Golf can best be defined as an endless series of tragedies obscured by the occasional miracle, followed by a good bottle of beer. Golf! You hit down to make the ball go up. You swing left and the ball goes right. The lowest score wins. And on top of that, the winner buys the drinks. Golf is harder than baseball. In golf, you have to play your foul balls. If you find you do not mind playing golf in the rain, the snow, even during a hurricane, here's a valuable tip: your life is in trouble. Golfers who try to make everything perfect before taking the shot rarely make a perfect shot. The term "mulligan" is really a contraction of the phrase "maul it again." A "gimme" can best be defined as an agreement between two golfers ...neither of whom can putt very well. An interesting thing about golf is that no matter how badly you play; it is always possible to get worse. Golf's a hard game to figure. One day you'll go out and slice it and shank it, hit into all the traps and miss every green. The next day you go out and for no reason at all you really stink. If your best shots are the practice swing and the "gimme putt", you might wish to reconsider this game. Golf is the only sport where the most feared opponent is you. Golf is like marriage: If you take yourself too seriously it won't work, and both are expensive. The best wood in most amateurs' bags is the pencil.