I played golf yesterday morning before work. Got out there at 7 am with Dave and JP and was set to play 9 holes. We went to the driving range and I forgot to stretch before I started hitting balls and after a few, I tried to kill my driver. I felt something twinge in my left shoulder. Ow. I played the holes and it got a bit worse, but it wasn't too bad.
Last night, Zach and I drove up to Whistler and with the exception of being pulled over by one of the nicest police officers I've ever met, it was an uneventful trip. This morning, Zach and I got ready to go skiing and we headed up to the midstation at Whistler. There was a bunch of new snow and I was really psyched to get some good skiing in with Zach. My shoulder was hurting a bit more, but not too bad. After a couple of really light runs it started hurting a lot more. Not sure if it was from being tight on the ski runs, or from the helmet or what, but at this point it was really hurting. We had lunch to see if it would calm down when we went inside but nope. So we had to leave early and head back to the hotel room so I could ice it and rest. Ugh. Driving home tomorrow should be a blast.
So does this make me the first person to not be able to ski because of a golfing injury?
Saturday, March 19, 2005
Friday, March 11, 2005
World of Photoshop World
I went to Photoshop World in Las Vegas this week. It was an interesting opportunity to meet a bunch of people who spend their days working in Photoshop, trying to take advantage of all of the powerful features in the application. I've come to a conclusion about them. They are User Experience Masochists.
It isn't that they aren't smart -- they are very smart and creative people -- but they seem to relish the gyrations they need to go through to accomplish what seems like simple tasks. Scott Kelby gave a talk on Photoshop Down & Dirty Tricks where he repeatedly said that the most obvious way to do something in Photoshop is invariably the worst way to do it. His mantra could be "why do it in 1 step when you can do it better in 12?" In fact, over and over I would hear about people who chose a wrong button accidentally at some point and stumbled across a completely incomprehensible dialog full of sliders and buttons and by twisting the odd control on a layer had discovered the most amazing duotone effect.
It kind of reminds me of playing Worlds of Warcraft (which I have been doing so much that I haven't been writing much here lately). They go on long quests to find the different parts of a process and try to remember the secret combinations that give them the most realistic shadow under a product shot. Their gaussian blur has 12% more stamina than any one they've seen. They have the Enchanted Blending Mode of Witherbark (+28 Frost damage!) which is only available to a Level 38 Photoshop Mage but can actually defeat the Dodge & Burn elite quest in Stranglethorn Vale.
They chat amongst each other in their guilds and swap war stories of how they created a star field out of pure noise (no--- really!) and gave their house a faint yellow glow against a purple sky which really made it "pop"! They are proud of the hours or days they spent figuring out how to make something work and equally excited to learn more arcane usages of layers, masks, filters and curves from other warrior quests.
Now I know that this doesn't work for all people, but I wonder if the ultimate imaging application would be one where there was a whole set of dialogs that all had scrolling lists of checkboxes, sliders, buttons and dial controls with names like "Fidget", "U731", "Quantitude", and "Mud Saliency" but no documentation about what any of them mean. Get the right combination and you have the most remarkable red eye removal for a digital photograph. Change the "Tremble Factor" slider on the third tab of the "Luminescency" dialog to 1014 and you can remove all motion blur from a photograph taken during an earthquake! (Don't try 1013, though, it will look like crap!)
Then you can create recipes of all of the best combinations and if you add just a pinch of Goretusk Snout you've got the cover of your next book!
It isn't that they aren't smart -- they are very smart and creative people -- but they seem to relish the gyrations they need to go through to accomplish what seems like simple tasks. Scott Kelby gave a talk on Photoshop Down & Dirty Tricks where he repeatedly said that the most obvious way to do something in Photoshop is invariably the worst way to do it. His mantra could be "why do it in 1 step when you can do it better in 12?" In fact, over and over I would hear about people who chose a wrong button accidentally at some point and stumbled across a completely incomprehensible dialog full of sliders and buttons and by twisting the odd control on a layer had discovered the most amazing duotone effect.
It kind of reminds me of playing Worlds of Warcraft (which I have been doing so much that I haven't been writing much here lately). They go on long quests to find the different parts of a process and try to remember the secret combinations that give them the most realistic shadow under a product shot. Their gaussian blur has 12% more stamina than any one they've seen. They have the Enchanted Blending Mode of Witherbark (+28 Frost damage!) which is only available to a Level 38 Photoshop Mage but can actually defeat the Dodge & Burn elite quest in Stranglethorn Vale.
