Dave Ford Does Earth

Posted by Dave Ford

This is a shot of my Pinehurst crew last weekend. My dad is in front of the pack.

I guess in my last rash of posts I let the cat out of the bag that the transition coming back home from South America and adjusting to life in America has not been exactly easy. I have had an especially tough time adjusting to the fact that I was actually working for an institution other than DaveFordDoesEarth. Believe me, there is nothing better than working for yourself. This even holds true when you are not making any money. I guess that is what I have been doing since I set off to travel last January 9th. I really love being my own boss.

Anyway, so having that attitude and then getting thrown back into the same environment (so I thought) caddying at Bushwood Country Club that I experienced when I worked there from age 15-22 was strange to say the least. Clearly, I am in a much different place now compared to what my life was like at age 22.

Bushwood is a very unique place. The caddy yard has enough personality for ten sitcoms on network TV. Much of the membership are members of the “Elite, Elite”. When I worked at Bushwood before I met President Clinton. Michael Jordan played the club quite a bit when he worked with the Wizards. Billionaires play at this club every day.

So, I started working at Bushwood at age 15 in 1994. My parents would drive me to work everyday so I could pick up golf balls on the driving range, wash carts, and take bags out of peoples cars at the bag drop. Eventually I became a full time caddy and worked myself to the top of the ranks before I got into the real world. I think I was at my best in 2000 and 2001. I would guess that I was in the top 10 caddies at that time. I was on the course walking up the hill on the 7th hole on 9-11 when I found out that the twin towers had fallen.

Now, I am far from being in the top 10 caddies. I guess I expected to be able to walk right back in and crush it again. You would be surprised how competitive caddying is. Most people do not have any idea what it is a caddy does. Even a good golfer does not know what a caddy is unless he/she is exposed to caddies regularly.

Here are some facts:

> Caddies can help you play a hell of a lot better, or a hell of a lot worse.

> Good caddies kick golf balls into better position for shitty players.

> Caddies bitch and moan a lot about slow golf (myself included).

> Caddies bitch and moan a lot about a lot of other things besides slow golf.

> The boss of the caddies is called the “Caddy Master”.

>Full time caddies are some of the most interesting/funny/weird characters of any profession that I have come across.

I worked twice this week. Both loops were very average.

Loop 1: I caddied for a guy that worked as an agent for major golfers back in the day and the head Golf Pro at a golf club in Florida. They were both completely uninterested in any chit chat, yet seemed to be ready to bust my balls all day long. In the end, I gave the ball busting right back and was to some degree well received.

The other caddy in the group was a very cool 55 year old black dude named Ed. He wants to start up a blog and I am helping him.

Sidenote: Throughout the course of the round Ed told me about 3 different occasions where he has had a gun pulled on him in Baltimore City throughout the course of his life. Yet, he said he was afraid to travel outside of the country due to 9-11 and Al Queda. It is crazy how scared the media in this country keeps Americans. I am pretty sure Ed could open up a can of whoop ass on me so I hope he is not mad that I brought this up. Furthermore, Ed has a beautiful singing voice.

Loop #2- I caddied for very, very, very, very horrendous and terrible golfers. One of the guys I had could win the prize for the biggest geek I have ever met in my entire 29 years of life. Furthermore, he insisted on keeping his putter cover on which is really annoying when you are caddying for a guy thats going to shoot 120. My other guy was a “head cover guy” which basically means that he had 5 different head covers on his 5 different woods. He had a turtle, a gopher, a bear, a moose….etc

They were so bad that we were pretty much picking up their balls, walking with them, and dropping them in good spots all day long. We were also kicking their balls quite a bit. If we would not have done so, we might still be out there. This behavior is a must when you are caddying for hacks.

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Here are my three favorite caddy ball advancement moves (aka “Foot Wedges”):

1. The tie your shoe move- You bend down to tie your shoe. While doing this you end up blocking the view of the ball from the player who is walking down the fairway. Then you reach down with your hand and give him a beautiful lie.

2. The walking big kick- This is when you are far in front of your player and have the option of trying to pull off a David Beckham like corner kick with the ball. This is very enjoyable but does give you the chance of getting caught.

3. The towel move- This is my favorite. What you do is pick up the ball out of the woods and walk confidently out into the clearing. You take your towel and hold it low to the ground dropping the ball from position A to position B. The ball drops from behind the blocked towel. The player never suspects a thing when you say, ” Wow, you got a really amazing kick off of that tree”.

Sidenote: By and large to successfully kick your players ball you need to be far ahead of the group. Furthermore, I do not kick balls of good players or in competitive tournaments. However, it is a fantastic tool to help speed up slow play.
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Notes:

Phil and I had our first crazy tapes session the other night. I think it really went well. We have about a half hour of footage to work with. I cannot wait to go to the Apple lab and get them to teach me how to make movies.

We have our second Australian Rules Football game tonight. Please enjoy the extremely gay picture of Dave Binck and the BV show in their Aussie Rules football practice gear. Apparently Dave has been infected by the BV shows “gay pic” disease.

> My trip to the golf mecca Pinehurst was a blast. In the four rounds I played I shot 101, 96, 96, and 92. Now everyone knows how much I suck at golf. All I need is a caddy to kick me into a good place.

> Jess and Lisa (traveled through Colombia, Bolivia, and Peru with them) are in town right now. I am pumped up.

> I have come to the realization that I might be blowing up peoples email in boxes with my recent flurry of posting. So, I have decided to try and post bi weekly on Tuesday and Friday. We will see how this works.

> Due to recent “amazing” and “crazy” advice that I have received from “my good friend” Tony, I am going to stop using the words “amazing”, “crazy”, and “my good friend” to describe everything I am doing and everyone I know. However, Phil will still be described as crazy.

> Golf makes people certifiably insane. I had a fit of rage after chilly dipping a shot from the hard pan, slammed my club into the ground, and ended up with a broken pitching wedge. Yes, I am an idiot. We make fun of people that behave in this manner when caddying. Yes, its ironic.

Shot of the waste bunkers of “Tobacco Road” in Pinehurst, North Carolina. This is the best course that we played. It was very nice to be able to spend so much time with my Dad last weekend. It was not very nice that he spent so much time in these waste bunkers.

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