First Tee/Sweetheart Loop

Okay, it's too hot to golf. My plan was to hit a bucket of balls and go home. But Steve Beetsra showed up at about 11 a.m. Central, and asked if I wanted to play. I should have said no. We played from the back at First Tee and I scored a 48, with 1 par, 4 bogeys, and 4 doubles. I think Steve, who's good (knows how to make the ball spin back toward the pin, plays with $4 Taylormade balls and hardly ever loses one), scored a 38. I will play again tomorrow, at 8 a.m., with Steve, Phil Martin, and Randal Hunhoff. Steve suggested he and I play Randal and Phil in best-ball match play, Steve and Phil from the back, Randal and I from the middle, with cold bottles of Coke and Diet Dr. Pepper on the line. Regular Arkansas heat, no problem, but this shit's killing me. I think there's a very good chance I'll be dead by Labor Day (to be truthful, I'd recommend the over, but I think you know what I mean).

It's cooled to 90 degrees at 8:31 p.m. Fuck. I walked and jogged the Sweetheart Loop with a late burst to finish in 39:53. The San Francisco Giants lead the Little Bitches 5-1 in the seventh inning. I now will fry catfish and then sit back to watch, hopefully, the Reds start to show the Los Angeles Dodgers what the final three games of a nine-game winning streak look like. I can't wait to listen to Vin Scully, and hear him say, in his impenetrable Brooklyn accent, "And, goodness, the Cardinals, the St. Louis Cardinals, have lost their fifth consecutive game. Brandon Philips can take a bit of solace after the St. Louis players reacted with such vehement anger to his perhaps accurate designation of them as the 'Little Bitches.' Little Bitches indeed. ...And Philips is at the plate, an All-Star this season for the Reds, the Cincinnati Reds, the four-game leaders of the National League Central."

OVERHEARD

"After I see people dying all around me almost every day, I'm not going to let a bad shot bother me too much. I feel fortunate to be out here hitting bad shots, you know."
—Steve Beetstra as he raked a sand trap on No. 6 at First Tee

"Me too."
—60-year-old produce man at Kroger's, after he gave me 4064 as the code for local tomatoes, and I said, 'I can remember that. Gale Sayers, Jerry Kramer.' He chuckled and said, 'Man, you're old school,' and I said, 'Yes.'