They chat amongst each other in their guilds and swap war stories of how they created a star field out of pure noise (no--- really!) and gave their house a faint yellow glow against a purple sky which really made it "pop"! They are proud of the hours or days they spent figuring out how to make something work and equally excited to learn more arcane usages of layers, masks, filters and curves from other warrior quests.
Now I know that this doesn't work for all people, but I wonder if the ultimate imaging application would be one where there was a whole set of dialogs that all had scrolling lists of checkboxes, sliders, buttons and dial controls with names like "Fidget", "U731", "Quantitude", and "Mud Saliency" but no documentation about what any of them mean. Get the right combination and you have the most remarkable red eye removal for a digital photograph. Change the "Tremble Factor" slider on the third tab of the "Luminescency" dialog to 1014 and you can remove all motion blur from a photograph taken during an earthquake! (Don't try 1013, though, it will look like crap!)
Then you can create recipes of all of the best combinations and if you add just a pinch of Goretusk Snout you've got the cover of your next book!
Sunday, January 30, 2005
Long Time No Tee - Golf @ Plateau and Trilogy
This was the first time I've played since I got back from Sarasota. A couple of weeks of skiing at Whistler and hanging out with Kate and Zach have been higher priorities but I got out this weekend twice with Rick and Paul. The first round was at the Plateau Club where I am now a former member. The course was in pretty good shape, though very wet. It was a pretty standard slog through the Plateau Club with not a lot of very memorable shots but perhaps that is because my mind is now filled with the second round -- today's round at Trilogy.
We had an 8:10 tee time and after warming up, we decided to play from the blues, which are the backmost tees at Trilogy. While my tee shot was well right, I hit the green on the second shot and two putted for par. Rick even birdied the first hole. I like starting out with a par. And I like following it up with three more pars even more. The most interesting one was the 615 yard par 5 that I had no chance of hitting the green in regulation, but a well drained putt saved par.
I doubled number 5, breaking my par streak but then parred number 6. Wow, +2 after 6 holes, pretty cool. I finished out the front 9 with bogies and was +5 after nine. Then things started to get better (!) On the tenth hole, I hit a great drive to the middle of the fairway, but my second shot went left across the cart path and was on some leaves just outside of the hazard. I tried to bump it up to the green but the wet grass caught it and it stopped just off the green. Fortunately, my putt from off the green found the hole and I escaped with another par. On 11, my drive went waaaayyyy right into the trees for my only lost ball of the day. I took the penalty and hit my third shot onto the green and sank that putt for a par even with the stoke.
I started thinking that I really had something going around this point and tried to just play smart to not blow a low score. 14 was nasty with a tee shot that again went right and hit a tree, but found its way back into play. I hit the second shot fat, the third one short into a bunker. Ugh. The bunker shot was great though, making it up to the green and I two putted for a double bogey. Not pretty, but it was my second long sand shot that went exactly as I had hoped, so I was happy with that part.
As I came up to 16, I was +8, thinking I just need some pars to stay under 80 (a bit easier than usual since Trilogy is a par 70 course). Of course asking for 3 pars in a row is a pretty tall ask for me. I hit another great drive leaving me about 98 yards to the green and then hit my approach to about 8 feet. Fortunately, Paul ended up just behind my shot so he gave Rick and me a great read to the hole and we both holed out our birdie putts. Birdie! Now I'm only +7 with two to go.
17 is a long dogleg right par 4. I hit a great drive to fairway at the corner, then my 4 iron rescue club 180 yards to the green. I didn't really think I would hit the green with it, I figured I would get close and at least not hit it into the water but the shot was right on. Two putts and I have another par. Golf is really a great game when things work the way you want them to :)
So I walked up to 18 at +7. Tied with Paul. We all hit our drives well to the right into the 10th fairway. My second shot stays right and is getting close to some trees. Rather than go at the hole, I figure I should just protect the score and hit it to a safe place back in the fairway. Lying 3, I am 78 yards from the pin. I hit a wedge to about 5 feet and realize that I am just a 5 foot putt from a closing par. I..uh...missed the putt. But I made the next one, giving me a grand total of 78 -- an all time low score. I had a 79 at Bellevue last year around this time but since we were playing from the blues at Trilogy, this gives me a round rating of 7.533 - a new low. Very cool.
