Postcards from the Road

--Casey Chmielewski, Cape May, N.J.

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A TRADITION (WITH A COST)

Our trip is called The McPherson Cup. It used to have another name, but now it's in honor of a friend who passed away last year. There are 16 of us. We've been going for eight or nine years, usually the weekend after Labor Day, when we get a good rate. We've been to Sea Island, Hilton Head, Daufuskie Island, Stonehenge in Tennessee, Old Waverly in Mississippi...

We're pretty serious about the competition, but we don't play for money. We have two teams -- Alabamans and Appalachians -- and we play for points.

We do have a tradition that can be pretty costly for one member of the group, though. On Friday night we have our big opening dinner, and we play a game called Credit Card Roulette. At the end of the meal, all 16 guys stand up, and each one tosses a credit card into a bucket. Then the waiter takes one out at a time and reads the name. The second-to-last name in the bucket pays the tip. The last guy out pays for everything else, usually in the neighborhood of $500. It's very funny.* You get some hilarious reactions as the names are called. --Allen Baker, Birmingham, Ala.

* THIS IS EASY FOR ME TO SAY, AS I, HAVE NOT YET LOST THE GAME.

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A WATER RESCUE ON THE 18TH HOLE

Everyone in our group belongs to the A-Z Investment Club in Fordyce, Ark. There are eight of us. Starting in 1996, we've been all over the U.S., from coast to coast and a lot of places in between.

On one trip a few years back, we played at the Las Vegas Paiute Resort. We play an individual net-score game every day during the trip. One of our guys, Bill Nutt, had never won. He approached the 18th hole on the final day with a commanding three-shot lead, but he pulled a Jean Van de Velde. He hit two balls into the water hazard, and somehow his club went in, too. I'm not saying he threw it in. It might have slipped. In any event, it was a new Cobra driver.

His partner, Allen Bedell, said something like, "You probably shouldn't have done that." Bill replied with an expletive.

As they stood there staring at the club, they were surprised to see the Cobra actually floated. Reflecting on the cost of the club, Bill decided to retrieve it, but the wind blew it farther from shore, out of reach.

When they finished the hole, Bill losing by one stroke to Dr. Jack Lyon, he went into the golf shop and offered the assistant pro some money to go get his club. The assistant said, "What kind of a Cobra driver is it? Is it an offset?" Bill said it was. The assistant laughed and said, "I'm not going in after an offset driver!"

We all sat down for lunch, and after a while Bill disappeared. He didn't say anything. He was just gone. And then we looked out and saw Bill standing outside, dripping wet, carrying his Cobra offset driver and a pair of soggy underwear. The whole place burst out laughing.

-- Steve Anthony, Fordyce, Ark.

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'MAN, YOU'RE ON FIRE THIS YEAR'

The trip I go on has been around for 28 years, and I've been on 18 of them. There are 12 golfers. Most of us worked for Ford, though now we're spread out in retirement.

The guy who organizes our trip is Duane (Boomer) Bloomquist. He's at the center of most of the funny stories about our group. My favorite took place a few years ago in Michigan.

We had one grill outside our condo, but we needed another for our steaks. So a couple of guys and I went out to get another one. When we came back, there was this bonfire in our living room. It was huge! We could see guys in there running around like mad, throwing towels on it and stamping their feet.

It turns out, Duane didn't have any matches, so he lit a piece of paper on the stove and then tried to run across the condo and drop it into the grill. But he couldn't get all the way to the patio, and it was burning his hand, so he dropped it on the floor, and whoosh! That carpet was not flame-retardant.

After we ate, guys got down on the floor with knives, and they were able to scrape up most of the burn marks. It didn't look too bad. These were not luxury condos. I'll bet the next people in there didn't even notice. And you know what? The smell was pretty much gone by the time we left.

--Bob Knecht, Plymouth, Mich.

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WAITING FOR THE CLAMPDOWN

Every November our group goes to the same place: Santee, S.C. It's not the most high-end destination, but the price is right. We stay five nights and play 27 holes a day. It'll come to $347 a man this year.

A few years ago, before there were condos, we stayed at a hotel right off I-95. This place had definitely seen better days. One of our guys, Dale Miller, kept complaining that his room smelled. So we dug around, and sure enough there was a dead rodent behind the nightstand. Well, this sends Dale over the edge. A dead rodent! In his room!

Later that night we went to a restaurant with a tank where you put in money and try to take out a live lobster with a mechanical claw. If you catch one, they will cook it up for you.

A couple of our guys decided they'd catch one and bring it back to the hotel. When we got back, the guys cut the rubber bands off the lobster's claws and hid it under Dale's pillow while he was getting ready for bed. Sure enough, when he climbed in and put his hands behind his head, the lobster clamped down on his finger.