Vegas & The Aftermath - Diary

[tikay]

And while we were just feet away, a squirrel climbed in to my golf bag. Tom approached it with a raised 7 Iron & it barely flinched before eventually scampering away.

Ralph had told us that he carries a bag of bird seed & feeds the Egyptian Geese & sure enough, two of them seemed to recognize him & waddled up, and Ralph got his bag of bird seed out & fed them, along with their solitary gosling. (There had been 6 goslings, but Mr Fox is in charge of Goose Population Control apparently).

[tikay]

.

[tikay]

Finally, on a sidenote to Monday's golf, Ralph offered us a Lion Bar to share between us, said it had been in his bag a year or more & had frozen/melted loads of times. Looked it too, had a sort of white bloom on it.

Well, I've not really eaten chocolate for 30 or 40 years but it was bloody lovely, I must say.

You should try one. A new product apparently.

[tikay]

Whilst on the topic of geriatric blondes, anyone recognize the long-term blonde punting ledge on a Luton FT last week? G Luton must be super soft these days. CLUE - he forced through an 8 way chop.

Quite surprised to see Greg Wallace on the FT too.

[Karabiner]

Well I did a list of prompts, a sort of note to self, on June 30th, but I've not made much progress, have I?


Retirement, & what it means. It's HUGE to me, a 100% lifestyle change, as I'll try to explain.

Vegas 2025 summary.

Service Levels

Paris

The Hermes shock experience.

Golf.

The elephant in the room.


Ooh, forgot a very important one.

EDIT - Addictions. Very very big one that. For almost everyone that reads this, as well as me.  

EDIT - forgot another one. BOOKS.


Think I covered Vegas summary & Retirement in general, & that's about it so far. I blame the elephant in the room which temporarily interrupted my new golf, poker, travel & IDGAF lifestyle.  

On we go.

Don't forget Glasto while you're in the mood..

And thank you for the extremely flattering compliments about my fairly crappy golf

[typhoon13]

By way of seeing if there are still any readers out there, think I'll start with a Caption Competition. Try not to be too rude, right?

On Monday I played golf with Ralph (karabiner) & Tom (Red).

For those not familiar - the closure of the Sky Community means we have a few new & very welcome Member here - the distinguished looking gent on the right as we look is Ralph Shalson, aka karabiner, & the gnarly looking bloke in the middle holding his willy is Tom, aka Red-Dog. I'm the young cool dude, obv.

I swear to God we've all shrunk (in height) in the last decade. Pretty sure I used to be 5'-10", & I'm barely 5'-8" now & the shortest of all three.



 

Last of the summer wine

[AndrewT]

By way of seeing if there are still any readers out there, think I'll start with a Caption Competition. Try not to be too rude, right?

On Monday I played golf with Ralph (karabiner) & Tom (Red).

For those not familiar - the closure of the Sky Community means we have a few new & very welcome Member here - the distinguished looking gent on the right as we look is Ralph Shalson, aka karabiner, & the gnarly looking bloke in the middle holding his willy is Tom, aka Red-Dog. I'm the young cool dude, obv.

I swear to God we've all shrunk (in height) in the last decade. Pretty sure I used to be 5'-10", & I'm barely 5'-8" now & the shortest of all three.



 

Last of the summer wine

More like Last of the summer whine.

[booder]

By way of seeing if there are still any readers out there, think I'll start with a Caption Competition. Try not to be too rude, right?

On Monday I played golf with Ralph (karabiner) & Tom (Red).

For those not familiar - the closure of the Sky Community means we have a few new & very welcome Member here - the distinguished looking gent on the right as we look is Ralph Shalson, aka karabiner, & the gnarly looking bloke in the middle holding his willy is Tom, aka Red-Dog. I'm the young cool dude, obv.

I swear to God we've all shrunk (in height) in the last decade. Pretty sure I used to be 5'-10", & I'm barely 5'-8" now & the shortest of all three.



 

Groucho ,Harpo and Chico momentarily evade their carers.

[Doobs]

Whilst on the topic of geriatric blondes, anyone recognize the long-term blonde punting ledge on a Luton FT last week? G Luton must be super soft these days. CLUE - he forced through an 8 way chop.

Quite surprised to see Greg Wallace on the FT too.

Gregg?  #MasterTwat 

https://x.com/cj87EFC/status/1942626581144617003?t=P59_VxzbSAy6vhcvXUJwtQ&s=19

[Pokerpops]

By way of seeing if there are still any readers out there, think I'll start with a Caption Competition. Try not to be too rude, right?

On Monday I played golf with Ralph (karabiner) & Tom (Red).

For those not familiar - the closure of the Sky Community means we have a few new & very welcome Member here - the distinguished looking gent on the right as we look is Ralph Shalson, aka karabiner, & the gnarly looking bloke in the middle holding his willy is Tom, aka Red-Dog. I'm the young cool dude, obv.

I swear to God we've all shrunk (in height) in the last decade. Pretty sure I used to be 5'-10", & I'm barely 5'-8" now & the shortest of all three.