I'm going to call this a soft 78 since we were being a bit generous with conceding putts and Trilogy is only par 70 but I was really happy with the round. In general, my drives were long and straight and my wedges were really on. I even had a few putts drop which hasn't been the case for a long time.
Fun :)
Duffergeek Stat Zone:
Plateau:
Score: 90 (15.580 round rating)
Putts: 33 (ick)
GIRs: 4
Fairways: 7/14 - terrible
Interesting stat: I parred 3 of the 4 par 3 holes.
Trilogy:
Score: 78 (7.533 round rating)
Putts: 26
GIRs: 5
Fairways: 8/13 - the ones that stayed in the fairway were generally very long as well
Interesting stat: Record low score. Oh and I didn't fall down at all this time - just like skiing!
We had an 8:10 tee time and after warming up, we decided to play from the blues, which are the backmost tees at Trilogy. While my tee shot was well right, I hit the green on the second shot and two putted for par. Rick even birdied the first hole. I like starting out with a par. And I like following it up with three more pars even more. The most interesting one was the 615 yard par 5 that I had no chance of hitting the green in regulation, but a well drained putt saved par.
I doubled number 5, breaking my par streak but then parred number 6. Wow, +2 after 6 holes, pretty cool. I finished out the front 9 with bogies and was +5 after nine. Then things started to get better (!) On the tenth hole, I hit a great drive to the middle of the fairway, but my second shot went left across the cart path and was on some leaves just outside of the hazard. I tried to bump it up to the green but the wet grass caught it and it stopped just off the green. Fortunately, my putt from off the green found the hole and I escaped with another par. On 11, my drive went waaaayyyy right into the trees for my only lost ball of the day. I took the penalty and hit my third shot onto the green and sank that putt for a par even with the stoke.
I started thinking that I really had something going around this point and tried to just play smart to not blow a low score. 14 was nasty with a tee shot that again went right and hit a tree, but found its way back into play. I hit the second shot fat, the third one short into a bunker. Ugh. The bunker shot was great though, making it up to the green and I two putted for a double bogey. Not pretty, but it was my second long sand shot that went exactly as I had hoped, so I was happy with that part.
As I came up to 16, I was +8, thinking I just need some pars to stay under 80 (a bit easier than usual since Trilogy is a par 70 course). Of course asking for 3 pars in a row is a pretty tall ask for me. I hit another great drive leaving me about 98 yards to the green and then hit my approach to about 8 feet. Fortunately, Paul ended up just behind my shot so he gave Rick and me a great read to the hole and we both holed out our birdie putts. Birdie! Now I'm only +7 with two to go.
17 is a long dogleg right par 4. I hit a great drive to fairway at the corner, then my 4 iron rescue club 180 yards to the green. I didn't really think I would hit the green with it, I figured I would get close and at least not hit it into the water but the shot was right on. Two putts and I have another par. Golf is really a great game when things work the way you want them to :)
So I walked up to 18 at +7. Tied with Paul. We all hit our drives well to the right into the 10th fairway. My second shot stays right and is getting close to some trees. Rather than go at the hole, I figure I should just protect the score and hit it to a safe place back in the fairway. Lying 3, I am 78 yards from the pin. I hit a wedge to about 5 feet and realize that I am just a 5 foot putt from a closing par. I..uh...missed the putt. But I made the next one, giving me a grand total of 78 -- an all time low score. I had a 79 at Bellevue last year around this time but since we were playing from the blues at Trilogy, this gives me a round rating of 7.533 - a new low. Very cool.
I'm going to call this a soft 78 since we were being a bit generous with conceding putts and Trilogy is only par 70 but I was really happy with the round. In general, my drives were long and straight and my wedges were really on. I even had a few putts drop which hasn't been the case for a long time.
Fun :)
Duffergeek Stat Zone:
Plateau:
Score: 90 (15.580 round rating)
Putts: 33 (ick)
GIRs: 4
Fairways: 7/14 - terrible
Interesting stat: I parred 3 of the 4 par 3 holes.
