Happy New Year. It has been a blessedly quiet celebration for us. We sat and watched movies the last two nights, seeing Denzel Washington in Fences and Out of Time as well as Keanu Reeves attorney drama The Whole Truth, Drew Barrymore's I Miss You Already and Nicholas Spark' latest movie, The Choice. It was nice. We actually sat in bed last night and watched the ball drop and then slept in until almost 8:30 this morning.
I played in The Holiday Classic this weekend with Paul. It was a 2 man scramble and we played both Saturday and Sunday at 9 AM. My game is pretty bland right now. I'm a 17 handicap at Woodcreek and playing like it. We shot a 74 on Saturday and left a lot on the course. Our combined handicaps at 25% gave us a 68 and we were in 4th place after the first day. The leaders had 63 and 64. We played with the team that had a 64 the first day. They played well and just didn't make any mistakes. The club at Woodcreek offered us two rounds with cart and lunch both days for $120, The scramble required each player to get in 6 drives and Paul was not playing well early on. I had the first six drives before he finally warmed up.
It was the opposite on Sunday as I couldn't get warm. It was about 40 degrees at tee time and only warmed up to 48 degrees by noon. Today was sunny and a high of 65 degrees. Sunday was overcast and COLD. It took me 16 holes to get my 6 drives in. We felt like we struggled more, probably because we missed about 4 really makeable birdie putts, but actually shot a 73 net 67 and hung on to our 4th place position. The guys that shot both 63 and 64 struggled and ended up tied with us for fourth. The winning team had 61 and the guys we ended up playing with on Sunday that had a 68 the first day shot a 72 with 9 strokes for a 63 and took second. Apparently Paul and I are great to play with. Fourth place ended up with five teams tied and a payout of $10 per man. If we had made one of those putts for birdie we would have won $50 each. Oh well. I added a couple of pictures from the course above.
I had a good time and I'm committed to improving my game this year to the point that I start shooting those "boring" 83's like I used to. I remember coming home from golf and telling Darla I shot 83 and she asked why I even played the game if I shot 83 every week. That seems a long time ago, but I look forward to getting back to those days. It will be a year since my shoulder surgery in February.
We did not end up hosting our friends for New Years as Darla was feeling a lot of anxiety and not sleeping well. I called our friends and asked for a mea culpa and they were all very gracious about the cancellation and wished Darla a speedy recovery. Her blood sugar numbers have been up and likely due to her lack of sleep. We have had a lot of frustration with the dog as the Obedience training was not successful. Once we took the collar off of him he was out of control, running from us and not paying any heed to us. We finally sat down and really had a heart to heart on how to get him under control. We don't want to shock him because it just makes him scared and skittish, but we need him to listen to us. We decided to put the collar back on him and use it if and when he refused to listen. What we have since realized is that we don't have to shock him. There is a Pager feature on the collar that just vibrates and lets him know to come. He immediately runs back to us when we push the Pager feature. It is nothing short of an epiphany as we now have a well behaved dog. You can see the picture of him chewing up the blackberry bush in the backyard.
What prompted the heart to heart was Samson totally losing it outside and running across the top of the pool with his e-collar on and me being afraid he was going to fall in the pool. I was so mad at him and went ballistic when he finally came back around. Darla has a feral cat that she feeds and he was chasing the cat in the dark at about 10:30 at night. We paid a fortune for the trainer to completely mess the training up, but the one good thing that came out of it is actually the collar and the fact that he heeds with it on.
Darla leaves Thursday for six days in Florida for a leadership event with Touchstone. They are staying at the Universal Studios hotel and the event is Friday to Sunday. They are staying an extra day in order to save money on the flights. They will visit Orlando on Monday and fly home Tuesday. She also qualified for the trip to Punta Cana, but did not qualify me. We thought about going, but with the wedding in April, we are looking to save money.
Darla and I paid for David and Becky's honeymoon in Hawaii and agreed to pay for Jennifer and McKenny as well. We had used our timeshare in Hawaii and they traded it for a place in Maui. Jennifer and McKenny want to go to Oahu and my timeshare company does not have any resorts on Oahu so we were hoping that something would come open for them. I called Diane this last week and asked if they'd be willing to pay half of a hotel in Oahu and we'd buy the airfare. She not only agreed, but offered to kick in $1000. We will book them the Outrigger Waikiki Beach hotel which is right on the beach in the middle of Waikiki and has Dukes as their main restaurant. Darla and I had stayed at the Sheraton on the beach and we ate there a couple of times at Dukes and ended up hanging out at the beach in front to the Outrigger. Small world.
Jennifer was supposed to have Sam on New Years eve for the first time in years, but John's plans fell through and he asked to celebrate with Sam. Jennifer agreed and she was glad that they did. They were home last night and dog sitting one of their friend's dogs, who is older. The dog ended up with a problem with his rectum and they ended up at the emergency vet all night. The old dog will have to be put down this week as the repair is sketchy at best and the dog is older. Sad, but also good that Sam missed all of that drama.
I cleaned out the pool filter and equipment today. It was pretty clogged with debris from the leaves that were in the pool. The pressure was way down and the sweep was pretty useless. I cleaned it out today and the sweep is working great. The only problem I had was that the bolt lock on the filter had stripped and I had to "jerry rig" some washers and nuts to get the strap seated properly.
Well, this is short, but dinner is almost ready (Chinese chicken salad) and I am ready to relax a bit before work tomorrow. I have a new employee starting tomorrow and will likely make an offer to a new Personal Lines Underwriter tomorrow. I hope all is well with each of you. Here's to a healthy and Happy New Year. I look forward to our cruise with the family in December. Ciao.
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