“My Life as a Golf Marshall” :Back on Track After the Great COVID Lockdown

Rather stupidly golf courses were closed due to the Great Ontario Lockdown that started on April 17th and lasted until May 22. The closure of my golf course was just that and the golf course was open as a park but somewhat quiet on the weekdays. As a park there was more crowding and lack of social distancing than had the golf course been open for golfers. The ignorance of the politico medico elite frightens me. They are off base with golf courses so how can we trust their medical “expertise”? We took advantage of this taking our dog on long walks at least three times a week. In addition to being good exercise for man and beast it enabled me to get to know the holes better. A golfer walks from one to eighteen in a linear fashion but a Marshall may zig zag to and fro so it is a good idea to know your holes, shortcuts and vantage points!

Getting up for the summer shift means being at the golf course at 6 for my 7-12 shift. I am not a morning person so I am making a sacrifice for what? Certainly not the money which is less than what you would make as a bus boy in a restaurant. It is the free golf. Yes for each shift you work you get 18 free holes at my golf course and you are inked in without the hassle of making any bookings.

Golfers were in a rip- roaring good mood when the course re-opened. Being imprisoned is no fun for human beings. I mean nary a single complaint was heard. And the divorce from the golf course certainly made for a bounty of bad shots. Golf can be humiliating sport. It can be cruel. Last year I recall making some super shots but they seemed to be attracted ever so slightly to tree branches. An inch here and there that’s all I needed to self-destruct. My last shot of the year was out of a sand trap over some impossibly high trees but I cleared them ending up three inches from the cup. I believe that to be one of golf’s greatest shots.

Happy golfers basking in the delight of their addiction is a Marshall’s dream. And strangely the golf course on this Victoria Day long week-end was somewhat quiet due to the threat of rain showers which must have frightened off 50 or 60 people, The flow was perfect. No waits or jam ups and since summer weather is coming a Marshall starting in the morning need not dress in gloves and a winter coat so this Marshall and all golfers had a happy day. Even those shots that infuriate golfers today resulted in laughter and not curses. How long is this happy buzz going to last?

RKS Wine: The Penniless Pensioner in Naples: I am worried!

After his engagement with Celine Serpent seemed to implode PP seems to have become a bit unhinged. He was put on tranquilizers by his therapist. And I receive an e-mail from him saying he is in Naples negotiating some cheese importation deal. I hope he knows who he is dealing with as when last in Naples the Mafia was big on counterfeit cheese and illegal dumping of garbage which you could see in the countryside here and there. PP narrowly managed a takedown in the Bernie Madoff Ponzi scheme and his offshore Panamanian bank accounts are sure bait for the Canada Revenue Agency to accuse him of tax fraud.

Well, while having dinner at Naples’s down home and perhaps best restaurant Umberto’s he had some Il Poggio Taburno Falanghina Del Sannio and asked if I could review it and let the good people of Canada know about it. He said Luca Maroni rated it a 95 and James Suckling a 92. So the next day a couple of men in silk suits driving a Maserati dropped off a case of the wine “for my troubles”. I got the impression if I didn’t like it I might suffer some fractures to my legs…..just a joke they laughed.

Deep fried Campanian vegetables with Arancini: Photo Robert K. Stephen

So under no pressure at all I try this Campanian wine. It is grown in volcanic soils so I am expecting something special!

It is light gold in colour. Very direct and clean in your face aromas of guava, lime, lemon and pineapple. This cleanliness is an advantage of wine fermented and aged in stainless steel. On the palate equally clean with precise minerality all clear as a bell. On the palate green apple and pear. There is nothing fancy or flashy about the wine. The best I can describe it would be clean and pure. Unlike red wines grown in volcanic soil there are no coal or petrol notes to the wine.

It has a short finish.

I rub my legs. I think they will remain intact but what about PP all alone in Napoli? I feel he is a little fish in a very big pond!

Speaking of fish this would be great for simply grilled white ocean fish or a plate of deep-fried Campanian vegetables or calamari.

