| Battle of the 1988 All-Stars |
[Apr. 18th, 2007|11:14 am] |
So Trevor Linden was drafted second overall behind Mike Modano in the 1988 NHL Entry Draft. They remain the only two players on those two teams who played against each other in the 1994 Stars-Canucks series. Modano has been the better player for the duration of their careers, offensively for certain, and in the last five to seven years that gap has widened as Linden has aged more severely than has Modano. However, let's have a look at their numbers through four games shall we?
Linden - 1 goal, 2 assists, 3 points, 0 PIM, 7 Shots in a mere 17:30 minutes per game, only 1:40 of which is on the powerplay. His goal was the game winner, and one of his assists was on an OT winner.
Modano - 0 goals, 1 assist, 1 point, 4 PIM, 11 Shots in 28:58 minutes on the ice per game. Modano is also averaging almost four minutes per game on the powerplay, with nothing to show for it.
Currently, Linden is winning the battle of the 1988 All-Stars, just like he did in 1994. Sweet.
In other Canucks related commentary, if I'm a Vancouver reporter, here are some questions for Turco:
"Marty, how do you feel about your already poor playoff record continuing to suffer due to some questionable goals in the third period of a home game that your team really needed you to close the door in?"
"Marty, how does it feel to have one of the most disparate regular season to playoffs goaltending records in NHL history?"
"Marty, what do you have to say about losing eight of your last ten playoff games? Does that weigh on you before games?"
I genuinely feel bad for Turco who is playing great but getting killed. Nevertheless, as a good old fashioned homer, I fully encourage our homer media to get in his head as much as possible, because I'm still waiting for him to blow it. Game five, here we come. |
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| It's been a good run, but.... |
[Apr. 1st, 2007|03:10 pm] |
So last night the CBC decided to give the West Coast the "good" crew - we got the HD truck, Don Cherry and Ron McLean, and, best of all - Bob Cole doing play by play.
The high definition truck was excellent, and there is really no excuse to not have that at every single Canucks game for the rest of history. If you're not fortunate to have an HD TV (and I don't in my apartment, but we were at a friends house who does) do yourself a favour and start saving for one because the difference is huge and it makes sports way better.
While Don Cherry has clearly lost a few steps, he is sitll worth watching, and Ron McLean is an excellent host, so it's nice to have those guys on during our game, even if you do have to deal with Cherry's blatant homerism for the Leafs. Honestly, I think Kelly Hrudey does a pretty good job and is probably just as good if not better than Cherry at this point, so I will call that one a wash.
Then, there was Bob Cole. Now, if the people at CBC think we were getting the good end of the deal by getting Bob Cole instead of Jim Hughson they are sadly mistaken. It is completely obvious that Cole no longer has the slightest clue what is happening on the ice in front of him, especially if neither of the teams involved are the Maple Leafs.
Some random examples include mistaking Daniel Sedin for Matt Cooke, horribly mispronouncing various names throughout the contest, at one point referring to a Calgary player as Tommi Santala despite the fact that Santala plays for the Canucks and wasn't even on the ice at the time. But, my personal favourite was the Canucks powerplay where he repeatedly called Krajicek Willie Mitchell, then mistook Bieksa for Mitchell as well, commenting that "Mitchell is all over the ice" despite the fact that he in fact wasn't on the ice at all.
His voice still sounds like hockey, but if you ever pay a little bit more attention to what he's saying and a little less to the tone of his voice it is horribly obvious that he needs to go. I know it's a hard thing for CBC to do given his history with the game and the fact that I am sure he still wants to be doing it, but the sad truth is that he just can't hack it anymore.
At the very least, stick him with the Leafs games and give us Jim Hughson back, because there is no finer call in the game right now thatnHughson's trademark "Great Save Luongo!" |
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| Random Tidbits |
[Mar. 27th, 2007|05:44 pm] |
1. I could sit and listen all day to Pratt and Taylor talk about the Canucks playoff run from 94 and the potential excitement of a playoff run this year - the potential for any kind of playoff run this year gets me giddy like no business.
