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Last in Tournament

After the relative high when I won the closed tournament among around 16 people, and scoring a very good score, I came dead last in my team as our team lost out to another team for number 1 in a bigger tournament last week.

There are 12 players from each team, which top 8 makes the total score. We lost with 287 points to 289 of the first team. I came dead last with a score of 32 stableford points and obviously not contributing to the score.

I started extremely bad – true, I was rushing and nearly did not make the tee time as I was stuck in a massive traffic and had to change in the car. So I stepped up to make my first swing and it OB’ed. I was triple bogey first hole. The second hole, I kept topping the ball and made quintuple bogey (without losing the ball!) and my third hole, I plonked into the water for a double bogey. I was +10 over the first 3 holes!

I had another triple later on and one more at the back nine, but I did come back with 7 pars and some wondrous escapes, but the blow holes really did me in as we were playing handicap of the day. I wasn’t that bad, really, it just was very unfortunate that the first 3 holes I was up against the wall and I had to really gun for a lot of the shots – normally I would play safe or putt safe, but playing too aggressive has its downside.

So it just goes to show:- if you are honest with your game, golf giveth and taketh.

Incidentally, the overall single winner was the guy that I had total beef with because he cheats. I have no proof this round as I wasn’t playing with him, but when he came in the clubhouse and said he scored 4 birdies – I was very skeptical. I have seen his ‘birdies’. He downright cheats when he plays non tournament with us so what stops him from doing the same in tournament?

I hate to be a sore loser actually, which I am not. I am gracious and thankful I still managed to enjoy my game – but any win from that guy will be forever questioned by me, even if he did play an honest game.

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Weighing in on Lane Graves

By now, if you are on Facebook or any sort of social media, you probably heard of a few issues: In US – Orlando, specifically, you have the assassination of Christina Grimmie, a singer; the mass shooting at a gay club that killed 50+ people, and the alligator attack at Disney World’s resort on a 2 year old boy, that tragically ended in him drowning. Also, the assassination of a parliament member in UK – and in Malaysia, amidst all this, we have a runaway ostrich and yet another idiotic comment from our politicians on ransom money being donated to welfare charities. It’s pretty sad. If the entire world was a living organism, our politicians have successfully made our beautiful country the arsehole of the world where shit after shit is spewed out from. If the genie gave a wish, I’d wish these politicians can crawl back into whichever hole they slithered up from and forever disappear from the face of this universe.

But back to the Orlando news – and this has nothing to do with golf, even if the US Open is up and running and Rory is playing like crap dirt, and Jordan Spieth is cursing and Jason Day is not leading….everything suddenly seems so trivial, when you hear about a 2 year old boy being dragged and killed by an alligator while on a holiday with his parents. While in a Disney resort.

Of course, everyone have their opinions but it seems to fall into two camps, whether the parents are to blame or not. I think a lot of people made this into a racial thing, which is understandable, since a couple of weeks ago, when the gorilla vs boy story blew the internet and the gorilla had to be killed, initially the mother is being taken into questioning to be charged (which has since been rescinded). The mother of the boy in the gorilla pit is black. The family of the alligator attack is white. The problem to compare was that the boy in the gorilla pit survived, the gorilla was killed. Here, the boy is killed, and the alligator (presumably) survived.

Some of the comments blamed the parents for neglect. I was just thinking, if I was there on a holiday in a bloody DISNEY resort, the last thing I am thinking about is a damn alligator coming into 2 feet of water and killing my son. Should my son be in the water? Well, yes, boys are boys. And what’s more, this family was from NEBRASKA. If you know Nebraska, there is not a single drop of ocean or water within a thousand miles. It’s the freaking midwest. So yeah, a family comes to Disney, a 2 year old boy wants to experience the beach and water , plus it’s man made – plus it’s bloody DISNEY. So to those who says that the parents are stupid to allow their son into the water in Florida shows these guys (the commenters) are absolutely retarded. As retarded as our politicians, apparently so it seems that we are not the only arsehole of the world. Part of America is. Obviously they don’t have children of their own. Or they smoke weed for a living and comment on facebook.

While sympathy is there for the family, and of course, me being a parent, I immediately superimpose the “what if it was my family” connundrum into the situation…I cannot imagine the pain they must be going through. Sympathy is not enough. The fault is not the parent’s. The fault isnt even on the alligators. They were just doing what they were created to do by nature – and then so many alligators were killed unnecessarily.

If anyone is at fault, it should be Disney. The company.