(Il Poggio Taburno Falanghina del Sannio 2018 DOP. Il,Poggio di Fusco Carmine, Torrecuso, Italy, $16.95, Liquor Control Board of Ontario # 17695, 750 mL, 13.5%, Robert K. Stephen A Little Birdie Told Me So Rating 92/100)

RKS Films: “Fire Music: The Story of Free Jazz”

Growing up as a teen in Montreal I remember walking through Alexis Nihon Plaza in downtown Montreal and hearing Led Zeppelin 2 blasting from a record store. Was that in 1969? I just had to buy it and arguably isn’t that one of the best rock albums of all time? Yes I loved them and Cream, Hendrix, Joplin and the Allman Brothers.

I was NEVER LOST IN ROCK! Despite all the great rock in the late 1960’s and 1970’s I was a bit of an outcast listening to classical music and jazz and enjoying it. But the jazz was traditional if I can use that word. Stan Getz, Sonny Rollins, Mingus and loads of classical jazz musicians. As a reviewer of jazz and blues performances I had an opportunity to see many of the greats long gone into the world beyond while so many of my cohorts were listening to rock.

Even beyond that after moving to Toronto I continued to listen to jazz and classical while rock had long died especially with the biggest traitor of all Rod Stewart going disco after a great run with the Jeff Beck Band. He disgusts me and I look forward to him writing theme music for Harlequin Romance films.

I can’t remember all the jazz concerts I reviewed in Montreal but if I could recount all the names you might say I was a very lucky man and I will not disagree.

So after listening to jazz for 40 years I watch “Free Music: The Story of Free Jazz” and I feel lost. What is this type of music? I can throw a bunch of names that play this genre of jazz and am left with a headache with discordant and maniacal jazz. So jarring I almost said no more so I stopped the film after 35 minutes and went to bed yesterday to continue tonight.

Of course, as a reviewer I will not snow you and say truthfully, I can’t identify with this style of avant- garde “free jazz”. I have never heard of the many avant-garde musicians in this film. It is not my fault as my radio stations have failed me sadly perhaps looking for a more comfortable style of jazz. I have never heard any Ornette Coleman, Cecil Taylor, Prince Lasha, Eric Dolphy, Don Cherry, Sam Rivers or Sun Ra on my local jazz station. Quite frankly the music is a cacophony and may lead to a migraine headache as one commentator suggests. But a bright light went off in my head as there is a clip of Gato Barbieri, an Argentinian saxophonist I saw live in that jazz club in Montreal, was it Sunrise? He had a slightly wild saxophone that must have tinges of free jazz! Note that wild his playing was on the film “Last Tango in Paris”.

I must admit that is not my style of music but as an historical trail, of “free jazz” it is a must for I am sure are a bunch of jazz ignoramuses.

Free jazz may be what Picasso or Miro was to art or Jimmy Hendrix to rock but it is a journey should you take if you are interested in jazz and what the mainstream has missed. You might not like the music but the fact you may not have been exposed to it reeks of jazz propaganda control.

Although the film is 84 minutes in length it spans 20 or so years jam packed with archival footage and cinematography that takes you back to a 1970 Mahogany Rush concert in Montreal with a light show!

A film by Tom Surgal and executive producers Ron Mann and Peter Afterman.

A thorough look at a largely ignored genre of jazz.

You can see trailer here https://vimeo.com/ondemand/firemusicfilmca/596149413

Theatrical releases in Canada are:STARTS Sept 29: HOT DOCS (Toronto, ON) In-Cinema
STARTS Sept 30: HOT DOCS (Toronto, ON) Virtual
STARTS Oct 8: WINNIPEG CINEMATHEQUE (Winnipeg, MB) In-Cinema
STARTS Oct 15: FIRST ONTARIO PLACE PERFORMING ARTS CENTRE (St. Catharines, ON) In-Cinema
STARTS Oct 22: VANCITY (Vancouver, BC) In-Cine

“Mutantism on the March” : Chapter 101 The Laflirte Kidnapping: Different Strokes for Different Folks

