Carl Spackler on the Dali Lama

I was doing some research for my site Things You Should Do and I found out that Phylis Pilgrim, the hiking director at Rancho La Puerta had met the Dali Lama. Wonder if she played golf with him?

The Catch - Montana to Clark

I was at Candlestick Park, on my knees praying for victory, when Dwight Clark made "The Catch" that sent us all to the Superbowl. On my new blog, www.thingsyoushoulddo.com I've got info about an event commemorating the 25th Anniversary of The Catch -- check it out.


SF 49ers, the+catch, joe montana, dwight clark

DEAN MARTIN VINTAGE 60'S COMMERCIAL

It's Time for Me to Go to the Driving Range

It's My Life

[Originally by Bon Jovi]

This ain't a song for the broken-hearted
No silent prayer for the faith-departed
I ain't gonna be just a face in the crowd
You're gonna hear my voice
When I shout it out loud

[Chorus:]
It's my life
It's now or never
I ain't gonna live forever
I just want to live while I'm alive
(It's my life)
My heart is like an open highway
Like Frankie said
I did it my way
I just wanna live while I'm alive
It's my life

This is for the ones who stood their ground
For Tommy and Gina who never backed down
Tomorrow's getting harder make no mistake
Luck ain't even lucky
Got to make your own breaks

[Chorus:]
It's my life
And it's now or never
I ain't gonna live forever
I just want to live while I'm alive
(It's my life)
My heart is like an open highway
Like Frankie said
I did it my way
I just want to live while I'm alive
'Cause it's my life

Better stand tall when they're calling you out
Don't bend, don't break, baby, don't back down

[Chorus:]
It's my life
And it's now or never
'Cause I ain't gonna live forever
I just want to live while I'm alive
(It's my life)
My heart is like an open highway
Like Frankie said
I did it my way
I just want to live while I'm alive

[Chorus:]
It's my life
And it's now or never
'Cause I ain't gonna live forever
I just want to live while I'm alive
(It's my life)
My heart is like an open highway
Like Frankie said
I did it my way
I just want to live while I'm alive
'Cause it's my life!

Don't You Just Love this Guy?

British Open Golf: Woods seizes an emotional title
Christopher Clarey International Herald Tribune

Published: July 23, 2006


HOYLAKE, England It was quite a contrast. After four days of phenomenally controlled golf at the British Open, Tiger Woods ended up sobbing uncontrollably in the arms of his caddie, Steve Williams, on the 18th green on Sunday.

Williams released his grip after a few seconds as if he sensed that Woods was about to release his, but Woods clung on: the sense of loss overwhelming the buzz of his second consecutive British Open victory.

"I've never done that; you know me," the usually self-contained Woods said. "It's just, I guess, all the thing that we've gone through of late.

"I'm kind of the one who bottles things up a little bit and moves on, tries to deal with things in my own way, but at that moment, it just came pouring out," Woods said. "All the things that my father has meant to me and the game of golf, and I just wish he could have seen it one more time."

Earl Woods, who was his son's golfing mentor as well as his father, died in May of prostate cancer after an extended illness. When Woods returned to the tour, at the U.S. Open last month, he missed the cut at a major championship for the first time in his professional career.

But Woods insisted upon arriving at Royal Liverpool Golf Club that he had come to terms with his father's loss in time for this major tournament, and his performance brooked no argument.

His American compatriot Chris DiMarco, who was playing despite the recent death of his mother, sank enough very long, very timely putts on the back nine Sunday to make it clear that he truly believed some higher force had big plans for him at Hoylake, too. But Woods kept hitting his 3-woods and 2- irons into the fairway and kept sinking shorter putts for birdies, and the result was a final-round 67 and a two-shot victory that made him the first man since Tom Watson in 1983 to defend his British Open title.

That statistic was worthy enough, but the more impressive one is this: Woods has held the lead on 11 occasions heading into the final round of a major championship and has now won all 11 times.

"He's got an uncanny ability, when somebody gets close to him, to just turn it up to another level," said DiMarco, who was within one shot of Woods on Sunday before his fellow American birdied 14, 15 and 16 to give himself plenty of breathing room.