2. There are only six school days left in my first year of law school. That is insane. We're done exams on the 23rd, which is less than four weeks from today.
3. I turn 24 years old in another week. I have attempted to grow facial hair in honour of that occassion and it is awfully sad. I am growing only a little chin thing and a "soul patch" - three weeks in now and it is starting to look decent. Not good, but decent.
4. I'm cheering for the Flames to win tonight. And Flames fans are cheering for Minnesota to win. How weird is that?
5. It's going to be strange to be back in Vancouver in a month, but I am looking forward to playing golf and hanging out and hopefully getting good hours at the pool.
6. Man I hope I can make it to ACF. We'll see.
7. Strange to see so many names I don't really know running in the AUS elections, it's amazing how fast casts can change. |
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| Don Taylor |
[Mar. 2nd, 2007|10:28 pm] |
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Okay, without looking it up - how old do you think Don Taylor of Sportspage and Sportsnet fame is? |
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| Legal Research is..... Fun ??!? |
[Jan. 24th, 2007|12:42 am] |
So I am currently engaged in the open memo, which is a particular form of hell for first year law students. Basically you are given a fact pattern and two issues of law to answer and told to find the answer. It's a somewhat realistic assignment in that it's likely the kind of thing you'd be expected to do as a summering student, an articling student or a rookie lawyer in a firm.
However, we've never really done legal research before so it can be quite a laborious prospect. I know that many people in the class are already getting frustrated, and I had a moment or two of frustration last night, but today has been much much better.
There is something really exciting about needing to find some principle of law or some case with similar facts and sifting through millions of secondary sources, trying different combinations of keyword searches, reading dozens of cases that point you to hundreds of other cases and then finally coming across that perfect case that gives you exactly what you need.
The thing I really like about it is that you have to go wherever the law takes you. Unlike in Political Science where I could decide what I wanted my conclusion to be and then find academic articles that supported that conclusion, in law there is only so much you can do. Obviously, lawyers are paid to try to find there way around any precedent or principle that stands in there way, but depending on the issue that just may not be possible. And for an assignment like this, which is based on impartially assessing the outcome, it's completely a matter of going where the law takes you.
Man, I am a dork. But I am a dork who is content that the decision to come to law school was the right one - must be if I like the worst assignment of the year. |
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| How much are the Calgary Flames Worth? |
[Jan. 22nd, 2007|10:38 pm] |
According to my Property Law textbook, not much. Here is a quote from Principles of Property Law, Fourth Edition, Bruce Ziff, page 207.
"Even something as ostensibly worthless as season tickets to see the Calgary Flames play hockey can be the subject of a trust."
That's right. In my property law textbook. The driest, most painful subject of all. Minimal research (ie, looking at the front of the book) revealed that Mr. Ziff is, <surprise!>, a Professor of Law at the University of Alberta, located in scenic (note the sarcasm) Edmonton.
I'd just like to say for the record that while I still detest this class, I have to have some admiration for an Oilers fan who managed to work in a shot at the Flames in an introduction to Property law textbook. That is all. |
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| Hey, maybe I can do this... |
[Nov. 7th, 2006|11:53 am] |
So there has been minor law school angst about not being smart enough and not doing well because it often seems like everyone else is smarter than me and at the very least, it's almost hard fact that they pay more attention in class and seem more focused than I am. I am working on a biggish (14 pages) assignment which is a closed memo and struggling a bit. Today we got back an assignment from my Criminal Law class that I was really worried about, in the generic comments about the paper at the beginning of class she seemed to be identifying many errors that I had made, so I was getting increasingly concerned. Then I got it back and it didn't have a grade on it, so I had to go back to her and ask what I had received and it was an A-! 80%! The average grade in the class was a B, so I'm pretty happy to be getting an A- and it has made me a bit more confident about this other assignment I'm working on. Maybe I will be able to handle this after all. It's really strange because I've always been lazy in school and done well, but I assumed that was the case for all these people and it might hurt me, but one assignment in and I'm doing okay. I realize it's simply a 15% assignment in one of my seven classes, but hey I will take it as a positive sign. I'm hoping to finish this assignment which is due on Tuesday by this Friday so I can go home this weekend with a clear conscience. We'll see if that happens.
