The Good Morning Thread

[rkj427]

Good morning Spies on a cloudy and damp Sunday here.

@ZJeb67 you may want to stay north for a while, seems the clouds and rainy weather is more towards the southern area of Michigan, south of Port Huron.

@RoverRick and @William P have a great time today, always great when Spies get together for a round.

@Byrnzee best of luck with the new irons in the bag today, looking forward to reading your comments on them.

I have a tee time at 9:36, so I will be out the door shortly.

Hope all here have the best day they possibly can, and that something enjoyable is in your plans. 

Edited 5 hours ago by rkj427

[Josh Parker]

Good morning!

Drinking coffee and looking forward to the sons first soccer game today. No golf planned but it will be a great family day. 

Hope everyone has a great day!

[revkev]

14 hours ago, Rickp said:

No notice word.   Yes both are in Tampa area. When I get a chance I’ll PM them.  I have their emails.  
Tampa caught some crap.

We got mostly brush/palm debris.  I picked up a lot of it today, glad I bought the EGO lawnmower.

Good morning and thanks for the concern.  We did not just take some crap.  Helene produced the worst storm surge in recorded history.  Fortunately my house is not in a flood zone and miraculously we never lost power.  However, many in my church and school community were devastated.  I've been dealing with that since around 5:30 Friday morning.  Three of our teachers are out of their homes.  I've lost count of how many lost their vehicles.  This will go down as the worst storm in history in my county.  My son and family are at my house - they live in a Mobile Home over in Hillsboro County and were evacuated.  They are still without power - their park flooded but it does not appear as if water got into their unit. 

 

I will try and reach out to Foz -

[Rickp]

10 minutes ago, revkev said:

Good morning and thanks for the concern.  We did not just take some crap.  Helene produced the worst storm surge in recorded history.  Fortunately my house is not in a flood zone and miraculously we never lost power.  However, many in my church and school community were devastated.  I've been dealing with that since around 5:30 Friday morning.  Three of our teachers are out of their homes.  I've lost count of how many lost their vehicles.  This will go down as the worst storm in history in my county.  My son and family are at my house - they live in a Mobile Home over in Hillsboro County and were evacuated.  They are still without power - their park flooded but it does not appear as if water got into their unit. 

 

I will try and reach out to Foz -

Wow, that’s awful.  The news here(mostly Orlando feeds) are really not saying much about the greater Tampa area.  Hope recovery is quick.    
I had at one time your email but couldn’t find it.

[Cfhandyman]

A fine good morning to all.  Enjoying my morning espresso, catching up.  Had a chance to demo the new Callaway irons yesterday.  I really liked the Apex Ti fusion irons.  Forged hollow body construction with titanium face.  With the black finish, beautiful looking irons.  Hot off the face and saw a noticeable jump in clubhead and ball speed, but also with good height and spin.  Great feel and sounds good (not high pitched or clicky).  Particularly nice with the Recoil shafts.  Downside, at $300 US ($400 Cdn)/per iron, so definitely on the rather pricey side.  On the schedule today is to watch the Presidents Cup and hope for some entertaining matches.  Enjoy your day

[Rickp]

5 minutes ago, Rickp said:

Wow, that’s awful.  The news here(mostly Orlando feeds) are really not saying much about the greater Tampa area.  Hope recovery is quick.    
I had at one time your email but couldn’t find it.

Revkev, Foz is fine no problems.

[cksurfdude]

Good Morning, good people! A little grey and wet and dreary again here, so not sure about any golf activity... Maybe another day of indoor projects and exercise.

Sad to see news and pics of the aftermath of Helene... Wow that storm was a b*#@$!

Hope the rest of The Spy Crew is doing well today!!

[ClevelandGirl]

Good morning, all, and my empathy to folks in Helene’s path from a Harvey survivor. It does get better, I promise!

I have a confession to make: I called off golf this morning. There was a 4 hour window between rain storms but after 2 much needed days of rain, I just am not in the mood for mud ball - plus I just cleaned my clubs. 
 

I know I’m letting the side down. My apologies.

[Jim Shaw]

20 hours ago, chisag said:

 

... The range is very valuable for woking on your swing. Either grooving something that is working well or fixing something that isn't. And as you said, age and physical limitations can make the range a difficult place to spend much time. Then there are those that just love the range. My best student was a +2 and one of the purest ball strikers I have ever seen. He rarely played golf but loved hitting bushel buckets at the range. He was with me over a year and I honestly never understood why. He could hit ten 4 irons in a row to a green never leaving the flag at 200yds. He would ask questions and I would make very small tweaks but I never really changed anything with his swing. 