At the tender golfing age of 30, Woods is tied for second on the all-time major championships list with Walter Hagen at 11. But to anyone watching Woods crying on Williams's shoulder and then sobbing in the arms of his wife, Elin, a few moments later, it was clear that this was the most emotional of his major victories.

"Coming up the 18th, Stevie said on the fairway, 'This one is for Dad,'" Woods said of Williams. "I said, 'I still have some more golf to play.' Once I finished out the hole, all those emotions just came pouring out of me. I guess they were locked in there."

Woods had played relatively little competitive golf this season because of his desire to spend time with his father and then mourn his father.

"The U.S. Open, he just wasn't there; he just wasn't ready," his coach, Hank Haney, said.

Since Woods won the British Open in similarly benign weather conditions at St. Andrews last year, the leading man in the majors has unquestionably been his American rival Phil Mickelson, who won the U.S. PGA, the Masters and should have won the U.S. Open.

But Mickelson never mounted a serious challenge here, finishing 13 shots behind Woods despite doing all the homework possible on this Royal Liverpool course that was making its return to the British Open rotation after 39 years.

While Mickelson was making repeat visits to the Wirral Peninsula to learn the lay of the relatively flat land, Woods arrived the weekend before the tournament to start cramming, and after seeing how hard the fairways were because of a long stretch of atypically dry and warm weather, he quickly arrived at the conclusion that it was better to take a low-risk approach.

Instead of hitting drives, he would use 3-woods and low irons off the tees and not trying to tempt fate or the many fairway bunkers that litter this course. He hadn't carried a 2-iron in his bag all season, but he made frequent and brilliant use of it here. In four rounds, he hit just one driver, and that was on opening day.

"I thought this golf course lent itself to that type of play," Woods said. "For me, if I hit my driver, my natural flight has now come down a little bit. I felt if my ball landed on the fairway, I really couldn't control my ball on the grounds. In a couple practice rounds, I was hitting 400-yard drives. You just can't control that."

Woods' conservative plan worked beautifully, and his final score of 270 (18-under par) was anything but conservative. He shot 67 in the first round, seized the lead with a 65 in the second round, held his ground with a 71 on Saturday and then left a very well-stocked leaderboard in the dust - of which there was plenty here- on Sunday with his masterful 67.

"Everybody thinks its because he can't hit his driver," said Haney of Woods's tactics. "That wasn't the case. The ball is going forever. How are you going to make it stop? Yeah, you're closer to the green down there. But you can't go at the pins anyway, so what good does it really do you? To be honest with you, after he got through the second hole in the first practice round, he'd already figured out he was going to be playing irons."

Woods started the day at 12-under, with only a one-shot lead over DiMarco, Ernie Els and his playing partner Sergio García, the 26-year-old Spanish extrovert who walked to the first tee wearing yellow from neck to toe. It was a bold move from a young man who had moved into contention by scorching the course with a 65 on Saturday. But yellow clearly does not have the same cachet here on this usually windswept stretch of northwest English coast as it did as the Tour de France ended in Paris on Sunday.

García, making his first visit in a while to Woods's fan-filled, camera- filled world, would be the first of the potential champions to fall away, as he missed a short putt for par on the second hole and an even shorter putt for par on the third.

Ángel Cabrera, only two shots back at the start of the day, quickly eliminated one of the best potential story lines by making a triple bogey on the second hole, which all but ruled out a repeat of his Argentine countryman Roberto de Vicenzo's victory here when the Open was last staged at Hoylake in 1967.

Jim Furyk, also two shots back at the start, bogeyed the first two holes, and so it soon became clear that whatever tussle there would be was going to be between Woods, Els and DiMarco.

Els, the big South African who won the British Open in 2002, was the first to make a move, birdieing the par-5 fifth hole and moving him into a tie with Woods at 13-under. But Woods, playing behind Els and DiMarco, responded quickly. He had come very close to making long birdie putts on the second and third, and on the fifth, he holed a 25-foot eagle putt that gave him back a two- stroke lead.

Woods was playing clinical golf. On the front nine, he would miss only one green and consistently put his tee shots in prime position. Meanwhile, his competitors were having to scramble, but DiMarco, a gritty 37-year-old with an odd putting grip that can sometimes produce birdies in bunches, scrambled well enough to stay in touch with the greatest player of his generation who had beaten him in a playoff to win the 2005 Masters.