Trilogy:
Score: 78 (7.533 round rating)
Putts: 26
GIRs: 5
Fairways: 8/13 - the ones that stayed in the fairway were generally very long as well
Interesting stat: Record low score. Oh and I didn't fall down at all this time - just like skiing!
Tuesday, January 18, 2005
Wireless & bunnies
Overlake Hospital has free wireless networking. That rocks! Now I can watch bunny movies :)
The Exorcist in
30 seconds, re-enacted by bunnies
The Shining in 30
seconds, re-enacted by bunnies
Titanic in 30
seconds, re-enacted by bunnies
Alien in 30 seconds,
re-enacted by bunnies
It's a
Wonderful Life in 30 seconds, re-enacted by bunnies
The Exorcist in
30 seconds, re-enacted by bunnies
The Shining in 30
seconds, re-enacted by bunnies
Titanic in 30
seconds, re-enacted by bunnies
Alien in 30 seconds,
re-enacted by bunnies
It's a
Wonderful Life in 30 seconds, re-enacted by bunnies
Saturday, January 08, 2005
Skiing at Whistler this weekend
Kate, Zach and I are up at Whistler skiing this weekend. Fun! This is our first time up here and we are staying at Eric's sweet condo. I've been meaning to do this for a long time and finally got around to it.
Summary of my skiing today:
I fell.
A lot. :)
Though given that I haven't skied for about 3 years and I've only gone about 5 or 6 times in my life, I'm still happy with it. It is kind of like golf in that there are a bunch of things you need to do correctly and you really can't be thinking about them if you want it to work well. Also like golf, there are times when it seems to click for a little while and I was thinking "I can do this."
Then I'd do something to bring me back to earth.... quickly.
Tomorrow, I think I will actually try a lesson. Now I have a better sense of what I need to work on, it will be great to get help.
Kate and Zach did great and had a lot of fun as well. They were both in full day classes. Zach was with about 10 other kids and really loved it. He is really excited to go back tomorrow. Kate was in a group lesson as well but she was the only one in the group so she basically got a full day private lesson. She made it up to the top of the Whistler gondola and went down the upper and lower Whiskey Jack runs. She really liked it as well, but was sooooo cold that she's not sure she wants to go back in the morning. Her first SMS to me today really sums it up:
"Whee!"
Summary of my skiing today:
I fell.
A lot. :)
Though given that I haven't skied for about 3 years and I've only gone about 5 or 6 times in my life, I'm still happy with it. It is kind of like golf in that there are a bunch of things you need to do correctly and you really can't be thinking about them if you want it to work well. Also like golf, there are times when it seems to click for a little while and I was thinking "I can do this."
Then I'd do something to bring me back to earth.... quickly.
Tomorrow, I think I will actually try a lesson. Now I have a better sense of what I need to work on, it will be great to get help.
Kate and Zach did great and had a lot of fun as well. They were both in full day classes. Zach was with about 10 other kids and really loved it. He is really excited to go back tomorrow. Kate was in a group lesson as well but she was the only one in the group so she basically got a full day private lesson. She made it up to the top of the Whistler gondola and went down the upper and lower Whiskey Jack runs. She really liked it as well, but was sooooo cold that she's not sure she wants to go back in the morning. Her first SMS to me today really sums it up:
"Whee!"
Saturday, January 01, 2005
Pictures from Alex's New Years Eve party
We had another great New Year's Eve fondue party at Alex's house last night. One heck of a confetti explosion as well. Happy New Year!
Oh, did I mention Kate's new hair color?
Oh, did I mention Kate's new hair color?
Golf: Um... what happened to December?
OK, it has been a while but it has been an unusual holiday season this year. But hey, it's 2005 now! Happy New Year!
I went to Florida to visit my parents for Christmas and played three rounds there. The first at Waterlefe (yeah -- they spelled leaf funny) the second at the Links at Greenfield Plantation and the third round at the TPC Prestancia Stadium Course.
Now winter in Florida should be nice and warm, right? Not this year. The day I arrived, so did the rain and cold. The highs were lower 50s and there was a relatively steady rain for the first 4 days or so. Even worse, one night the winds really started kicking up to about 65 MPH. It was really howling out there and it blew a bunch of sailboats up on to the beach in Sarasota bay. By the time we got to Prestancia, though, it started to feel like Florida again. The sun came out and we had a nice round on a very nice course.