Also I played soccer with the law school intramural team on Sunday and scored two goals in a 4-0 win. I was pretty happy to score twice considering it was only the second game of soccer I've ever played. I should have a had a hat trick, but I slipped on a good chance near the end. I avenged myself by scoring a hat trick in our intramural hockey game later that night - it was a good sporting day.
Other than the fact that I'm as sexually active as your average monk I don't have a whole lot to complain about. |
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| Brutal Honesty |
[Oct. 27th, 2006|12:01 am] |
Have had a couple conversations with people in the last couple days which have ended up being a little more honest about myself and things I don't like about myself than I would have intended. While I am often fairly aware of my less than awesome traits, there is a difference between awareness and unfortunately frank discussion about them. Don't really have much to say about it other than that it's not a fun conversation to have and sometimes I don't really like the things I do. Alas.
Tomorrow is the first midterm of my law school career. I don't think it's going to be too hard, I feel fairly ready. I will now go to sleep and kick the shit out of this test tomorrow. And then get drunk. |
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| Some Things Never Change |
[Oct. 20th, 2006|05:01 pm] |
Things I have done today:
- Went to Safeway and bought tons of groceries
- Two loads of laundry
- Tidied entire apartment including bedroom
- Cleaned kitchen including counters and floors
- Vaccuumed entire apartment
- Cleaned bathrooms
- Started cooking elaborate Stroganoff dinner
- Phone call with mom
Things I have not done today:
- Any work at all on assignment due on Monday. Oops. |
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| Stop Wasting My Class Time |
[Oct. 18th, 2006|02:01 pm] |
Who the fuck interrupts a professor to ask a question that is prefaced with "I don't expect you to answer this question, but..."
If you don't think the Professor can or will answer the question, have you thought about maybe, I don't know, shutting your damn mouth? Just a thought. Fuck. |
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| Meh |
[Oct. 14th, 2006|04:19 pm] |
So I ran for a position on the Law Student's Society, a first year rep. There were two spots for that position and five of us ran. Out of the four opponents two were two of my best friends in the program. I ran not necessarily dying to be on the LSS, but obviously I was somewhat interested or I wouldn't have run. There was virtually no campaigning and at the speeches I said that I was okay with other people winning because I thought they'd all do a good job. That was a true statement. We had the results emailed out to us today, and the two people who won were my tow best friends.
I'm a little bit confused as to how I feel about this. I'm not super upset that I'm not on the LSS - it would have been a fairly big time committment and now I don't have that, but my natural competitiveness makes me wish I had won, just because I hate losing at anything. But I can't really be upset because I have to be happy for my friends, and I am, but I don't know it's just a weird feeling. I'm still enjoying everything out here, but I think going home the last two weekends has made me miss home and my friends at home a bit more than I was before. Oh well. I'm sure I'm just in a minimal funk and will get out of it in the next day or so and feel better about the world. |
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| Living by your lonesome |
[Oct. 4th, 2006|09:15 pm] |
Have had a very good day or two for a variety of reasons. I've really started to embrace this living by myself and being proud of where I live and all that stuff. I really love my apartment but it is still very bare bones in terms of decoration and whatnot. I finally got around to fixing the lighting in my bathroom so now I can see my face when I shave, and having made that small improvement really sort of kick started me into getting my shit together and making this place look as great as it can.
That has currently resulted in me purchasing a mirror for the entry hall. No crazy purchase by any means, but it's amazing what small things can do to the place. There is still tons of bare wall and I've started looking into getting some of my nicer photos from Europe blown up and framed and whatnot for the rest of the smaller wall spaces. I still have to find some larger items for the large wall spaces, but that will come when I find something legitimately good. None of this will be cheap - getting prints at 11x14 or bigger plus a frame is generally going to run in the $35 - $45 range depending on how nice the frame is, and I will need quite a few, but it is worth it to have the place looking good and it's not like I'm moving out soon or the pictures will go bad.