When René Hecklevesque heard about the kidnapping of Quebec Minister Laflirte he collapsed and had to be helped to a chair. Some idiotic Orangemen had thrown a wrench into the fine machinery of his plot, as after the Laflirte kidnapping the population of Quebec welcomed its occupation by the conquering Canadian army. If the army could rescue one of its own kidnapped from les maudits Anglais their presence wasn’t that unbearable. Hecklevesque could hardly draw but a small crowd to his speeches. Some of the audience even heckled him labelling him a troublemaker who had caused this Quebec grief. What a fickle group of fools they were. In public they were brave freedom fighters but when it came to the test they preferred their American cars and Californian wine! It was only the hardcore MSQ members that still backed Hecklevesque but they lacked the power to galvanize the entire province of Quebec into action. Masses were needed to overthrow the old status quo! Oh the tides of electoral politics were cruel! What options were open to Hecklevesque? If Laflirte were executed it would crush him and ruin his fragile popularity. Quebecers would view his execution as a great tragedy and would feel more comfortable in their own misery than in attacking and rampaging against Americans as who wanted to listen to ranting politicians in time of sorrow? His priceless momentum would be lost and he’d lose his chance at assembling a conquering army. His agreement with U.S. President Affliction would be useless as the masses were in no mood to attack Americans and their property. They were so engrossed in the two kidnappings drama. The population had observed and tasted the consequences of a failed nationalist power play. They would be more cautious in the future. Hecklevesque (aka Jiber) was growing impatient.

There was one person who couldn’t be happier with the current state of affairs and that was Montreal mayor Droolpoop. What a windfall the War Pretension Act had been. Almost all members of  the opposition parties in the upcoming municipal election had been arrested! And they would stay there, along with thousands of other without bail and no trial dates being set! Droolpoop was now the established and trusted politician. The probability of a clean sweep in the municipal elections loomed. It could only increase his bargaining power in his bid to bring the 1976 summer Olympics to Montreal.

Montenez, Eno Ergot and Squid were warned by the Montreal police to keep neutral or else be locked up. Other than the warning they were left unmolested. All of them relaxed thinking that the Jiber had overplayed his hand. They thought the Jiber had been responsible for the Dentalfloss kidnapping but it did not make sense that he would kidnap Laflirte under the guise of the Son’s of Westmount and risk a backlash from the public. Jiber had wanted to invoke an aura of repression and have the population rally around his soothsayer image and it worked as the Canadian army streamed into Quebec but this new kidnaping of a Quebec government minister shattered the fantasy of an easy Quebec split from Canada. The population hoped that Laflirte would be rescued by the Canadian army. No body was fighting them. Their loud talk disappeared as they looked down the barres of rifles.

Quebec was in a state of shock as the body of Laflirte had been recovered from the trunk of a pink Cadillac in the parking lot of Lower Canada College in NDG. Quebecers were rightfully steamed up and the only reason a pogrom was not razing Westmount was the presence of the Canadian army so revenge would have to wait until the army left Quebec. There was so much Anglo bashing in the population there was no desire to attack the Americans. Jiber would simply have to make the best of a bad situation. If only the FLQ would release Dentalfloss it would show that the French had more compassion than the English and perhaps this would rally the population against the Americans and the English to regain the honour and dignity of a murdered leader. So Jiber ordered his men to release Dentalfloss but holy shit he died minutes before the call choking on a Kentucky Fried Chicken bone . Now the Quebecers would perceive their own just as bad as the English. The elusive army would have to wait. Not everyone was as fortunate as Montreal mayor Droolpoop who had won a majority of city council seats. Jiber toyed with becoming a food supplier of tainted horsemeat. Back to the drawing board.

“My Life as a Golf Marshall” :COVID and its Effects on Golf

The great lockdowns and enforced segregation of masses of society and the inability to travel and socialize has created a newfound interest in golf or is it the only outlet and escape and chance to interact with humanity in a socially distanced fashion? Perhaps all the above but it has created a huge volume to deal with where in the course I Marshall at 78 foursomes are hunted eagerly online by 500 people every day. And many of these golfers were former golfers and rusty and there are the dreaded newbies clogging up time and patience. The sheer volume makes Marshalling potentially stressful with hot pressure to limit 18-hole time to 4:20 hours virtually impossible on the week-ends where the drinkers and inexperienced dominate. In the courses that still have Marshalls the week-end pressure is, for many Marshalls, simply not worth the “free golf “as management bears down and places assembly line pressure on Marshalls many of whom were highly paid professionals making as Marshalls nothing or less than the toilet cleaners of the porta potties on the golf course. Are we talking slave labour?

