to have another spring on this earth.

iPadurday Eve Diorama

docpark — Sat, 03 Apr 2010 00:13:44 +0000

The day is nearly nigh! In celebration of iPadurday Eve, I constructed this diorama of Steven Jobs bestowing upon humanity the iPad (as modeled by the iPhone which is now technically the iPad Mini) all underneath an actual Apple Tree.

The Man in Brown will drive by and deliver our iPad tomorrow. If by some twist of evil fate he is held up, I will drop by the Apple Store (of earthly delights) to pick up my reserved iPad (to sell on eBay?).

So happy iPadurday to All!

The Perfect Golf Shot

docpark — Sun, 28 Mar 2010 18:27:05 +0000

I played 27 holes this weekend. My 9 holes yesterday were played in windy, cool weather and I got a 50 for my efforts. It was notable for a par on the treacherous second hole which has a tilted green. I hit 5 of 7 fairways yesterday but three putts and botched approaches made life difficult.

Today, I hit the reset button and armed with a new 58 degree wedge from Callaway, I set out solo onto an empty course. The picture above is from the first hole. My drive was directly into a 20 mile per hour wind which made the 48 degree weather a touch more miserable -hence the absence of players on an otherwise very golf-worthy Sunday morning. The drive was in the left rough off the first cut, leaving me 200 yards out on a sidehill lie that left the ball below my feet. I tried to play a duck hook around the tree, but I lost my balance and lucked out by having the ball settle on a steep upslope with line of site to the green.

The first hole at Wakonda is officially a par 4, but it really is a par 4.5, and with the wind, it was a stretch to make par. I was 150 yards out and the pin was in the middle of the green -the green tilts to the right and I had to land the ball center or left to get to a makable par putt.

The wind was going a sharp right to left and the green is a good 20 feet above me. The ball is on the upslope. I chose to fade a 5 iron -the upslope would take some of the distance off and the fade into the draw cross wind would straighten the shot, I hoped.

It is always here on number 1 where I have my most intense golf moments -where concentration and visualization becomes very clear and I decided to pour myself into this shot. I set up aiming slightly to the left of the pin and practiced a fade swing, trying to keep my head still and my shoulders in line with the slope. The shot I had in mind was “locked in” and the actual shot became the apotheosis of my mind’s vision.

The ball launched after a clean hit -this is so important on wet, sodden grass, and the ball kept climbing and going straight -this despite my having hit a near slice. The winding motion of the ball that normally creates a slice now was creating more lift with the right to left wind. The ball landed on line with the pin and I knew the ball would be 10 feet from the cup with a straight uphill putt (image -right).

I missed the putt by a hair, but still made a 5 which on this day was fine. I ended up with a 47 on the front -a great round given that I had great difficulties with my initial approach. After 18, I hit 10 of 14 fairways, but made only one green in regulation -this will require work. Despite this, I am still in bliss from the perfection of that approach on number 1.

This Week’s Daily Bread

docpark — Sun, 28 Mar 2010 12:23:23 +0000

I am beginning to get the idea behind bread. It gets its flavor from fermentation and a touch of salt. It converts a bland wheat flour into something palatable and portable. I can see why the first bread makers would have been excited.

The no knead recipe from the NYT (link) has some intimations about how much water to flour you need, but I am learning from experience. The dough, if you can pour it, results in a kind of a hard crust foccacia. Actually, its somewhere between that and a Levantine flat bread. To get a boule, the dough needs to have a touch of backbone. The no knead technique then really is about creating a steam oven for the non-professional bread baker.

The problem with making a stiffer dough is that it can result in a denser bread -I think then I will have to let it rise longer.

I advocate this for everyone -make a loaf of bread on the weekend -it is relaxing and invigorating at the same time. It is a game of balance and timing. It takes patience. It is the culinary equivalent of golf.

Michael’s Old Country Sabbath Challah from Chernowitz

docpark — Sun, 21 Mar 2010 03:21:10 +0000

My daily bread for this week is challah bread. Specifically, it is Chernowitzer Challah bread from my current favorite iPhone app, Epicurious. I have always felt the pull of Judaica since I was a child in the shtetl of Jacksonville, Florida. Now, I can partake of a little bit of manna.

This bread took about 6 hours to make -my kitchen is a bit cooler than that called for leavening dough. The bread out of the oven looked great but was “biscuit-y” according to my wife. The difference was that I used bread flour rather than plain enriched white flour -perhaps the enriched flour is more gluten-rich?

I will try when it has cooled -perhaps the structure will set in as it cools giving the inner texture that one associates with the best challahs. That may be it or the Chernowitzers just prefer cakey challah.

My Favorite Bar In Manhattan

docpark — Wed, 17 Mar 2010 14:59:42 +0000

In celebration of St. Patrick’s day, I will give out the location of my favorite bar. The Landmark Tavern (link) is my favorite bar in Manhattan. It is old, classy, with naked lady sculptures and bas-reliefs meant to mesmerize 19th century gentlemen. The barkeeps are fastidious and silent -the place is never full, usually empty, and nearly impossible to find from just memory, hard to get to by public transit, and there is a Hotel California kind of vibe if you go there at night. The picture above implies that the place is sunny and it is absolutely not -it’s dark and gloomy, and best visited on a rainy afternoon. Its the place to go for solitude, for breaking up (although awkward because there are literally no cabs and the nearest subway is two avenue blocks or so to my recollection, but aren’t they always awkward), for catching up with long lost friends, and for the best shepherd’s pie on the island. I half expect to sit down to a drink with Ullyses S. Grant in the place. There are no college students, and no loud drunk tourists. It’s a serious bar for serious people who want to meditate in the twilight zone.