 |
 |
 |
|
When we arrive at the ball I climb down into the trap and ask of Harry, "How many times has this ever happened at The Player's Championship?"
"Zero," Harry says.
From the bunker I punch out my ball and it heads at an alarming rate of speed towards the bunker on the right side of the fairway. Then, the first true calamity happens since the first hole. I walk past a ball sitting up just short of the bunker on the fairway and climb down into the other bunker. Take a practice swing and hit the ball into another bunker further up the fairway. Only, just as I swing, I hear Harry call out, "Nooooo!" Which makes perfect sense. Because I've just managed to hit the woman vice-president's ball instead of my own. Turns out she was too nice to tell me that I was playing her ball. Either that or she was in shock. This is mortifying, the golfing equivalent of making a porno movie starring yourself and a horse. So we have to put a new ball down for her and I have to clamber back up out of the sand trap and hit my actual ball. Which I do. Into the water. Only it turns out there's some uncertainty about where my ball actually landed. Yep, the caddy has lost my ball. Or in his words, "I didn't see a splash and I was watching for a splash."
Eventually we find my ball embedded in the mud alongside the pond. I play it from there and end up with a miraculous 6. (A 7 if you count the ball I hit which wasn't actually my own.)
6. "I've gotta pee," Tardio says, "Do you think we can pee on this course?"
"I think Harry will yell at us," I say.
"We're grown, Harry can't yell at us," Tardio says. "I've gotta go."
We all hit our tee shots on the sixth hole and then Tardio sprints off into the Florida scrub brush to go to the bathroom. I wait to see if Harry is going to yell at him and when he doesn't I follow Tardio into the woods. Because the only thing worse than having to pee is having to pee while someone else gets to pee.
When we re-emerge, I manage a bogey. Tardio doesn't fare as well. After he hits a three wood, a disgusted Harry says, "That's over everything." We're through 6 holes and I'm 9 over par. "I want a beer," Tardio says, "but Harry will yell at me for sure."
"I think Harry likes me a lot more than he likes you," I say.
"No way," Tardio says. "You already hit the wrong damn ball."
(Coming Wednesday, holes 7-18, the famous island green, and the conclusion of our round)