So at this point, I'm sure you are all on the edge of your seats to find out how I did. Thanks to my new Nike Ignite 10.5° stiff driver (thanks Leslie!!) I did pretty well. The driver was doing great with relatively consistent 250 yard drives that most of the time were down the middle of the fairway. Now on these courses, hitting 250 yards off the tee leaves me some sort of short iron or wedge into the green which is something I was not used to -- but if felt really nice :) At Waterlefe, I missted the greens pretty regularly but was chipping really well giving me 6 holes with only one putt -- which is good because the greens at Waterlefe were like ice.
TPC Prestancia was the nicest course of the week though. Lots of challenging holes with expansive waste bunkers and a fair amount of water on many of the holes. In fact, it was the long drives that got me in trouble a few times when I bombed shots into bunkers or water that I didn't think I would ordinarily get to reach. It's hard to feel too bad about that though :) On the front 9, I was playing really well parring 5 of the holes and finishing the front 9 at a TPC course with a 40. Wow! I should have stopped there :) The back 9 was a little less friendly, particularly starting double, bogey, double but I finished the day with an 87. In fact, I finished all three rounds (and for that matter, my last 10 rounds of the year) in the 80s. Overall, it was a fun set of rounds with my parents to close out a remarkable year of golf.
Let's go over some of the most memorable moments of the year.
First, of course, the January rounds at Pebble Beach and Spyglass, but even earlier was my first sub 80 round at Bellevue. Then the frigid, windy round at Paiute for the PMA tournament. Then a couple of fun rounds at the Disney courses, the highlight being Eagle Pines. There was the first 36 hole day at Newcastle for Rick's birthday. Then my 18+ rounds during my sabbatical, including 6 rounds at some beautiful courses in Hawaii. Then the Member/Guest tournament with Kevin, a number of fun rounds with Dave, Clint and Kevin at Bear Creek and the amazing trip to Sahalee in October. All in all, I had 60 non-tournament rounds logged for the year and my handicap, which started the year at about 18 dropped to an unofficial 12.7 (that includes some of our winter rounds which don't get officially posted).
All in all - a good year of golf.
I went to Florida to visit my parents for Christmas and played three rounds there. The first at Waterlefe (yeah -- they spelled leaf funny) the second at the Links at Greenfield Plantation and the third round at the TPC Prestancia Stadium Course.
Now winter in Florida should be nice and warm, right? Not this year. The day I arrived, so did the rain and cold. The highs were lower 50s and there was a relatively steady rain for the first 4 days or so. Even worse, one night the winds really started kicking up to about 65 MPH. It was really howling out there and it blew a bunch of sailboats up on to the beach in Sarasota bay. By the time we got to Prestancia, though, it started to feel like Florida again. The sun came out and we had a nice round on a very nice course.
So at this point, I'm sure you are all on the edge of your seats to find out how I did. Thanks to my new Nike Ignite 10.5° stiff driver (thanks Leslie!!) I did pretty well. The driver was doing great with relatively consistent 250 yard drives that most of the time were down the middle of the fairway. Now on these courses, hitting 250 yards off the tee leaves me some sort of short iron or wedge into the green which is something I was not used to -- but if felt really nice :) At Waterlefe, I missted the greens pretty regularly but was chipping really well giving me 6 holes with only one putt -- which is good because the greens at Waterlefe were like ice.
TPC Prestancia was the nicest course of the week though. Lots of challenging holes with expansive waste bunkers and a fair amount of water on many of the holes. In fact, it was the long drives that got me in trouble a few times when I bombed shots into bunkers or water that I didn't think I would ordinarily get to reach. It's hard to feel too bad about that though :) On the front 9, I was playing really well parring 5 of the holes and finishing the front 9 at a TPC course with a 40. Wow! I should have stopped there :) The back 9 was a little less friendly, particularly starting double, bogey, double but I finished the day with an 87. In fact, I finished all three rounds (and for that matter, my last 10 rounds of the year) in the 80s. Overall, it was a fun set of rounds with my parents to close out a remarkable year of golf.
Let's go over some of the most memorable moments of the year.