... While the range has its purpose I am right there with you for playing practice holes or if you get the course to yourself, a whole practice rounds hitting multiple balls and working on shots, not working on your swing. I find it invaluable to hit say, a little fade to a back right pin protected by a bunker with a 5 iron from 175yds that I normally wouldn't attempt when playing a round. But as you know it's nice to have all shots in your pocket when needed. Working the ball around the course hitting it high and low or just dialing in a solid shot on a difficult hole. Going right at a back right pin with a bunker in front and a severe drop off on the right side helps me know how my misses will effect that stressful shot as opposed to a tension free middle pin with no trouble from the same distance. 

i totally agree with that, especially the part about getting some "practice time" on the course. The little town I grew up playing golf in did not have a driving range so i just practiced "on the course" by hitting shots and learning them, for many years people would ask, "how do you hit a fade" and I honestly didn't know, I just did it. 

I still remember those feels on occasion and it does help...I have access to all the tools now and have enjoyed the range, putting green, chipping green, launch monitors, but it has gotten my game a lot more mechanical, which I guess is better under pressure.

Nice to have both options in my back pocket though. 

[Jim Shaw]

5 hours ago, BIG STU said:

Had a nice day yesterday got plenty of laughs watching tourist idiots. When we play we take our time and are not in a hurry. Not slow but not in a rush either. We rested and let these 2 guys through and I guess they were in a hurry. After we let them through they started doing stuff like agonizing over every shot and lining up putts like they were in a Tour Event. They ended up holding us up. Took a rest stop and let this one guy through. Dressed to the nines with a Scotty and fancy cover. He was arrogant as heck. was mad at the 2 guys said slow play pissed him off. He said he had to get back to the Motel to take the wife and kids out. What was funny those guys never let him through. On the next tee he mentioned he was in a hurry. He said something about I was having trouble. I told him no I was fine. He asked if we were in a hurry? I told him naah we lived here and I was a member so we played as much as we wanted to. OMG that ticked him off. I saw on 9 he skipped those guys and went straight to 10. We took an extended break on the turn and caught those guys on 16 anyhow. We still made our lunch time and had a great meal. Came home and I worked the dinner off cleaning up storm debris. Was tired in a good way last night and slept good.

This morning up early and well rested. We have a tee time at 7 for the Sunday bunch at my course. 

i love this post, no rush, just enjoying your day watching others get wound up lol... 

[Puente37]

Good morning, Spies!

 

Even though I won’t be hitting the course today to enjoy this beautiful Sunday forecast here in Cheyenne, Wyoming, I’m wishing everyone out there long drives and smooth one-putts! Hope you all have an amazing round and enjoy every moment on the course.

 

Cheers

[tony@CIC]

1 hour ago, revkev said:

Good morning and thanks for the concern.  We did not just take some crap.  Helene produced the worst storm surge in recorded history.  Fortunately my house is not in a flood zone and miraculously we never lost power.  However, many in my church and school community were devastated.  I've been dealing with that since around 5:30 Friday morning.  Three of our teachers are out of their homes.  I've lost count of how many lost their vehicles.  This will go down as the worst storm in history in my county.  My son and family are at my house - they live in a Mobile Home over in Hillsboro County and were evacuated.  They are still without power - their park flooded but it does not appear as if water got into their unit. 

 

I will try and reach out to Foz -

Amazing the difference a couple of miles makes. We live west of 41by 2 miles and we only got 3.5" of rain and moderate winds (30-40 mph) range. No damage, a few small branches from our Live Oak and that's about it. Our course was open on Friday with only 2 out of 27 holes CPO. I really feel for those affected - many are still recovering from the devastation of Idalia last year. 

[Erin B]

Sunday Sunday Sunday!!! Good morning everyone!!! Not playing golf today, it’s Hockey time!!! 

Oh, and Wyoming beat Air Force last night!!! Woohoo!! Zoey’s game is at 10 here in Cheyenne!!! Can’t wait!!! Happy Birdie Hunting!!!