On other home improvement ideas - I'm looking into getting mirrored bifold doors for my closet - currently they are white doors which is fine, but there is no full length mirror anywhere in my place, and it's nice to be able to look at your whole outfit together before you go out, especially when you're trying to make sure your suit looks good before these wine and cheeses. Also, the lighting in my room isn't superb and the mirrored closet will reflect a lot more light and make the room seem bigger and brighter which would be good too.
The final element of my good feeling about living here was today when I came home from school and started preparing a real dinner like nobodies business. The absolute favorite thing my mom makes is Beef Stroganoff and I have been thinking about making it for awhile and today I finally did. Dinner was beef stroganoff on white rice with boiled broccoli on the side followed by some ice cream for desert that my friend Emily brought (as I made dinner for her). I was a little bit anxious about trying to make something that I like so much, but it turned out absolutely perfect and if anything tasted even better than my mom's because I had worked hard to make it taste good - there is extra satisfaction in the effort.
After dinner I cleaned all the dishes, pots and pans right away so the kitchen was spic and span, then have spent the last while cleaning my room and did my laundry so the place is clean, everything is where it belongs and I'm just entirely contented. It's sometimes silly how easily I can feel good about my life with stupid stuff like cooking a good dinner and cleaning my apartment, but there is a certain sense of peace about taking care of yourself and doing it well.
Now I just have to read about seventy pages of constitutional law, torts and property before I go to bed and the day will be complete. Things are good :o) |
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| First Weekend Home |
[Oct. 1st, 2006|10:52 pm] |
So I went home to VanCity this weekend for a couple night and it was a lot of fun - but it was strange to be back in Vancouver when it's not home anymore.
I came in on Friday afternoon and got picked up by Quinn - he and I had a lovely lunch at BK and caught up and all that jazz, it was lovely. Afterwards I headed out to UBC (I have no idea how I did that commute for so long without killing myself, it is awful now that I don't have to do it) to hit up the Gallery as it is Friday afternoon. This was a nice visit with Corbett, Costa and Omar, but it was mildly depressing only because the Gall on Fridays just isn't the same as it used to be. I'd heard that from several people over the year, but as it turns out that is the truth. Then hung out with Nikki and some Rec types for awhile before getting a drink with Jon and Jaclyn, stayed sober for the day and just had a nice time visiting with everyone.
Saturday I rolled out to the field to play some rugby which I wasn't sure about, but it turned out to be a blast. We lost both of our games, but we were really close - especially in the second one. I had a lot of fun and as it turns out, I'm even somewhat decent at the sport. I knew I'd be okay at tackling and getting hit because I've done a lot of contact stuff with hockey and whatnot, but apparently I'm even kind of fast which was shocking because I'm generally not considered the fastest guy in the world. I got several compliments however on my running and I had a couple really good runs with the ball throughout the game. One side of the field had an unfortunately large amount of dirt as opposed to grass, and I had several large hits along that part of the field which has led to my knees being absolutely mangled. With about five or six minutes left in the second game I took a lot of weight on my thigh and got a nasty charley horse that had me limping pretty severely the rest of the day. All in all it was a lot of fun and I am still glad that I played contact sports that you wear padding in, because that makes a lot more sense.
After the game I swung by Longboat and had a great time saying hi to people until I was picked up and dropped in the ocean by several large jerks. It was quite hilarious and whatnot, but it was kind of shitty because they dunked me in the only coat I had brought to Vancouver and because the bloody ocean was quite cold. It was nice to see the whole Rec crowd, but it was a little bit sad because it made me remember how much I liked that part of UBC and how I'm not a part of it anymore. I think I'm going to be super sad when I don't get to do Storm this year. Life moves on I guess.
We hit up Darby's with all the boys for some drinks afterwards which was fun, I was still driving so I didn't get nearly as drunk as most of the other guys. We went to the hotel that people were staying in for awhile where they continued to drink and I just tried to stop hurting. We all went to the Cellar, and I was just really not in the mood - I hung out for awhile and ended up ditching fairly early to go home. Ended up chatting with my dad for about an hour quite late at night, which was a nice chat about a variety of things and woke up clear headed and not quite as sore this morning.