First, of course, the January rounds at Pebble Beach and Spyglass, but even earlier was my first sub 80 round at Bellevue. Then the frigid, windy round at Paiute for the PMA tournament. Then a couple of fun rounds at the Disney courses, the highlight being Eagle Pines. There was the first 36 hole day at Newcastle for Rick's birthday. Then my 18+ rounds during my sabbatical, including 6 rounds at some beautiful courses in Hawaii. Then the Member/Guest tournament with Kevin, a number of fun rounds with Dave, Clint and Kevin at Bear Creek and the amazing trip to Sahalee in October. All in all, I had 60 non-tournament rounds logged for the year and my handicap, which started the year at about 18 dropped to an unofficial 12.7 (that includes some of our winter rounds which don't get officially posted).
All in all - a good year of golf.
Wednesday, December 29, 2004
Sarasota pictures
My only birdie at TPC Prestancia
Rainbows and Dolphins in Sarasota
The aftermath of the overnight wind storm
Pretty flower :)
Friday, November 26, 2004
Turducken
What do you get when you combine a turkey with a duck and a chicken? Give up? OK, what about when you stick a chicken inside of a duck, and then stick the duck inside of a turkey, and then cook it? You get a Turducken.
And Turducken is good.
We went to Alex's house last night for our thanksgiving feast. Now cooking and eating is a competitive thing within our group. We are always trying to improve upon previous years' attempts and each year we take it to a new level. Two years ago, we did the deep fried turkey thing in our back yard. It was very simple and also very good. Last year was the Thompson's Turkey which took something like 8 hours to cook since you need to basically keep coating the turkey with an egg based paste of some sort. This year was the turducken and it is the most involved of the preparations to date.
Alex and Kat spent four hours (!) deboning a turkey and a duck and a chicken. Then they made a variety of stuffings, one from Andouille sausage, another with shrimp, and stuffed the birds with stuffing, then stuffing the birds with the other birds. Then the cooking begins. Now a turducken is a meal in itself but we didn't stop there. We had mashed potatoes where the quantity of butter in them may well have exceeded the quantity of potato in them. An amazing sweet potato au gratin that made a return appearance from last year and some of the best macaroni and cheese I've had (hint... bacon makes things better). 3 Pork Surprise where I think the surprise was finding out there are 3 kinds of pork, though Walter suggested that the surprise would come much later when we all caught on to the fact that Alex only has one meat thermometer and it was in the turducken. And of course, it wouldn't be Thanksgiving without having both types of cranberry sauce, the one with the berries and the one with the flavo-ridges™.
Then there were the desserts. Leslie made pumpkin cheesecake and an Apple Cranberry Ginger pie that more than one person there thought was the best pie they had ever eaten.
So how was the Turducken? In a word, fantastic. Tender and delicious. All of the birds came across well and the stuffings were great as well. I would rate it the highest of our past 3 attempts, but then I didn't have to spend 4 hours deboning three birds either. The general consensus was that the best flavor for amount of work award goes to the deep fried turkey, as long as you don't burn your house down in the process.
So how do we out do our selves next year? I was thinking that the Turducken concept could still be taken a bit farther. There is certainly room for a quail inside of the chicken. And maybe a sparrow inside of the quail. And the whole thing could be put inside of a nice sized ostrich. So perhaps next year we'll have Osturduckenailow?
Mmmm, I can't wait!
The Turducken
A cross section view
Hillel can't get enough of those Flavo-Ridges™
And Turducken is good.
We went to Alex's house last night for our thanksgiving feast. Now cooking and eating is a competitive thing within our group. We are always trying to improve upon previous years' attempts and each year we take it to a new level. Two years ago, we did the deep fried turkey thing in our back yard. It was very simple and also very good. Last year was the Thompson's Turkey which took something like 8 hours to cook since you need to basically keep coating the turkey with an egg based paste of some sort. This year was the turducken and it is the most involved of the preparations to date.
Alex and Kat spent four hours (!) deboning a turkey and a duck and a chicken. Then they made a variety of stuffings, one from Andouille sausage, another with shrimp, and stuffed the birds with stuffing, then stuffing the birds with the other birds. Then the cooking begins. Now a turducken is a meal in itself but we didn't stop there. We had mashed potatoes where the quantity of butter in them may well have exceeded the quantity of potato in them. An amazing sweet potato au gratin that made a return appearance from last year and some of the best macaroni and cheese I've had (hint... bacon makes things better). 3 Pork Surprise where I think the surprise was finding out there are 3 kinds of pork, though Walter suggested that the surprise would come much later when we all caught on to the fact that Alex only has one meat thermometer and it was in the turducken. And of course, it wouldn't be Thanksgiving without having both types of cranberry sauce, the one with the berries and the one with the flavo-ridges™.