At my course golf carts are hosed down but not sanitized and for the summer period unpaid students were washing the carts as part of their “community volunteer hours”. Something not quite right there. And there was no disinfecting at all. Something not quite right there. Even the towels used to dry the carts after they were hosed off (and not thoroughly cleaned) were soppy and dirty more germ spreaders which would no doubt cause the politico medico elite ruling the province a bird!

By the way at least 25% of the weekday golfers are “working from home”.

“Mutantism on the March” :Chapter 100: The Canadian Army Rolls into Quebec: The Son’s of Westmount Strike!

Immediately after the War Pretension Act was passed the Canadian army rolled into Quebec in a show of overwhelming force. Other units were placed on alert throughout the country. Canada in peril! The pimply faced beer swilling youngsters from The Atlantic provinces were proud to be patrolling the streets of Montreal and Quebec City beating up “suspects” and arresting them without warrants. It was more fun than sitting on the base and cracking “frog” jokes. The presence of the army calmed the knee shaking Quebec Anglos and thrilled Hecklevesque who now had an enemy at the doorstep to verify his warnings of a hostile Canada. The Quebec government led by Poorassa played into his nationalist hands by refusing to criticize the occupation of Quebec. In fact they supported it! Hecklevesque was to use their support against them by pointing out to the population how weak they were by refusing to assert themselves against the traitors. In public he chastised the army but of course privately it was the best thing that could have happened. The CDQ and the mutants were equally vocal in their outrage calling it, “the most hypocritical action of federal politicians who profess a belief in the concept of rights and civil liberties”.

Matters became more confused wen yet another kidnapping was announced. The Quebec Minister of Communications, Pierre Laflirte was abducted as he left his favourite Michigan Red Hot frankfurter restaurant Chez Lafleur in Montreal’s Ville St. Pierre. The kidnappers called themselves the “Son’s of Westmount For Freedom” (SWF) and threatened to execute Laflirte unless the FLQ released Dentalfloss. In a communique dispatched to Montreal’s English radio stations the SWF outlined its demands;

“The Son’s of Westmount for Freedom

We have abducted Minister Laflirte and will execute him unless our sole demand is met. Release Dentalfloss from the hands of the French-Canadian Marxists. We English have endured enough discrimination. We have resorted to such drastic action to protect the English community in Montreal. The kidnapping of Her Majesty’s Royal government’s servant illustrates how law and order has broken down. We have taken the law into our own hands to save Canada from anarchism. So what if the Canadian army has been dispatched to Quebec. What can we expect from Prime Minister Fauxdo a Quebecer? His roots render impartiality impossible. Latin blood obstructs rational decisions. Release Dentalfloss you commie thugs or else!

Long live the Queen

Long live the Commonwealth

Long live a free and united Canada

Long live a free and democratic Quebec united within the bonds of Confederation.”

“My Life as a Golf Marshall” :Your Intelligence Network

You have several sources of intelligence open to you as a Marshall.

  • The Starter: The Starter has the first real view of the skills and attitudes of golfers. Are they angry or argumentative?  Are they abusive? Are they hackers? Do they reek of alcohol or cannabis? I often start my rounds on the first hole chatting up golfers. This may be your first and best intel source. It is not Afghanistan but a week-end at a municipal golf course may be close to combat.
  • The Golfers: Many golfers blame delays on the group immediately ahead of them which is incorrect 90% of the time. On a shift I had there was a back up developing on the third hole but I caught up with the offenders on the 12th hole who were running late by 25 minutes. Chasing down the source is time consuming. The more experienced golfers have the ability to see beyond the party ahead of them. They can be your ally in identifying the culprits.
  • The Cart Lady: These are the ladies who zoom around the course selling beer and other alcoholic beverages and food. They can tip you off who may be pickled or getting to that point. You can also look in the garbage cans and see how many beer cans are not being sold by the cart lady but smuggled in. Most golf courses prohibit bringing in your own alcohol.
  • The Reputation: If you have been around long enough you will recognize what to watch out for. There are names that say to you I have encountered this foursome before. It could be Mr. that took swing with a golf club at A Marshall. It could be the perpetual laggards that are so slow they run 25 minutes slow time and time again.
  • You: Once you identify a gap of a hole ahead of a group of golfers. You have identified the criminals!
  • The Marshall You Are Replacing: If you are replacing a Marshall that Marshall will give you the low down on the slow, abusive and clueless as to etiquette.