It was fun to be home and I am going back again in five days, so it's not too long till I get to do it again. |
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| Law School |
[Sep. 20th, 2006|11:37 am] |
So I realize that I have been virtually silent on the LJ front and for anyone hoping to keep up with my life over here via this medium, I apologize. The first two weeks blew by in a haze of alcohol and introductions and there was little time for reflection or observations. Now "real" classes have started and the amount of reading assigned is monumental.
Currently, I am in one of my seven classes which is entitled "Law, Legislation and Policy". Now this class is very important because you need to have an understanding of how laws are made, how the laws pass through Canadian parliament and all the things that go along with that. The only problem with this is that the majority of the class does NOT have a political science background and therefore this class is currently incredibly remedial for anyone with even a basic knowledge of the Canadian system.
Not to judge anyone in the class, as everyone here knows millions of things that I don't and would likely scorn my lack of knowledge in their field, but today in this class we have fiielded questions such as "what is a backbencher"?, "do we know who votes yes and no in votes in parliament?" and "how does cabinet get picked?" as well as being taught that the PM is very important, he resides in both the legislative and executive branches of government, and are currently looking at a chart of how a bill becomes a law.
Again, this is important information and I know that many people may not know it, but holy shit am I bored out of my mind. Thankfully I have my laptop and can surf the internet to my heart's content. I do hope that this class will get more in depth and start covering things I don't know because otherwise I'm going to find it quite difficult to show up to this stupid class.
I will attempt to post a little bit more often in the upcoming weeks as I do like getting some thoughts down and the partying has really toned itself down, so there should be more time. I am having a blast over here, but there are definitely times where I miss you fine folk at home quite badly. I'm managing to survive though, and am excited about a lot of the learning that is going to happen in the next few years. |
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| Victoria Living |
[Sep. 3rd, 2006|11:38 am] |
So I am now a resident of Victoria. It's quite a strange thing to realize that this is going to be home for the next several years - the first few days has really just felt like I'm on a vacation and I'll be returning home to my real life any day now. I think that feeling will really completely end once classes start and I'm too busy to think about going home.
Victoria is a great city and I love where I live. I'm just on the outskirts of downtown (think if you lived immediately on the downtown side of the Granville Street Bridge) which means I'm just far enough away to avoid some of the sketchy drug users who are quite prevalent in the downtown core, but I am within easy walking distance of all the bars and pubs and restaurants that downtown Victoria has to offer. For someone who was so far away from downtown Vancouver my whole life, this is quite an exciting development.
Campus is nice and full of very attractive girls, although most of them were born in 1988, making me feel incredibly old. The city itself is full of attractive women walking around, I've been quite impressed. A lot of this has to do with the fact that it's still awfully summerish outside and the fact that the racial makeup of the city has a far higher proportion of caucasian women (my general preference) is also a factor. It is quite small, which makes getting around easy, although the streets are all very bendy so there has been a fair amount of getting lost from time to time. Luckily enough I haven't been in a tremendous rush to get anywhere so it doesn't really matter. I've found a pretty effective route to school which takes me about 10-12 minutes in my car, and since I'm used to my commute from Richmond I don't envision that being a problem at all.
I still have some work to do to get my apartment the way I want it - I definitely need to buy a new dinette set as the one that Clayton has is quite ghetto, and I require a bookshelf or two and a bunch of stuff for the walls which are currently quite bare, but I will get around to all of that stuff in the next couple weeks, it doesn't have to be done immediately. I already sent out an email with this information, but if you don't have my phone number or address let me know and I'll send them to you again. Feel free to mail me something so that I get something other than bills and flyers in the mail, it would be quite exciting.
I'm very much looking forward to school starting and meeting my classmates and the people who are going to be my friends for the next couple years. It's kind of crazy, but I'm very excited for it all to happen. Make sure to drop me a line from time to time to let me know how things are going in your neck of the woods. |
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| Love |
[Aug. 10th, 2006|11:01 pm] |
| [ | Current Mood |
| | Sappy | ] |
| [ | Current Music |
| | Elvis - Love Me Tender | ] |
Love has very much been on my mind in the last few weeks and it was especially so tonight.