Yes, the CEO apparently visited the family and paid his condolences. No, he shouldn’t just do that as if that was a big deal. So what? Because you are CEO the family should appreciate your time? Who cares? You are just a human, like everyone else. The fact was, Disney failed to put up a sign to state there were bloody alligators. And why are there alligators roaming around your bloody Resort? If it’s a natural lake, sure. But this is a man made lake belonging to the resort. And the sign stated ‘No Swimming’. WTF does that mean? Why not put, “No swimming because a crocodile is going to snatch up your kids”? The kid wasn’t even swimming, he was wading on the shore, looking for treasures. Just like my kid would do.

Disney just made 1 billion with their new movie Zootopia. They have a few more movies coming out that will cross that mark – Finding Dory and another one about a hawaiian princess, Moana. They make millions from their parks and endorsements and copyright.

Disney should own up on their fault here and they should pay this family at LEAST 20  million USD. The money won’t bring Lane Graves back, but the company should be punished for severe negligence on their part.

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First Tournament Win

cropped-gilagolf2.jpgI’ve been playing recreational golf for more than 10 years. Started in 2004, first time swinging the club and now it’s a dozen years and I’ve gotten my game down to 12 at one point before ballooning up to 24 and now re-settled back at 16.

We had a small, closed tournament recently and amazingly, this is the first time I won. As in win anything at all in golf. Here’s my theory on my game:

My weight had also ballooned up, till a point one of my regular kakis whom I have not met for a long time kept commented how bloated I am when I met him at the tournament. He was a strange fella. He’s the type of golfer who talks a lot and analyzes a lot but still plays like crap. I mean not total crap, but I’ve never really seen him play well before in my life but the way he talks makes you think he is scoring regularly in the 70s. But he doesn’t. He scores well into the 90s and sometimes even 3 digits.  I suppose he is marketing guy. He kept going on about my weight and being so amazed etc, until it was getting slightly awkward as I wanted to just retort to him that while weight can change, unfortunately his face cannot. He has a face like an avocado, as in pockmarked and completely brutal to look at. The sort that only his wife would probably appreciate. In the dark. He’s like Deadpool, without the mask.

But I treasured our friendship a lot over the years and just smiled politely. He’s a really nice guy under all the golf BS, really and I didn’t want my silly sarcasm to spoil anything between us. Besides, I wasn’t offended or anything, but it’s just sort of natural for me to start bantering and has gotten me into all sorts of scraps previously. So I’ve learnt to shut my gap more.

Anyway – why I’m saying this is I think my weight has added some good stuff to my game, while subtracting from my lifespan. I’ve gained around 8 kilos since my second son came out and due to less golf and more food, gotten to a point where I can’t fit into a lot of my pants. However, for some reason, my golf game has improved.

I feel a lot more stable now on my irons and my drive. I don’t know if the weight has anything to do with it, but I am totally clobbering my irons. As in, murdering. I was standing at around 120 meters at one point in the game and overshot the uphill green with my gap wedge. Right now, for anything 140 meters, I am taking out a pitching or at most a half swing 9-iron. 100 meters, I am looking at a sand wedge. Anything in the 180s I am hitting my 5-iron. I regularly take 2 clubs less than my playing partners – and while my score is floating in the high 80s to low 90s level, I am a lot more confident approaching most of the greens with a 9 iron than a 7 iron.

The tourney was in KGSAAS and I havent played there in years. The first nine, I reeled off 4 pars in a row to end the nine, all with makeable birdies which I missed badly, and ended the game with 89. This includes a triple, and 5 greens where I 3-putted. My putting for some reason has become like a retarded platypus.

Now the competition was not PGA Tour standard by any means, in fact, there were no buayas (it was a very friendly competition) – and the winning score was actually 35 on stableford. In fact 5 people tied for 35 but because of my eight pars, my handicap was the lowest and I won. Yea.

It’s still a milestone though.

And I think I’ve got my weight gain to thank for this. So. More Durians!

 

 

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Glenmarie’s Thieving Caddy

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It’s been a while since my last post!

The thing is, the amount of golf played this year has been absolutely minuscule – since my second son came out around Christmas, it has been almost six months, and the amount of golf I’ve played is probably – 4 or 5 rounds, I can’t really recall. Only in the past 4 weeks I’ve managed to play twice – 2 weeks ago I played in KGNS Kelana Course after laying off for months and promptly scored 83, my best score for a long time. This included 8 pars, 2 double bogeys and 8 bogeys. And this was walking the course, with the last 4 holes played with an excruciating cramp in my left leg.