[Rickp]

16 hours ago, fixyurdivot said:

Hey Rick. It sounds like you guys didn't get hit too hard by the storm.  Anyone heard from @fozcycleand @revkev?  I think one or both live near the Tampa area.

@fixyurdivot Foz is fine Revkev area got blasted.  

[ZJeb67]

2 hours ago, rkj427 said:

Good morning Spies on a cloudy and damp Sunday here.

@ZJeb67 you may want to stay north for a while, seems the clouds and rainy weather is more towards the southern area of Michigan, south of Port Huron.

@RoverRick and @William P have a great time today, always great when Spies get together for a round.

@Byrnzee best of luck with the new irons in the bag today, looking forward to reading your comments on them.

I have a tee time at 9:36, so I will be out the door shortly.

Hope all here have the best day they possibly can, and that something enjoyable is in your plans. 

Thanks @rkj427

No sense rushing into highway construction. (Or rushing home to start the next work week)

[Jim Shaw]

some photos from “pebble beach north” lol..

spectacular setting and luckily a nice day. 
Victoria Golf Club… 

[EnderinAZ]

Good morning spies! Went to the mountains to put a cover on our trailer. 3 hours up, 40 minutes of work and visiting with the neighbors who will all leave by next week, and 3 hours down.  Kind of a long driving day. MyGolfSpouse and I both climbed out of my truck stiff and limping.

Oh speaking of my truck, it is a 2023 Colorado ZR71 with lots of bells and whistles most of which we don't use. There was the traffic jam caused by a parade in Lakeside/Pinetop yesterday, she was driving (I get the hour plus drive out of the city, she gets the empty mountain road), we were creeping along and the close vehicle alert came on and slammed on the breaks. Scared the crap out of both of us. I didn't know the truck could do that. 

Might get out of a few holes on the exec course today (championship course is closed for overseeding).

Might not. Today is our anniversary, 46 years! 

[ILMgolfnut]

Good morning Spies! Just back from getting the MRI on my bum shoulder. I doubt seriously that it will tell us anything we didn't already know, but my ortho guy wanted to get it after my last cortisone shot wore off, which it definitely did. I think my shoulder is a little better anyway, but I've had this problem for too many years to think it's going to go away. May eventually need surgery, hoping that's not soon. Don't have my insurance deductible satisfied so I'm having to pay for this out of pocket; had to pay $260 up front this morning. Definitely the loudest MRI I've ever had, much different than the last one a few years ago.

I'll probably check on Presidents Cup from time to time today but won't be glued to it. Main sporting priority is watching a couple of soccer matches, and keeping tabs on Packers-Vikings, which we won't get at the Casa (and I don't care enough about the NFL to pay for Sunday Ticket).

Speaking of the PC, golf blogger Geoff Shackelford has been "reporting" on a mythical PC this weekend with both men and women competing. That would probably be fun and might even get me to pay attention. (I'm old enough to remember Shackelford's dad Lynn, who was a UCLA teammate of Kareem Abdul-Jabbar and later a sports broadcaster).

Edited 2 hours ago by ILMgolfnut

[Shrek74]

Good morning, Spies!!

Quiet morning here as I just get some basic housework done. Football and Prez Cup watching later. Quiet day planned.

Everyone have a great day.

[RichL85]

Morning all. Hoping for everyone that was in the path of Helene. I haven't seen much of the aftermath, but seems like a few areas got hammered pretty badly. Main office was shut down on Thursday despite being in a relatively safe area, but I was on vacation last week anyway. 

Got back from our trip and found that the sprinkler system zone for the front yard had some kind of problem. There was a notice that we had been reported for wasting water. Looks like the system started up around midnight like usual and we didn't get home until around 10pm, so that's a lot of water to put out. Turned off the main water, manually opened and closed all the valves, turned the water back on and things were fine for the moment. Guessing it was probably something that stuck the valve open and it wasn't able to close when the cycle timer ended. The strangest thing about this whole situation? The front yard is turf... Fake grass... Why exactly the owner wants the front fake grass watered, I have absolutely no idea. 

[jbern]

Good morning! We are doing a cleanup day around the house. Which mostly includes kids toys/projects that have been left out for the summer. My kids can stir up quite a mess, but it’s nothing like the clean up some of you folks in the path of Helene are facing and I’m thankful for that! Praying for all of you that are affected! @slash25rc- that looks bad, but glad you didn’t see much damage to your house! @revkev- sounds like you got pretty fortunate with missing some really bad stuff!

