I really should buy an economical car

I see gas prices are on the rise. This increase will last until sometime late tomorrow... after I fill my tank. No, I am not paranoid. It is just fact. I do not know how they know when I am approaching the point at which I must buy gas but they do.

On the way to the golf course yesterday morning, I noticed that the price had jumped overnight from $3.21 to $3.45 per gallon. We know that is not quite true, don't we? It's really $3.459, isn't it? That's what the hardly noticed "and ⁹/₁₀" means. It's a bit like the ".99" after the "$19" on the price where the ad says "less than $20!"

The price of gas will drop in a few days... after I fill up... but not by much. Not as much as it has risen.

It's time for controversy.

If you do not play, understand, or like, golf then you may as well skip this post.

As anyone who reads this blog knows, I play golf. To be honest, I should say "play at golf." That is, I play golf in comparison to the pros as Little Leaguers play baseball in comparison to those in the National and American Major Leagues. What I do on the golf course only vaguely resembles what the worst player on the PGA Tour can do.

Half of all allotted strokes on any golf course consist of putts. This makes putting pretty much 50% of the game. A few years ago, a controversy began over something called "anchored putting"... wherein the golfer anchors the putter against some part of his body... either the belly (with the butt of the putter shaft braced against the stomach) or the chest (a much longer shaft with the upper hand braced against the chest area).

Only about 15% of pros use the anchor type putting style. I have no idea about the amateurs but I see maybe 1 out of 20 on the golf course on any given day.

Make no mistake, putting is incredibly difficult. To do well, it requires a sort of relaxed, yet intensive, concentration coupled with a multitude of unconscious and conscious calculations of force and terrain. The best putters are simply amazing and sink just about anything within five feet of the hole. The average golfer, by comparison, can miss two-footers easily. Faye claims she is so poor a putter that she once failed to sink a putt dragging the ball over the hole in miniature golf.

I am told I am a good putter by those I play golf with. Of course, we all lie to each other on about our skills. I know they are lying because I will 3 putt at least three holes out of any given 18. A 3 putt, in case you are unaware, is a guaranteed failure to make par on any hole... unless you can reach par 5's in two, which I cannot. A good putter, in my opinion, will not 3 putt more than one hole in any given 18.

But the USGA and the Royal & Ancient (the two governing bodies of the sport) have agreed to outlaw anchored putting. The following video attempts to explain why:



Something that happens to most, if not all, golfers is the deterioration of putting skills. The hands getting a little shakey is the most common. This leads to something called "the Yips" where the player's ball generally ends up quite a way past the hole but also leads to pulling putts to one side, short-putting, and loud cursing.

Putting is so important to golf that whole books have been dedicated to the art. And it is an art as well as a science.

I have no problem with the anchored putters because I believe the skill needed transcends the ability of technique and technology. I do not use an anchor putter because they always feel awkward in my hands and I am more comfortable (most of the time) with a standard putter.

I feel, as many golfers do, that there should be different rules for pros and amateurs. And I also feel the "powers that be" should not have outlawed the anchored putting style... even for the pros.

Huh?

I am confused.  I have always been this way, I suppose. Born into the chaotic world of human beings, it's hard not to be. So much to learn: talking, sitting up, walking, running... all within a few short years. And then there was sharing and playing well with others (I still haven't got those right), swimming, various games (called "sports"), when to speak and when not to (another pair I still have trouble with), and so on.

I barely survived childhood and figuring out school when I enlisted in the Navy. Much more to learn and not a lot of time in which to do it. I had only 4 years (three years and 11 months, to be exact, in my case). I learned enough, I suppose, to get by and not get tossed into the brig. And they let me out early. By a whole month. It wasn't because they liked me, though, I am pretty sure of that.

And then life kicked back in. A marriage, a child, and so much more to learn while teaching those skills that child would need. Not sure I did such a good job but he has turned out okay.

And here I am at 66 and still confused. Time sure flies...

Thoughts on guilt and innocence

I was perusing the news on the web the other day and chanced upon a murder case detailed on "48 Hours". It was about the murder of a woman and her dog near San Antonio.

In 1994, I became a little obsessed with the O.J. Simpson case. I watched the trial, I taped it when I could not watch it live, I bought some of the books written about the case, and... in the end... I was stunned by the verdict.

I also learned a lot. About trials, lawyers, judges, the police... the whole justice system. I thought I knew something about lawyers. My mother was a legal secretary and, therefore, I grew up around them.  I also knew something about the police. I had had my run-ins with the police in my teens and had seen the inside of a police station on more than one or two occasions. I had numerous encounters with police outside those stations, most of which led to nothing. I had been falsely accused a couple of times and gotten away with crimes a couple of times. But you can always learn and you often find that your "knowledge" is not all that accurate.

Among the things I learned is that people might tell the truth but it may be the "truth" as they saw it. That neither side (prosecution nor defense) tells the whole story. And that juries are always manipulated.

My final take on the Simpson case? The police tried to frame a guilty man and it backfired on them.

Liberty, not the world, will end with a whimper

Last week I suggested you keep an eye on Democrats up for re-election and how they stand on gun control measures being considered by what we, sometimes laughingly, call "our government." The following comes from a New York Times article about how Democrat office holders are facing some backlash regarding gun control legislation.

As Congress considers what, if any, laws to change, Mr. Manchin has become a barometer among his colleagues, testing just how far they might be able to go without angering voters. 
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/01/24/us/politics/democratic-senators-face-gun-owners-roused-by-talk-of-new-laws.html

The article is more opinion than news... which is what "news" is all about these days; influencing people rather than informing them.

There is a quote featured in Thursday's summary of NY Times articles (which I get in an email each day):
“We give up our rights one piece at a time,” a banker named Charlie Houck told the senator.

I note that the author of the article made very sure we knew that Mr. Houck is a banker. Why is that relevant? Is Mr. Houck's opinion more or less important because of that fact? I would suggest that Mr. Houck wasn't attending that meeting as a banker but as a citizen of West Virginia, a constituent of Senator Manchin.

And Mr. Houck is absolutely right. That is exactly how rights are taken away. At first.

"Eternal vigilance is the price of liberty."  A statement by one Wendell Phillips, abolitionist. He was right... about the price of liberty and about slavery. At the time, however, he was viewed as radical and dangerous. And not just by the slave states. Though we are not taught that in school, are we?  When I was in school, the distinct impression was that the non-slave states were united and their citizens spoke as one in opposition to slavery. As I grew older, I realized that this was completely untrue.

Our opinions are shaped by what we read and what we hear. Seemingly few of us arrive at independent conclusions. This is why I urge people to read opposing viewpoints and try to understand the reasoning behind them. It is much too easy to dismiss arguments out of ignorance of the opposing side, much too easy to support imposing the will of one side upon the other when all you hear or read is that which supports your own preconceptions.

The debate will continue on gun control and those in favor of increasing it will scratch their heads over why it failed because they do not understand, and simply dismiss, all the arguments against it.