This week, managed to play a round at the Valley course in Glenmarie and scored around 92. I played the front at 43 and just had a bad streak in the back 9 with a double, triple, triple scored due to bad breaks and over clubbing. I was hitting my driver and irons way better than I was hitting in KGNS but that’s how golf works you know. Sometimes you play badly and score well and sometimes you score badly and you play well.

Glenmarie has always been a little of a sore course for me. The course itself is ok, but the management of the course is just stupid. It’s stupid. Go read the reviews of the course in this blog and you will find I have no issues with the course, but with the people running it and the people in it.

This round, we had a caddy who was a little too chatty for my liking. He seemed very eager to talk, and asked us if we were betting and such. I said, just a bit, nothing big. Then in a few holes, he cracked some jokes which were just a little off, I felt. Like he was high on drugs or something. He didn’t do anything bad but he didn’t do anything good either – he was bad at reading greens and basically, not extremely helpful at all. No biggie.

We tipped him after the round and finished the game and left. After lunch my buggy mate texted me and asked if I was missing any money. I wasn’t sure, since I didn’t even know how much I had in my wallet to begin with. He said he lost RM500. As in, missing from his wallet. I told him to call up the club and check on the caddy because the caddy seemed very off. It’s just a gut feeling, you know, when you don’t have proof.

Sure enough, a few days on, Glenmarie calls back and they said they have recovered back RM400 from that caddy.

Wait – ok, thank you Glenmarie for being prompt, but what about the RM100? And What did you do to that caddy? Did you make sure you fired him and ensure he never ever gets any job within a 100 mile radius of a golf course again and spend his entire life sifting through shit to get his daily meals? What is your hiring policy? Is it going to change? How do you ensure the peace of mind of golfers if your caddies are thieves?

I think Glenmarie should make a public statement on this to ensure golfers are at peace with their game in the club. They should publish it and say that they apologise for hiring thieves and that they will do everything they can to shore up their hiring process to make sure these drug addicts don’t see the light of day again.

Also – they should give us a free round at least as an apology.

So Gilagofers going to Glenmarie – BEWARE! You might be having a thief in your buggy with you!

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Schadenfreude for Spieth?

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One of the first German words I learnt was schadenfreude. At least I think it’s german. Ich weiss nicht, tut mir leid.

It means that we are happy over someone else’s misfortune. For instance, the BMW that just cut into my lane this morning and immediately ends up in a horrific crash…but of course he escapes and his entire car bursts into flames. Man, that feels good. Or the car that parked in two parking lots suddenly randomly bursts into flames.

Or take Tiger – after years of dominance and arrogance, suddenly to be reduced to a lousy hacker that cannot chip – tell you what, a lot of people had that schadenfreude feeling.

But Spieth?

I saw his trainwreck in Augusta back nine. It’s similar to the one that Rory endured in 2011. Unlike Spieth, Rory was already struggling on the front nine before exploding to a back nine 43 and a final score of 80. That’s like us hackers scoring 110 on the final day.

Jordan? No one saw it coming on the front nine. He was at one time -7 and 4 under for his round. After he reeled off 3 birdies in a row including an extremely difficult one on the 9th, most people just thought, just give him the damn jacket.

Then came the implosion.

10 was a bad drive, 11 was a bad putt where he missed a 4 footer after an incredible 3rd shot. And then, came the 12th. Amen corner, at least 11 and 12 are.

Remarkably, his total strokes on 10,11 and 12th is exactly the same as Rory’s in 2011. Rory scored 7-5-5 and Jordan scored 5-5-7. Unfortunately his meltdown of 7 came on the par 3, so he played it 6 over as opposed to Rory’s 5 over. So it’s worse.

But while Rory was shaking his head, throwing his putter, untucking his shirt and looking like he had the worst job on earth collecting shit; Jordan did not throw his club once, did not slam his club into the ground, did not slam his club into his bag, and when he chunked his second into the water on the 12th – he just calmly ask for another ball. When he putted out for a 7, he just walked off, disappointed obviously but all the while as if he was just 1 down on a 15-5-5 betting game instead of the bloody Masters at bloody Augusta.

Its impossible to not like Jordan Spieth. Welcome to the world of sports, where you can be a good guy and also the best in the world. The world of Michael Jordan thrash talking is replaced by the mild mannered Stephen Curry – the world of Tiger Woods replaced by Jordan Spieth, who has a little sister with Autism and started a foundation for special children’s needs.