 

Groucho ,Harpo and Chico momentarily evade their carers.

 

[tikay]

A month into retirement and it's all going rather wonderfully so far. I thought I'd struggle to fill my days but so far it's been non-stop, Paris last weekend, then golf every day this week & poker last night.

Seems to me that a variation of Parkinson's Law is in play here. 


"work doing nothing expands so as to fill the time available for its completion[/b]"

That is turning out to be so true.

Another week has flown past in a flash.

Played golf Monday, Tuesday, Thursday & Friday. Was booked to play Wednesday but my intended partner was unwell so I had my first empty day since retiruing 40 days earlier.

And annoyingly I wasted it.

Got chatting with mates on WhatsApp & somehow we just chatted shit all day. I like them all, & contributed as much as anyone, but afterwards I had a sense of guilt that I'd wasted a day. Never even went pokering in the evening.

WhatsApp is great, I really do like it, but like all social media, it's a monster time sponge.

When I get round to discussing "Addictions" that'll be on the list. 

[tikay]

All 4 rounds of golf were very enjoyable, & it was especially pleasing to catch up with Ralph on Monday.

In all 4 rounds I was the highest handicapper.

In all 4 rounds I finished plum last.

After a nightmare front 9 one day a ray of hope appeared when Moulty announced I was leading on the back 9. We were standing on the 12th tee at the time....

And I promptly hit my drive deep into the woods, never to be seen again. On the next hole, a simple downhill Par 3, my tee-shot sailed clean over the OOB ditch into a farmer's field.

Trying to find a positive, I at last made a Par on the 18th, demonstrating to myself that I never give up, which was about the only positive I could find. And the other two both made Pars too. Bastards.

On Friday, stood on the difficult 15th at Priory, I hit my best drive ever, right out of the middle of the Driver face, lovely trajectory, no shape at all, with that lovely feeling & sound a perfect shot makes. Sadly it was a pull, & landed smack in the middle of the adjoining road. Re-loaded, & hit the ball even cleaner & further this time. This one cleared the road & scattered the sheep in the field across the road.

But on the brutally hard 500 yard Par 5 18th, where I rarely manage a point, I somehow got home in 6, which, all things considered, was some sort of triumph.

When you are shite, you have to find positives somehow. And battling adversity without giving up is the best thing ever, it really is.

Tom is amazing. Started playing around 18 months ago & is now officially 7 shots better than me on our internal handicap system.

A new week starts tomorrow, 3 rounds 100% booked, possibly a 4th on Friday. This week I'm going to play better. I am.   

[tikay]

In the addictions department I had a major breakthrough on Thursday.

Partly due to my (ex) working life, I was always on the 'phone, or checking for e-Mails, messages etc. And despite retiring, I still can't help but check my 'phone every few minutes. I'm big into Golf Etiquette - behaviour, dress code, everything, & smartphones are a definite no-no, but I could not stop myself checking my 'phone on every Tee. 

I'm not alone of course. Sit on a rush hour train & when it arrives at a station, look at the waiting passengers on the platforms - 90% of them are glued to their 'phone.

Play poker, & a majority are on their 'phones non-stop, me included. Many poker players in Live poker even play Online poker at the same time. Now that IS sick, that's a serious addiction right there.

Anyway, the first step to curing an addiction is recognizing it. So I've ticked that box.

And I decided on Thursday to try & start the weaning-off period, cold turkey & all that.

And I played a full 18 holes without once looking at my 'phone.

Gotta find the positives somehow, & that made me very pleased with myself. So there's that.

[tikay]

To gauge how smartphones have changed our lives, how about this. According to Mr google.....



While the exact number of smartphones in the UK isn't explicitly stated, it's known that there are over 83 million active mobile subscriptions in the UK, with a significant portion of these being smartphones. Since the UK population is around 67 million, the number of mobile subscriptions, and thus smartphones, exceeds the population, indicating that many people own multiple devices

So, 83 million 'phones, population 67 milly. Deduct infants under the age of, let's say, 5 or 6, & super Seniors over the age of 80, plus people who are long tern seriously unwell. That probably leaves ~55 milly or so. Almost 1.5 phones per eligible person.

Smartphones never existed 20 years ago, & that UK saturation is almost certainly reflected across most of the civilised world.

Did any invention, ever, change life so dramatically?

[tikay]

So, if we tried to compile a list of the most noteworthy inventions/innovations in our lifetime, where would you start?

I'll have a stab.

1) Smartphones & internet. (They are sort of the same thing).

2) The ability to market plain, natural water as a Consumer Product. Now that's really clever.

3) Coffee on the go. It barely existed 20 years ago.

4) Social Media. Overall, surely a negative? We waste SO much time on it.

5) Online poker. Who'd have ever guess such a think was possible 30 years ago?

6) Mini skirts. Think how much harmless pleasure they have given to so many people. And it's free to look & admire. They just look fabulous.



Anyone want to submit their list? Go on, I dare you.