Then there were the desserts. Leslie made pumpkin cheesecake and an Apple Cranberry Ginger pie that more than one person there thought was the best pie they had ever eaten.
So how was the Turducken? In a word, fantastic. Tender and delicious. All of the birds came across well and the stuffings were great as well. I would rate it the highest of our past 3 attempts, but then I didn't have to spend 4 hours deboning three birds either. The general consensus was that the best flavor for amount of work award goes to the deep fried turkey, as long as you don't burn your house down in the process.
So how do we out do our selves next year? I was thinking that the Turducken concept could still be taken a bit farther. There is certainly room for a quail inside of the chicken. And maybe a sparrow inside of the quail. And the whole thing could be put inside of a nice sized ostrich. So perhaps next year we'll have Osturduckenailow?
Mmmm, I can't wait!
The Turducken
.JPG)
A cross section view
Hillel can't get enough of those Flavo-Ridges™
Thursday, November 25, 2004
3 rounds - Golf @ Willlows Run, Bear Creek and Trilogy
Yeah, technically this should be 3 different entries but let's face it. No one really wants that much detail about three rounds over three consecutive days where I pretty much played the same way each day. So nyeah.
Paul, Rick, Dave and I started out at Willows on Monday (gotta love the holiday weeks...) Rick let me borrow his 10.5° 410cc Nike Ignite driver since mine wasn't helping me much over the past few weeks -- at least not reliably. I think this really is the key to these three rounds. The driver worked great (or I worked pretty damn well with it). I was hitting long drives straight down the fairway most of the time. In fact, I think the most remarkable thing about Monday's round was that I out drove Paul 4 times when we were both hitting drivers. This has never happened before. Ever. Not even once. OK, maybe once if Paul like missed the ball entirely and I didn't but if that ever happened, I don't remember. Ordinarily, that might upset Paul, but not today since he was really on, ending up even for the round. His quote was, "You can outdrive me all day as long and as long as I end up even for the round, I'll be happy." My irons and short game did pretty well on Monday and the only thing that didn't really work was the long irons and fairway woods. I parred all four of the par 3 holes and birdied 18 for a final score of 81. As a follow up to my best round ever at the plateau, this one came in second place.
The next day, Dave and I played at Bear Creek. The driver was still on. I used it on just about any hole I could and while it wasn't foolproof, it was in good shape most of the time. I had a few more irons issues that day and my fairway woods still didn't help me much, but it was a good round again. The most interesting shot was on 16 when my drive was a bit right and my second shot was about 120 yards uphill to a plateau green but there was a tree blocking my shot. I figured that if I could get the ball up fast enough, it might make it. I took my 9 iron, added a bit o' loft to it and took a good swing at it. I made good contact, but I had absolutely no idea where it went. I didn't see it in front of me, didn't see or hear it land, but on the good side, I didn't hear and trees being hit either. I'm relatively certain that my ball left our dimension and went to ancient Rome for a little while. Fortunately, when it returned it dropped about 2 yards short of the green in the fringe leaving me a pretty easy chip towards the hole. Phew! My final score at Bear Creek was 88 which was 2 strokes better than my previous best there.
Finally, Rick, Paul, Doug and I reunited from our Pebble Beach adventure last January to take on Trilogy. Just to make it fun, we dialed in 15-30 MPH gusts of wind and a bit of rain to make it more interesting. We weren't sure we were actually going to get the round in, but I figured that this is the way golf was intended to be played, so out we went. It took me a couple of holes to get used to the conditions, but once I did, I was playing very well. Between the 7th and 15th holes I had 6 pars and the rest were bogies so I was feeling pretty good about that. Unfortunately, 16 and 17 were both doubles, and while my final score of 86 won't even figure into my handicap calculations (even if we were still officially counting) it was still a good solid round. I didn't hit as many fairways, but most of that was related to the high winds grabbing my tee shots.