When you have him say, “Being Ellie’s brother humbles me every day of my life.”, you know his guy is honest-to-God a great guy and there is no way anybody on this God given earth can have a bad thought about him. Check out this clip on him and slowly clap your hands.

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Ernie Els is now a Hacker

How the mighty has fallen.

Ernie Els used to be one of the best golfers in the universe, with a swing as sweet and soft as ours are horrible and unsightly. We used to crave for his swing, but end up swinging like a baboon. That is on drugs, and possibly rabid.

But here he is: 6 Putting.

Yes. And this is 6 putting from 3 feet.

I have seen one of my hacker friend 4 putt from 3 feet and we were down to the ground laughing at his misfortune.

Welcome to the new record, which even John Daly won’t beat.

I mean, here it is. The first putt was just a miss. The second putt, like all professionals, he wanted to ram it straight through the break but must have pulled it. So he is back to where he was originally. He must now know the break is to the left.

He misses the SAME way. The same.

Now he is pissed. And also uncertain. He deccelerates his fourth putt and doesnt get enough speed and just breaks again.

He is pissed even worse now. He taps a 5 inch putt and it hits the hole. By now he has given up.

He never recovered and finished with an 80 and third last.

As of this writing, he just teed off his first hole and did much better. He double bogeyed it.

Bye bye Ernie.

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Welcome to the year of the Monkeys!

Gilagolf would like to take this time to wish all patient readers of this blog: Happy Chinese New Year and may your irons always be true and straight and your driver never stray from the path of righteousness.

As you know, I am in a sort of a downtime (although I did manage to squeeze in a reasonable round in Glenmarie recently. After starting with an awesome Triple-Double-Double, I managed to crawl home with a respectable 94 despite carrying a bad slice. I didn’t play too badly. The points were all lost in the short game typically:-chunked chips, skulled pitches, overhit puts … things that you generally have after laying off 6 weeks of golf.

The reason why we chose Glenmarie was due to the recent wipeout of the Asian team in the Eurasia cup. If you have watched the cringe worthy trashing, it was like watching Barcelona first eleven playing 100% against Setapak High School for 90 minutes. It was just a total thrashing. It was like me playing 18 holes against my 1 month old baby, who cannot even lift his head. It was like Mike Tyson going 5 rounds against a caterpillar, and I mean the animal, not the construction brand. Which begs the question:

Why did Danny Chia call out ‘Ian Who?’ the day before his singles against Ian Poulter?

For those of you who does not know, this is a tongue and cheek reference to the “Tiger Who” reference that Vijay Singh’s caddie wrote on the back of his cap during the 2000 President’s cup. Tiger got so incensed that he didn’t concede any putt more than 18 inches and won 2&1. The caddie and Vijay obviously thought it was funny, but at the same time, it was a mental game they wanted to play with Tiger.

Now you need to understand the circumstances.

Vijay was a top 10 player in year 2000. Tiger was number 1 and had won 9 tournaments. Vijay however got the Masters that season so they were probably toe to toe in terms of their capability. Vijay knew he needed a bit of push to derail Tiger a little, unfortunately, it backfired and Tiger got pumped up and dispatched the big Fijian. But it was a calculated move. Vijay knew if they were just to play normal, he would probably be routed out of the park. But a fired up Tiger might go both ways – his drives might wander and then who knows? Tiger made almost 10 million that year, Vijay had around 2 million earnings and they were great, great players.

Let’s refocus back on WTF was Danny Chia thinking. Now, I love to support Malaysians as well as the other guy, but the problem with Malaysians I feel is that we don’t think before we open our big mouth. Look at our politicians for God’s sakes. That Ahmad Maslan guy is like an accident waiting to happen everytime he opens his mouth – demonstrating how god awful his intelligence is hovering somewhere between a plankton and a jellyfish. It also demonstrates the eventual degradation that our brains are having and evidence of the de-evolution of human kind. His statements are not just an insult to Malaysians all over, but it’s an insult to mankind as a whole. Or recently (since Maslan has been sacked in his post recently), our wonderful AG (attorney general), making all sorts of STUPID statements. I mean, it’s just STUPID. Why would he say things like: “When someone donates 2.6 Billion to our Prime Minister, why does anyone care?” Umm. WTF is wrong with you, man? If I knew that my wife was paid 1 million dollars by a handsome prince for some service she did for him, you’d think I would say, why should I care? Dude, if our PM is becoming another country’s b*tch, we definitely have the right to give a damn or do you NOT feel that piece of meat poking you in your a$$? Jeez.

