| A
few months after I turned thirty,
I did something that John Peel once likened to “entering
the ante-chamber of death”.
I took up golf.
Every late Wednesday afternoon, I stop-started
and wanker-gestured through one of North London’s most loathsome
traffic clag-spots and washed up at a rickety little practice
range where a man called Phil attempted to guide me through the
basics.
My swing was okay, he said. The grip and stance
weren’t bad, he said. But I was striking the ball too high
and my follow-through needed a lot of work.
A lot of practice was the key, he said.
I had booked and paid for ten lessons, but stopped
going after five. John Peel was right. The merest act of grasping
a club and shuffling into position over the ball made me feel
twenty years older. I came in with some flimsy notion that it
might be an idea to get good at golf. But using the range’s
well-worn ‘house clubs’ made me feel like a schoolboy
who’d forgotten his kit, and no-one ever smiled, and the
shop smelt a bit like sick, and I just didn’t have the trousers
for it.
”Get the FUCK in!…
I mean, FORE!”
But, this. This is terrific. All the precision
and peace (cuckoo noises, tinkling streams, the fuzzy drone of
light aircraft) without the tedious business of remembering to
keep your eye on the ball and holding the club like Phil says
is best.
It’s pretty much the same as Nintendo
64 Mario Golf, with maybe a little more challenge and substance
to the single-player mode. In that classically Nintendo way, it’s
as basic or complex as you want it to be (stick to the Easy shot
mode until you’re nice and comfy with the mechanics, and
then ease on up to the trickier – but more rewarding –
business of Power Shots, Top/Back-spin, Draw/Fade). And that.
”I’d just like to
thank… Mfffnfn. Mmmmm…”
It’s smooth, immediate and polished. The
cartoonish Mario friendliness is ever-comforting, and it’s
bursting with courses, challenges, treats and unlockables. But
the sweetest touch is the thing that really makes it an instant
multiplayer classic…
In real-world golf, it’s good form to
stand around in hushed respect as an opponent does that crouching
line-up thing, that pretend-shot thing, that shuffly distribute-balance
thing… Here, though, the non-shot taker can blurt out a
snidily timed, in-character cheer/taunt.
The Track & Field-style speed-wanking
game is… unorthodox.
Some of them are like this:
“Miss! (Mario)
“I rule!” (Bowser)
“Good luck! To ME! Ahh ha ha ha ha ha ha ha!” (Wario)
Some of them are a bit odd, like this:
“Don’t whiff!” (Waluigi)
“This shot is all you!” (Peach)
“You make me sick!” (Petey Piranha)
Some of them are laugh-out-loud cuntish, like
this:
“Put it in!” (Diddy Kong)
“You’re going to lay an egg!” (Birdo)
“You look ridiculous!” (Luigi – which, y’gotta
say, is a fairly astute comment on golf’s overall sartorial
culture).
They are all, without exception, really, really
irritating and genuinely off-putting. Particularly when executed
in vibratey-finger, old-school, Jack Yer Body/N-n-n-n-Nineteen
‘scratch’-style (“M-m-m-m-m-m-MISS!”…
“A-a-a-a-a-ACHOO!”… “C-C-C-Could you,
c-c-c-Could you, c-c-c-c-c-could y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-you
– ‘Ah yeah!’ – c-c-c-c-c-c-c-could you
hurry up?”).
So, if you like yer Nintendo style, you’ll
like it.
If you like golf, you’ll like it.
If you don’t like golf, you’ll probably still like
it.
And if you’re Phil, sort out that halitosis, for fuck’s
sake.
SICKBOY, January
2004.
RODENT CASH RATING -
£40
 "Aye,
the beautiful game."
One more thing… Ages ago (sometime in 1994ish) there was
a superb ‘home page’, which featured ‘I LIKE
GOLF AND TITS!!!!!!!’ in big flashing letters. There were
two links – one to a golf website, the other to a porny
site. It’s long gone, of course. But, whoever was responsible
– we love you long-time.
Comment
Here. (It's working again)
____________________________________________________________________
Things to 'Make' and 'Do'.
The official website of Seve
Ballesteros – the best bullfighter/bastard/golfer ever.
Golf Online.
If they don’t got it, you don’t fuckin’ want
it.
Lee Carvallo’s
Putting Challenge (scroll to bottom).
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