My parents will celebrate their 30th wedding anniversary on August 14th and they are celebrating with a big party on Saturday. I spent most of today looking through photo albums for pictures of them throughout the years to display at the party. My present to them, that they don't know, is that I've been taking photos of these old photos (don't have a scanner and most of these photos are pretty permanently stuck in their albums now), editing them to look as good as possible and printing them out full page size on my printer. Then I spent a bunch of time hacking up old cardboard boxes to make backings for the photos so that I can arrange them on the hedge in our backyard so that all of the guests can have a look at them. Thus far, I've printed and backed three photos from their wedding (one of my mom, one of the wedding party, and one of them in their car afterwards), a picture from their fourth anniversary (that looks exactly like every American Eagle ad ever - I'll post that one soon), a picture from their tenth anniversary (which is the beginning of the moustache years for my dad but is a great picture nonetheless), one from when they'd been married 16 years which I'm sure they won't like too much, and one that I took of them on their 25th anniversary.
So after all this going through of photo albums of them as basically kids (my mom was 19 and my dad 22 when they were married), then as young adults, then young parents, and then finally looking more like the people I remember them as, it's made me really appreciate how lucky I am and how good their marriage is. I mean, they bicker and get into silly fights as much as anyone else, but tonight when they started looking through photos as well (they know I've been looking at them, but don't know exactly what I'm planning) they were just so cute that I was almost kind of sad, but more than anything else I was hopeful. Hopeful that one day I'll find someone who is a true partner, someone I'll still love thirty years after I've married her.
The other thing that has made me think about love a little is Alan and Jess and their impending wedding. Talking to them about engagement rings and dates and plans and all the crazy things they have to do between now and when they get married makes it sound like a lot of work, but the excitement they have about marrying each other is hard to ignore. Spending time with them and seeing how perfect they are and how excited they are makes me really look forward to meeting that person.
Like the Beatles said, all you need is love. So to those of you who have it, enjoy it. To those of you who don't, look forward to finding it one day soon.
And, if you're lucky enough to have parents who are still married, spend a half hour and look at their wedding photos and photos of them from the first few years they were married - you will really enjoy it and I think it's something that everyone should do every now and then. |
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| Furniture! |
[Aug. 8th, 2006|05:11 pm] |
I think that furnishing an apartment may be one of the most fun things possible. What a great way to spend literally thousands of dollars on great junk and furniture and things. The endless endless list of things that you can buy. Man it makes me happy.
Today was an important item shopping day - the couch and loveseat combination. My mom and I went to a variety of places: Ikea, JR Furniture, the Brick, United Furniture Warehouse and a couple other smaller places and my favorite couch/loveseat was this one from United Furniture Warehouse. It is called the "Black Knight" despite being a nice navy blue. It's a microsuede and it is super comfy. I was thinking about leather, because it's a very classy look, but none of the leather couches were as comfortable as this one. The salesguy (who was really great) offered us $1078 for the two pieces and I figure that can come done a little bit. I haven't bought it yet, and I am just curious as to what people think - the loveseat is exactly the same.  |
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| Lazy Sunday |
[Jul. 30th, 2006|10:23 am] |
Laying in bed listening to the thunder boom and the rain pour down in brief spurts against my pool, gaining in power then ebbing, then booming again and coming down harder and harder.
This does not inspire me to go play golf, especially since I blew up yesterday and have no chance of winning the tournament. Alas.
Also, the poor run of luck continues in my house as apparently my dad left the garage door open last night after my parents came home and a whole shitload of stuff was stolen from our garage - my dad's cell out of his car, his driver from golf bag, couple boxes of wine, toolbox, more tools, and some other stuff. Luckily enough they didn't come into the house and they left a fair amount of stuff in the garage as well, but it fucking sucks. Nothing of mine in particular was stolen which is nice.