Stay safe everyone!

@RoverRick and @William P - have fun golfing together today! Hopefully your TPT shafts keep everything in the fairway for you both! 


 

[Rickp]

7 hours ago, BIG STU said:

I work in the yard in the same manner by sections. I did away with our shrubs except the 3 Azella bushes some 3 years ago. Paid a crew to come in and dig them up and dispose of them. I hate shrubs anyhow. Here we get bees and all kinds of nasty stuff including copperheads in them. 

Not a fan of copperheads!  Haven’t seen a copperhead since left CT.  Lots of others though especially black racers. When we 1st moved to FL we did the FL thing and put in palms & magnolias and all the other swell stuff.  After 2 years we moved and no palms no magnolias and kept it simple .  The builder had all kinds of shrubs bushes & trees which I have removed.  I do the shrubs in 3-4 stages 4x a year with little touch up occasionally.  

[cksurfdude]

42 minutes ago, RichL85 said:

The strangest thing about this whole situation? The front yard is turf... Fake grass... Why exactly the owner wants the front fake grass watered, I have absolutely no idea. 

That is pretty strange! Do you know if there's an electronic / programmable controller for the system that allows creating custom programs, ie one without the front yard zone?

[RichL85]

5 minutes ago, cksurfdude said:

That is pretty strange! Do you know if there's an electronic / programmable controller for the system that allows creating custom programs, ie one without the front yard zone?

There is an electronic controller, but I generally leave it alone. The homeowner we are renting from changes the program timing occasionally. There are some plants around the front yard landscaping, so maybe the sprinklers are more for those. It's just funny to see fake grass being watered along with everything else. For now I just have it off until I can cycle through and see if the solenoid is shot or just bad luck with the valve not closing. Had this problem at our old house and it was just a little debris blocked a valve from closing, once we cleaned it out and cycled a few times it was fine. I just didn't feel like troubleshooting the issue after 6 hours of driving home on Friday. 

[chisag]

51 minutes ago, RichL85 said:

I haven't seen much of the aftermath, but seems like a few areas got hammered pretty badly.

 

... Western NC was devastated. Power gone and all roads closed. A friend of mine that lives in Asheville NC posted these:



 

 

 

 

 

 

[fixyurdivot]

3 hours ago, revkev said:

Good morning and thanks for the concern.  We did not just take some crap.  Helene produced the worst storm surge in recorded history.  Fortunately my house is not in a flood zone and miraculously we never lost power.  However, many in my church and school community were devastated.  I've been dealing with that since around 5:30 Friday morning.  Three of our teachers are out of their homes.  I've lost count of how many lost their vehicles.  This will go down as the worst storm in history in my county.  My son and family are at my house - they live in a Mobile Home over in Hillsboro County and were evacuated.  They are still without power - their park flooded but it does not appear as if water got into their unit. 

 

I will try and reach out to Foz -

Glad to hear you guys are okay.  We did hear from @fozcycleyesterday... he shared is excitement about UK's big win over Ole Miss.  I've been watching some of the post storm coverage and it's amazing how differently areas, just miles apart, faired...crazy really.  Just slight differences in topography and wind/surge direction can be huge.

As a yute growing up in Ft. Lauderdale, I experienced several hurricanes.  I remember how "exciting" it was helping my Dad and older brother install the steel storm shutters, pulling the boat out of the slip and up to higher ground, etc.  Funny how our perspective on such happenings change as we get older.

[fozcycle]

9 minutes ago, fixyurdivot said:

Glad to hear you guys are okay.  We did hear from @fozcycleyesterday... he shared is excitement about UK's big win over Ole Miss.  I've been watching some of the post storm coverage and it's amazing how differently areas, just miles apart, faired...crazy really.  Just slight differences in topography and wind/surge direction can be huge.

As a yute growing up in Ft. Lauderdale, I experienced several hurricanes.  I remember how "exciting" it was helping my Dad and older brother install the steel storm shutters, pulling the boat out of the slip and up to higher ground, etc.  Funny how our perspective on such happenings change as we get older.

My Grandson has 5 acres just outside of Perry, FL.  He has been so lucky. This is his 3rd hurricane in an area that has not seen a direct hit in 100 years. He had a lot of damage earlier but seems to have survived Helene. Praise the Lord.