Now I am generally neutral to politics in this blog, but I cannot stay neutral to STUPIDITY. And this is STUPIDITY in the highest order. This AG, like that Maslan guy, is an absolute horror show, and if Aliens took samples on human intelligence, they would exterminate us all immediately and start from scratch with bacteria, that probably has more potential of intelligence than us. I just get so worked up when I think about these guys because it’s like having them insult our human race over and over and over. ARGH.

Anyway, back to Danny Chia vs  Ian Poulter.

He wasn’t as bad as our two Malaysians examples above. But the question is why would he say “Ian Who” to the press before the singles game? Why, for the love of God, would you do such a thing, knowing that Ian Poulter is actually a murderer in disguise when he comes to playing singles.

Danny Chia is ranked 256.

Ian Poulter is ranked 55. There is a massive 101 steps between them.

Danny was thinking, hell, I am ranked higher than Tiger Woods now, you know so don’t play play. Let me go and poke this Ang Moh a little in the butt and maybe he will scurry away to the nearest toilet in fear. I am Danny Chiah wor. Malaysian top player of the year, man!

Ian Poulter walked all over poor Danny. It was a car wreck. It was like having a tabby cat being bowled over by an Elephant. It was like Barcelona first 11 playing 100% against my son’s class – which is kindergarten 3 to 4 years old. There was no reason whatsoever why Danny would need to say that. None. All he had to do was to not say things and go out and play like a crazy monkey to beat Ian Poulter. Not to fire up Poulter. Poulter is like, Jeez, this is a total insult to my skill to play these jokers. I’m going to just use a halfset and tee off with my putter just to even things up.

At one hole, and this was when I turned off from watching the tournament – the camera was on Ian Poulter’s distinguished gait walking after a great shot to stick it near the hole. It then panned to a slumped Danny Chia taking a smoke. Yes, taking a smoke. I am not sure whether I’ve seen any PGA player doing that – but it just shows the gap of professionalism between the two players. PGA players CAN smoke, but they don’t, mainly because their sponsors pressure them and they earn tons. Asian players probably have lesser pressure from their sponsors, since instead of Rolex sponsoring them, they generally get sponsored by Roleks (sic). Instead of Nike, they get sponsored by Bata, and instead of Mercedes, they get sponsored by Proton Iswara. But c’mon, it’s just a turnoff, you know to show how different the class of golf is among the two players.

Don’t get me wrong, Danny played really well the first few days, and if it wasn’t for his partner’s 1 foot putt miss, they might have won one game. I was totally supporting him, and it’s just disappointing that he would think it’s a good idea to call out Ian the day before. It just shows, like the two examples of humans above, that we are truly in the year of the Monkey now.

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Summarising 2015

2015stats2

So 2015 has ended, and now 2016 is in but golf is going to be scarce. I suppose this is a good time as any to look back what has been achieved last year.

First of, summary stats above.

The most damning stats here is the 91.21 average gross. This is just not good enough. I wanted to set out last year to break 90, but in 39 rounds played, I only broke 90 15 times, which is a poor 38% while only breaking 85 in 2 tries (both times at Mines, incidentally). I suppose the only good news is that I only broke 100 twice – once in Seri Selangor and the other one recently in the blow out in Nilai Springs. Otherwise, it’s mostly 90 – 95 scoreline. In fact, it took me 6 games into 2015 before carding an 86, and in first 10 games, only broke 90 twice. The good news, is that, in the last 10 games, I broke 90 on 6 occasions. Granted, these were played at a lot better courses compared to the first 6 games and I didn’t have to tackle Seri Selangor in the last 10 games. My fairway hits are also low, but it doesn’t really matter because in some games, I can hit all the fairways but still fail miserably in scoring, while the opposite is true, whereby I miss all fairways and still score pretty well. My GIR is up, which is good, and at 2.56% par breakers, it means I had my share of birdies also.

2015stats1

 

A further break down as above.

I recorded 18 birdies last year, of course, the best coming from the recent Mines game where I hit back to back birds. Overall, I have around 4.5 pars per game, which technically is just not good enough. I should be comfortably averaging around 6 – 7 pars per game. The encouraging fact is that my iron games has improved a lot. My par 3 is being played a lot better, and has highest conversions of pars and play to only +0.96. Which is great. That means, if I can work out my par 4s, I should be playing a steady 15 – 16 handicap, as opposed to a very unsteady 16.
2015stats3

Finally – horses for courses. It’s pretty obvious my favourite courses also happens to be the best courses – Glenmarie Valley and Gardens, and Mines. Of course, Bangi has to be there since it;s such a short course. Kota permai, Sungai Long are played around 90, while Palm Garden, around 91.