Also, my laptop won't let me run Bearshare because of the ad software that comes with it and I am wondering what people use as file downloading software? I'm mostly interested in just downloading single songs and occasional video clips, so if you guys have any suggestions that would be wonderful.
What a meandering entry. And on that note, I'll mention that I went to the fireworks last night down at English Bay with Omar and a couple of our friends from school and it was pretty fun. The girls were drinking and Omar went looking for them at one point so I was by myself and ended up making friends with some people sitting around me. Had a nice time hanging out, the fireworks were fireworks but they were pretty impressive. The drive home from downtown was crazy, including seeing one gang of teenagers bear spray or mace another group of teenagers from the car. It's amazing how fast people move when that stuff gets in the air, it is strong.
I like the fireworks but that will probably be the only time I go this year, it's just too much of a hassle and fireworks always look like fireworks.
The rain outside my house is insane right now. Insane.
Here is hoping that it clears up because playing golf in the rain does not make me a happy camper, and neither does going back to work at 5:30 in the morning which I have to do tomorrow and for the rest of August. Fuck. |
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| Day One |
[Jul. 28th, 2006|11:37 pm] |
Today I shot 77 - a fairly awful score. I hit the ball fine, but I couldn't putt to save my life. I only made one birdie, leaving putts short in the jaws a number of times.
The low score of the day was a 69 from a junior, followed by a 71, two 75s and two 76s. So I am eight shots off the lead and in seventh place. There are still two more rounds to go, so I'm not out of it, but I'm going to have to play really well the next two days.
I figure if I go 72-72 I'll be right in the hunt, so hopefully I just get my putter going and I'll be right where I need to be. |
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| Golfing Nerves |
[Jul. 27th, 2006|11:14 pm] |
So it's obvious that I love golf - there is nothing that I'd rather do in the summer than play golf almost everyday - I love hitting the ball, I love being outside in the sun and the green, I love playing with my friends, I love playing by myself. There is very little about the game that I don't like.
I'm quite a good golfer, my handicap currently floating around 1 or 2, but I've never really enjoyed competitive golf. The year I played varsity at UBC was the least I've ever enjoyed golf and since then I have entered virtually no tournaments, never wanting to pay the rather high entrance fees or have to worry so much about my score. It's not that I don't try, or that I don't want to play as well as I can, but I just don't want my happiness to depend on my round, as it seems to during tournament play.
This isn't to say I never compete in my golf, I play for money with the guys at the club, I enter men's nights competitions, I play in the scratch league, but these are all one day things that often involve handicaps and partners so it's not really the same as multiple round stroke play tournaments.
The one exception to my tournament free golfing is the Club Championship at my course. Pretty much all private courses have a club championship and at Quilchena the format is three rounds of stroke play. Since this is the only tournament I enter, I obviously end up getting a little nervous each year about it. I've decided the last few years that the best way to deal with the tournament is to just treat it like any other rounds of golf and try to do my best that way.
The championship starts tomorrow and runs through Sunday and I'm really really excited about it. I've been playing very solid golf lately, including a great round of 73 at Marine Drive yesterday. For me, the test of whether my game is good or not is playing at other courses - I can shoot 75 with my eyes closed at Quilchena because I'm so used to the course, but to be able to take my game out to a course I haven't played in six years and shoot well gives me a lot of confidence. I also got lucky on the draw and am playing the first two rounds with two guys I really enjoy playing golf with and two guys who I expect to be right near the top of the pack, so it's good to be able to know what they're doing as the rounds go.
The biggest challenge for me this year will be to relax and just play golf. I know that I'm one of the best players at our club and I know that I'm playing solid golf and I know I've got a shot. I just want to get out there and throw three good rounds together and maybe I have a shot at winning this thing. The single most important thing will be for me to not overthink myself and not put too much pressure on myself, especially if I have a good first day or two. So I'm going to go to work like normal tomorrow, enjoy my last day at the outdoor pool, come home and eat lunch and head over to the golf course just like it's a normal round and hopefully I can play as well as I have been playing.
I just hope I play well. |
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davetallguy's journal