A birdie on the 10th hole put DiMarco within two strokes of Woods and on 13, he sank a 25-foot birdie putt to drop to 14-under. Minutes later, Woods made his only bogey of the day on the 12th hole after badly misjudging an approach shot.

The lead was once more down to one shot, but even though DiMarco made a putt of at least 50 feet, or 19 meters, to save par on the 14th and clenched his fist with understandable satisfaction, Woods was about to take over for good with three consecutive birdies that took him to 18 under, which is where he remained.

DiMarco was coping with loss of his own. His mother Norma died on July 4, and he only made the trip to England because he was convinced that his mother would have wanted him to play. "I had a lot of divine intervention out there; I felt my mom there the whole week," he said.

But in the end, there would be no thrilling finish. DiMarco and Els, who finished five shots back of Woods with a 275, smiled as they walked down the 18th, making comments to their friends at home by speaking into the lens of the television camera that was tracking them.

Woods stayed on task until the bittersweet end and has now won three British Opens, after winning in 2000 and 2005 at St. Andrews. Jack Nicklaus, Woods's historical measuring stick, also won three, but he still has the lead over Woods with 18 major championships.

The gap continues to narrow, though, and what happened Sunday will certainly have a prominent place in Woods's career scrapbook. Perhaps it was a coincidence that the two men who finished on top of the leader board here were playing for somebody else this week.

But it was certainly no coincidence that the man who ended up winning was Woods.

Bye Bye Baby*

*that's what Charles Barkley said to me when he left me at the 15th Hole at Edgewood Golf Course




-----------


from the Seattle Post-Intelligencer

Go 2 Guy: At 'Party with Arty,' Barkley and friends grab spotlight

By JIM MOORE
P-I COLUMNIST

STATELINE, Nev. -- "Ten thousand five hundred?! That ain't enough, little fella!"

It's Wednesday night in the Harrah's Casino showroom, and Charles Barkley is smack-talking Marcus Allen as they bid for a trip to Wimbledon, a charity item at the American Century Championship.

"Hey, $15,000!" Barkley shouts from his spot next to the bar.

Emcee/auctioneer John O'Hurley informs Barkley that Allen just raised the bid to $15,500.

"Hey, man!" Barkley yells to Allen. "You're bringing a knife to a gunfight. $20,000!"

Sold.

Besides the celebrity golf tournament at Edgewood Tahoe, there are several peripheral events such as this one, an auction that was preceded by an elegant buffet dinner and followed by a standup routine from Cedric the Entertainer.

Barkley takes the stage to introduce the headliner but gets off a couple of cracks before he does.

"As y'all know, I'm probably not gonna win this thing, I'm here for the gamblin'," Barkley said. "But I want you to know that no matter how good you think you are in this room, you're not at the greatest level. So you suck just like I do."



Cedric the Entertainer is funny, but not hilarious Barkley funny. The next show is about to start in Harrah's lounge. It's a "Party with Arty," but Arty the keyboard and karaoke guy is about to turn the spotlight over to Barkley and friends.

About 200 people crowd around as Ray Allen takes one of the mikes and sings a background vocal to "Brick House." For the next two hours, the Sonics star is center stage, but if this were baseball, he'd be the set-up man, and Barkley the closer.

In less than an hour, Sir Charles buys 10 bottles of Patron tequila and pours double shots into plastic cups for dancers and drinkers around the stage. He takes several swigs himself and is unquestionably the life of Arty's party.

Former Coug Mark Rypien has a tradition here of interrupting the hip-hop and rap music with his rendition of Billy Joel's "Piano Man." Part of the crowd swayed and sang along, but Barkley glared.

"I love Mark Rypien," he says to the crowd. "But if he ever plays that song again, I'm gonna kill him."

With that, Barkley polishes off the last shot from the 10th bottle with help from Jerry Rice.

"I'm sorry, I gotta go," he says. "If I don't gamble, I'll break out in a rash."

Barkley told ESPN he has lost $10 million gambling. He won't quit but is trying to bet in moderation. Asked how much he was up or down playing 21 in the high-rollers room Wednesday night, Barkley said: "Up about a hundred (thousand)."