So there you have it. 2015 has been filled with some pretty amazing shots (2 birdies in a row for example) and some pretty crap ones (10 greens in regulations and 6 three putts), and as I approach 2016, new father of 2, I don’t expect too much gametime. Whatever game I have, hopefully I can learn how to take those opportunities and break that darn 90!

Happy hacking everyone.

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So What Does 2016 Bring?

So quickly, we are in 2016.

I don’t think I achieve my goal of breaking 90 on average last year. I am probably hovering around the 91 – 92 mark. Which kinda suck. I had around 4 games I didn’t take into account last year – the scorecards are still in my bag. I think it reads around 88, 89, 102 and 88 or something. The 102 is the score in Nilai Springs, where I just had the shittiest time ever. Everyone knows Nilai Spring can be a bi*ch if you carry a hook. I think 99% of the holes in there are set up to kill the hooker. OB left. OB left. Water left. OB left. There was one hole, I hooked 4 drives into the bush. I was so pissed. Of course that hole I counted off as quadruple. In reality its probably around Unquadraguple. Look it up. It means +41.

I hate Nilai Springs.

The games before and after were good. I recall one outing at Mines where I struggled mightily at the nine that I usually score, and scored at the nine that I usually struggle, including two birdies in a row. It’s ridiculous, this game.

Anyway, starting 2016, my golf will generally be severely limited. My first kid is experiencing first hand his first year at kindy and every morning screams like how I scream when I miss a two foot putt. After screaming, he goes into a negotiative mode, like: “Can we just see the fishes and go?” “I want to see grandma” “I want to be with papa” and my all time favourite “I want to be a baby”. When everything fails, he goes into his default mode of screaming his lungs out. Every. Single. Day.

So, by the time I drop this bundle of screams off to be the teacher’s problem, it’s already around 8.45. I don’t think I will be picking up my golf clubs anytime soon, unless for an afternoon game maybe during the CNY.

My resolutions? Not to make any resolutions for golf. I think overall I have really improved. When playing in good golf courses. 2015 was a year where we played in Mines, Glenmarie, Sungai Long, Palm Garden, Kota Permai. When I go back to shitty courses like Nilai Springs and Kinrara and Seri Selangor, I generally end up playing like a panda humping a walrus. Technically I don’t think it’s possible but you get my point.

So don’t expect too much golf course reviews going into 2016. I might review a bit about baby food and stuff, but that’s over at my other blog at giladad.com.

For now, happy hacking and happy new year, you gilagolfers!

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New Year – New Dad

Haven’t been posting in a while but with a good reason. Finally having some reprieve after the Christmas season when we welcomed our second son into the world. Just to everyone who says the second kid is easier – NO. It’s not. It’s the same thing, except now you have the additional 3.5 year old kid running up and down and causing havoc in the house and screaming he doesn’t want to go to kindergarten at 7 am in the morning. So, no. Whoever said that only has the theory, but not the practice. They. Have. No. Clue.

Anyway, more on that later. For now, he is feeding reasonably well. The jaundice is the big worry, so much so, we were advised to rent a phototherapy unit in the house. It sounds much worse than it is. It’s actually pretty convenience, it’s around RM500 for 4 days 3 nights, and you basically lay the kid face down for 2 – 3 hours per session (around 3 sessions or 4 per day depending on how long you feed/breastfeed). So yeah it’s like maybe a round of golf in Mines or something, plus caddy tips and lunch. He sleeps very well like this as opposed to face up, but you need to have someone watch over him though and make sure he doesn’t block his nose or something. So the moment he moves, you should be up there and not watching football or something. We had him on a level of 270 for jaundice (bilirubin, if we need to be more exact) – but after 3 days we have gotten him down to 210, which is a safer level for 10 day old baby. We are putting him through 2 more sessions before our rent finishes. There’s this company in Kelana Jaya that does it http://www.bluelite.com.my/v2/. Its quite simple actually, in fact, the toughest part of it all would be to put the eye cover over his head and trying to turn him properly without thinking you would rupture his neck in the process. PM me if anyone needs more information in this. Not that I am an expert, but if you are anything like me thinking that home phototherapy is like understanding the science behind Interstellar movie, you will be better equipped once you realise the only instruction is: Turn On, Turn Off.

Welcome to earth, my little guy.