Seizing on the incredible density of industry folk just before E3, Jamie constructed the First Annual Child’s Play Invitational Golf Tournament. Our policy is essentially to look real hard at the kind of thing an actual charity would do, and then do that, in the same way that wearing daddy's coat makes one indistinguishable from a grown-up.
Gabriel was “Varsity” in Golf when we were in high school, something I always take great pains to announce, his varsitaity, even though I have no idea what it actually means to be Varsity. I know there is a Junior Varsity, and that theirs is surely a scrabbling and threadbare sort of existence, but that’s it. As for Gabriel: I saw him put the ball in the ball-hole thingy, the cup, at seventy yards once.
It’s a long ways. And the balls they use in this game are incredibly small.
No seventy yard drops yesterday, but there were ridiculous feats and the associated derring-do. Chipped-in “birds” and putts beyond any reasonable expectations of success were not uncommon. We did not win the tournament, but our clan showed virtue throughout. We were partnered with an elite cadre of golfomancers that I am proud to call brothers: Shieldbearer, Trap Addict, and... Ken, who never got a nickname. Not because he didn’t deserve one. He was just very... I mean, you know. He was just very Ken about everything.
Robert and Gabriel had a friendly bet regarding who would win between the two of them, though, a friendly bet with quotation marks around the friendly which might be more accurately described as a blood oath. We received a text message about halfway through the day to suggest that Robert and his stalwart crew were no longer trying to get a low score, but a high one, which struck me as unorthodox. I never underestimate him, though. You will recall that he figured out a way to transform two mean jerks into an engine of international charity, after all; it is my policy to give him the benefit of he doubt.
The idea that we could have as much fun as we were having and generate over twenty-five thousand dollars for Child’s Play simultaneously is a lot to process, and we occasionally had to remind ourselves of the fact. I want to thank the incredible Enforcers who (as always) formed the spine of the event, the amazing sponsors, and the truly great players who came out for an awesome experiment that’s almost certain to become a tradition.
I’ll be coming back on a plane as E3 is truly getting underway, missing some of the initial rush. That is, unless I feel like paying twelve dollars to use the Internet for an hour and a half. I’m not entirely certain I’ll make that bargain. I should get back just in time to have this bulk of this vital information “contextualized” by blogs into a uniform, ironic paste.
(CW)TB out.