BEN ROETHLISBERGER arrived at the range before 8 a.m. Thursday, attracting more media attention than Donald Trump, who hit balls next to him.

Roethlisberger is a big story because he led the Steelers past the Seahawks in the Super Bowl and an even bigger story after a helmet-less accident on his motorcycle last month in Pittsburgh.

For the first time, Roethlisberger spoke about the incident on ESPN Wednesday night and said he nearly died. Aside from talking to Sam Farmer of the L.A. Times and Roy Firestone on Thursday, Roethlisberger won't address the scribes here until this morning.

That didn't stop some of us from observing him, and one of us sunk lower than a divot to blatantly eavesdrop on two of his conversations.

"You look good," Maury Povich told Roethlisberger.

"Thank you, I feel good," Roethlisberger said.

I'd never seen him close-up before the accident so I have no idea if he looked about the same, worse or maybe even better after breaking his jaw and other facial bones. He looked completely unblemished from my range, maybe 10 feet away.

"Are you going to be able to go full speed from the beginning?" Trump asked him.

"Yeah," Roethlisberger said.

Fans with his No. 7 jersey lined the green fence behind the range and watched him hit a handful of balls with his Nike clubs, smacking drives that towered over the pines and traveled straight, too.

AFTER ROETHLISBERGER left for his 7:55 tee time, I hung out behind Trump's bag for half an hour. He hit some good shots and more bad ones, while finding time to be interviewed, pose for photos with fans and schmooze with other rich people.

He seemed bothered by interview requests and short with responses. In a crafty veteran move, I asked yet another Trump assistant if I could talk to him, and the guy said yes, when Trump was finished.

I prepared a few questions, realizing I'd get about 60 seconds with the man. I also chose not to give him a hard time for rejecting my request to caddie for him because he probably didn't hear about it anyway.

"So what was harder for you, turning 60 or fatherhood at 60?" I asked.

Trump's wife, Melania, gave birth to The Donald's fifth kid three months ago, a boy named Barron.

"Definitely turning 60," he said. "The concept of fatherhood I've handled well. But I see friends of mine who are 60 and I go (bleep)! Sixty! That's getting up there, no question about it."

Trump has said he doesn't change diapers and indicated Thursday he doesn't get awakened at night because "I've got a wife who watches the baby so beautifully."

At that point he was whisked away from the questions and onto the course, his hair not-so-neatly tucked under his red cap.

RAY ALLEN is about to tee off but finds a few minutes to hit balls and answer questions. But first I had to poke fun at his karaoke skills.

"When people do karaoke, who can sing?" Allen said, lamely defending himself. He would get a better shot in later.

Allen addressed a variety of subjects. He said the KeyArena issues won't affect the players, and he hopes free agent Chris Wilcox stays with the team.

"He's in a whirlwind right now," Allen said. "We've been playing phone tag. I definitely want him to understand how much we need him. What he did at the end of the season, he could do for an entire season. Contract-wise, if he plays well, he doesn't have to worry about money."

Regarding controversial first-round draft choice Mouhamed Saer Sene, Allen said: "I was booed when I was drafted by Milwaukee. We all have to assume the guy is going to be able to play and help us a lot. They wouldn't have drafted him (No.) 10 if he couldn't play.

"And really, how much do you get out of first-year players anyway, especially this year because the draft is so much weaker?"

Allen won't guarantee a playoff berth next year, saying: "All I can guarantee is when people come in the building, they're going to enjoy themselves. We're going to do as a team what we're expected to do."

A Bob Weiss backer a year ago, he's a Bob Hill backer now.

"He's a great motivator, and he's going to get on you, but he always peppers it with good stuff," Allen said of his coach. "You can see his passion. He'll cheer on the sidelines and it breeds on down the bench."

Allen then tackled a more important topic, wondering if I wanted to bet on his score. What? Of course. He's a 6-handicapper, and we set the over-under at 77.

I caught up with Allen again on the par-5 18th tee. Naturally, he was 1-under. "Want to go double or nothing on this hole?" he asked.

So we did, Allen needing to make birdie to win again. What happens? He smokes a 310-yard drive down the right side, has 180 left, hits a branch with his approach, lands in a bunker, knocks it out to 15 feet and naturally makes the downhill birdie putt.

An index finger is pointed my way, and I wanted to respond with a different finger but settled on a handshake instead.

