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Here or there: Weather fine [UPDATED]
Published 9:37am Monday, March 19, 2012 Updated 11:39am Monday, March 19, 2012Golf or running. It’s always a difficult question. This year, it’s going to be particularly tough.
When my golfing mates and I planned a spring trip to Phoenix for mid-March, my first reaction was, “Great time of the year! It’s never nice by that time.”
Little did we know that, while we are playing golf in 80-degree weather in Phoenix, we could be playing golf in 70-degree weather at Balmoral or Wildflower in
Otter Tail County.
A glass-half-empty person might say that this weather makes my trip to Phoenix a wasted one. After all, the point of going to Phoenix in March is to escape the harsh Minnesota winter.
However, I’m a glass-half-full person on this one. After all, typically, we can’t get on the golf course around here until early April, and sometimes even mid-April.
Thus, what traditionally happens on a spring golf trip is that you work out the kinks by playing 90 holes of golf over three days, and then you put your game on hold for three weeks until the local courses open.
This year, it’s a strong bet that we’ll land in Fargo on Sunday, and playing golf on Tuesday in Fergus Falls. And there’s nothing wrong with that.
Besides, no matter when you go, getting the chance to a.) get away from work, b.) golf, and c.) hang out with guy golfing friends is always a good thing.
I have to face facts. I always talk about having a “staycation” where I take vacation but stay around the area and golf and fish.
But it’s just too tempting to reconnect with the office when I do that.
That Blackberry, after all, delivers every one of my e-mails, and one glance at it typically turns into a cascading pile of problems that I have to engage myself in and solve.
If I’m in Fergus Falls and work people know it, they tend to find me. If I’m in another state, I can get away.
So enjoy the weather, Fergus Falls people. Try to get in a round of golf or at least a great walk or two over the weekend. I hope the Otter girls have won the state
tournament, and if not, they had a great run.
No matter what it’s like here, I’m going to enjoy my vacation down there.
Also, I just thought of the fact that, for once, the groundhog was right this year.
On Feb. 2, he predicted six more weeks of winter. If you judge the beginning of spring by when the golf course opens — well, Puxatawney Phil is just about dead on.
• • •
It’s a good thing our local high school sports teams had good years, because, as you know, our professional sports teams have basically been in the toilet.
Capping it all off, of course, was the injury to Ricky Rubio.
I never would have thought a year ago that an injury to a Timberwolves player would have been such a downer.
They were, after all, the worst team in the NBA for the past five seasons.
This year, however, they have been the shining beacon in a sea of dark matter known as the Minnesota professional sports scene (Twins, Vikings, Wild, Gopher basketball).
Let’s hope his knee makes a full recovery, because as Leia once said to Luke in Star Wars, “You’re my only hope.”
Joel Myhre is The Journal’s publisher. E-mail him at joel.myhre@fergusfallsjournal.com