The strongest point was clearly the 10.5° 410cc stiff Ignite. Looks like I'm a gonna need me one of those. But for now, I'll just keep borrowing Rick's. Do you think he'll notice?
Duffergeek Stat Zone:
Willows Run Eagle's Talon
Score: 81 (10.161 round rating)
Putts: 32
GIRs: 8
Fairways: 9/14
Interesting stat: Second round rating score ever for me, outdrove Paul 4 times.
Bear Creek
Score: 88 (13.064 round rating)
Putts: 30
GIRs: 4
Fairways: 9/14
Interesting stat: Best round at Bear Creek
Trilogy
Score: 86 (14.883 round rating)
Putts: 31
GIRs: 5
Fairways: 6/14
Interesting stat: Um... It was so wet, I fell on my ass twice while walking down hills.
Paul, Rick, Dave and I started out at Willows on Monday (gotta love the holiday weeks...) Rick let me borrow his 10.5° 410cc Nike Ignite driver since mine wasn't helping me much over the past few weeks -- at least not reliably. I think this really is the key to these three rounds. The driver worked great (or I worked pretty damn well with it). I was hitting long drives straight down the fairway most of the time. In fact, I think the most remarkable thing about Monday's round was that I out drove Paul 4 times when we were both hitting drivers. This has never happened before. Ever. Not even once. OK, maybe once if Paul like missed the ball entirely and I didn't but if that ever happened, I don't remember. Ordinarily, that might upset Paul, but not today since he was really on, ending up even for the round. His quote was, "You can outdrive me all day as long and as long as I end up even for the round, I'll be happy." My irons and short game did pretty well on Monday and the only thing that didn't really work was the long irons and fairway woods. I parred all four of the par 3 holes and birdied 18 for a final score of 81. As a follow up to my best round ever at the plateau, this one came in second place.
The next day, Dave and I played at Bear Creek. The driver was still on. I used it on just about any hole I could and while it wasn't foolproof, it was in good shape most of the time. I had a few more irons issues that day and my fairway woods still didn't help me much, but it was a good round again. The most interesting shot was on 16 when my drive was a bit right and my second shot was about 120 yards uphill to a plateau green but there was a tree blocking my shot. I figured that if I could get the ball up fast enough, it might make it. I took my 9 iron, added a bit o' loft to it and took a good swing at it. I made good contact, but I had absolutely no idea where it went. I didn't see it in front of me, didn't see or hear it land, but on the good side, I didn't hear and trees being hit either. I'm relatively certain that my ball left our dimension and went to ancient Rome for a little while. Fortunately, when it returned it dropped about 2 yards short of the green in the fringe leaving me a pretty easy chip towards the hole. Phew! My final score at Bear Creek was 88 which was 2 strokes better than my previous best there.
Finally, Rick, Paul, Doug and I reunited from our Pebble Beach adventure last January to take on Trilogy. Just to make it fun, we dialed in 15-30 MPH gusts of wind and a bit of rain to make it more interesting. We weren't sure we were actually going to get the round in, but I figured that this is the way golf was intended to be played, so out we went. It took me a couple of holes to get used to the conditions, but once I did, I was playing very well. Between the 7th and 15th holes I had 6 pars and the rest were bogies so I was feeling pretty good about that. Unfortunately, 16 and 17 were both doubles, and while my final score of 86 won't even figure into my handicap calculations (even if we were still officially counting) it was still a good solid round. I didn't hit as many fairways, but most of that was related to the high winds grabbing my tee shots.
The strongest point was clearly the 10.5° 410cc stiff Ignite. Looks like I'm a gonna need me one of those. But for now, I'll just keep borrowing Rick's. Do you think he'll notice?
Duffergeek Stat Zone:
Willows Run Eagle's Talon
Score: 81 (10.161 round rating)
Putts: 32
GIRs: 8
Fairways: 9/14
Interesting stat: Second round rating score ever for me, outdrove Paul 4 times.
Bear Creek
Score: 88 (13.064 round rating)
Putts: 30
GIRs: 4
Fairways: 9/14
Interesting stat: Best round at Bear Creek
Trilogy
Score: 86 (14.883 round rating)
Putts: 31
GIRs: 5
Fairways: 6/14
Interesting stat: Um... It was so wet, I fell on my ass twice while walking down hills.
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