"Remind me to never bet against a professional athlete again," I told Allen.

"No," he said, "I'll remind you to not bet against me again."

The amount of the bet was nominal ... to one of us.

MORE BARKLEY: Can there ever be too much? In between tequila pours, I asked Barkley if I could get five minutes with him on Thursday. He obliged, and the quickie Q&A was conducted on the first two holes of his round in which he hit his drives everywhere but down the middle.

Lance Armstrong is here, helping raise money for charitable causes, which is a very cool thing, but he's not a true athlete according to Barkley.

"Nobody riding a bike can be considered great," Barkley said. "Everybody can ride a bike. He's in phenomenal shape, but he rides a bike."

Asked if he likes the idea of Michelle Wie playing against the men, as she is again this week at the John Deere Classic: "No, 'cuz she's a woman. She's trying to see if she can make the cut. If you can't win, don't do it. She needs to learn to win against people her own age. Making the cut doesn't mean anything to me."

And he has a dog. What kind? "A little, I don't know what you call the (bleep)," he said.

Barkley has lost 25 pounds and hopes to lose 25 more, trimming down for a special occasion in September.

"I don't want to be a fat (bleep) when I go into the Hall of Fame," he said.

Multimedia message

Happy Birthday America

Let's have a party!

First I need to gather the music ...

US Marine Band - Marine's Hymn and Stars and Stripes

Lena Horne - The Best Things in Life Are Free, From This Moment On, and I'd Do Anything

Dwight Yoakam - Streets of Bakersfield and Merle Haggard - Okie From Muskogee

The Stylistics - Betcha By Golly By Wow and I'm Stone in Love With You

The Pussycat Dolls - Sway

Lee Greenwood - God Bless the USA

Johnny Cash & June Carter - Walk the Line, Jackson, Ring of Fire and It Ain't Me Babe

Ray Charles - America the Beautiful, What'd I Say and Georgia on My Mind

Frank Sinatra - The House I Live In, The Birth of the Blues, The Song is You and Night and Day

The Supremes - Where Did Our Love Go, Stop In the Name of Love and You Keep Me Hanging On

Sir Mix-A-Lot - Baby Got Back

Cake - I Want a Girl with a Short Skirt and a Long Jacket

Dean Martin - Return to Me and Ain't That A Kick in the Head

Darryl Worley - I Will Hold My Ground and Have You Forgotten

The Doors - Light My Fire

Nancy Wilson - The Best is Yet to Come and Do You Still Dream About Me?

Anybody want to add any suggestions to the play list?

Want to have some fun this summer?

On my other site, I've got lots of suggestions

Los Angeles

San Francisco Bay Area

San Diego

Palm Springs & the Desert

Monterey & Santa Cruz

Lake Tahoe, Yosemite & the Sierras

Orange County

San Luis Obispo & Santa Barbara

Sacramento, Gold Country & the Valleys

North Coast & Wine Country

Inland Empire


I've got a bunch of ideas for Hawaii

and a handful of ideas for other places around the country and the world :
Alabama, Alaska, Arizona, Washington D.C., Georgia, Maryland,
Minnesota, Montana, South Carolina, Virginia, Washington, Mexico, Canada and Spain

If you've got anything to add, email me at thingsyoushoulddo -at- hotmail.com

Thanks!

Airstrike Remix

Check out this fantastic video


And more from the Mil Bloggers
Blackfive - the Paratrooper of Love

Here is One Marines View

In the post just before this one I talked about “Supporting the Troops”. If you don’t have the time to go to Anysoldier.com but want to still show your support for the troops, you can look on the far right Colum and donate quickly by clicking on “Donate Cigars”. Once we have a respectable amount we will purchase stoags for service members in Iraq and the ship them over to them. We will then put their pictures of them smoking your cigars here! Wet wipes are great, Gatorade is better but stoags are the heat!!!


Click on the donate button, then send us your alimony you were going to pay to your “other”, then stand by!!! Nothing beats shooting at bad guys while enjoying a cigar!!!


I challenge any cigar store out there to match what we buy!!! C’mon fellas, they are Marines!!!


Semper Fi……….


Time for a C-Gar!

Posted by Capt B at 05:35 PM | June 7, 2006