“My Life as a Golf Marshall” :Welcome to the Oven! Summer Golf in Toronto

I’ll take a cool fall day with brilliant colours surrounding me hoping that the chill wakes up my hidden golf abilities!

Summer in Toronto in the past couple of years has been nothing short of brutal. You know how bad it can be that golfers are soaked through at 10:30 a.m. and complaints about slow pace are replaced by dehydrated golfers almost begging for the refreshment cart. Humidity would seem to be an enemy of a good game score wise. Many golfers have remarked after 15 holes with sweat rolling down their face and into their eyes they just want the game to end quickly.

I had made a suggestion that the golf cart refreshment brigade be doubled to a cart serving the front nine and another serving the back nine. It has fallen on a deaf ears. I am trying to ensure happy golfers in Hades realm but the third party refreshment provider lacks much commercial sense. Those who ignore a profit-making opportunity…what do we call them?

What does heat and heat paired with humidity do. It slows the pace particularly the later the start in the day the more impact the heat and humidity have. Humid air is “thick” and slows the trajectory of the ball.

While the chilly spring climes on a golf cart make life miserable for a Marshall due to the wind chill created by zipping around on a golf cart the zipping around in heat creates a natural cooling effect at least when you are moving and a Marshall often makes stops for conversation and to make requests to speed up. So a Marshall can feel the heat and humidity but the smart Marshall know where the shade is and can advantage of that.

I will chill a litre of water in a flask and take a root beer or San Pellegrino fruit drink and hydrate galore. Despite all this at the end of a shift in the summer whatever the hour I am drained. On my stressful Sunday 12-5 shift a chilled beer afterwards in the backyard is a prerequisite to moving on to normal life. I have no appetite only a thirst for a bitter thirst-quenching Ontario craft brew IPA.

Summer golf can be hell but golf addiction defies realities and that addiction powers golfers through Dantes Inferno. The cart lady has huge beer sales and attendant tips! She walks away with 4 times more than I do per hour. Oh injustice!

RKS Wine: The Penniless Pensioner Ratches Down His Cali Cab Expectations!

The Penniless Pensioner appears flushed with cash but his period of austerity has infused a “budget streak” in the man who laments the amount of money he once spent on trophy wines. He seems to have an obsession to troll the bottom end of the monetary scale for wine and he loves the challenge to find a bargain. I advised PP I found a Liquor Control Board of Ontario store manager mark down of a Monterey California Cabernet Sauvignon from $17.95 to $12.95. PP is excited hoping he will have discovered Nirvana. His base house wine in the California Cabernet Sauvignon category was Mount Veeder Winery Cab from Napa selling at the Liquor Control Board of Ontario for $70.

I tell PP that the winery is located in Greenfield a hotbed of legal and illegal cannabis cultivation in California at least until the megacorps started edging out the smaller growers. PP quips noting he hopes the winemakers were not stoned when they made the wine! He then goes into a diatribe about Celine Serpent his most likely ex-fiancé after that disastrous open house barbeque. He snickers Celine was most likely a low life stoner taking her CBD and THC for her arthritis. Why he exclaims he never saw her limping and in pain so it’s just an excuse to be a stoner. I try to explain there is such a thing as medical cannabis. I also suggest that as Celine is not limping around perhaps the CBD and THC is working. I just get a frustrated retort about that damn Trudeau legalizing cannabis. I don’t bother saying that cannabis was legal until 1937 in the United States until the rise of Big Pharma that had an interest in selling chemicals.

So we try the super discounted Cab. If worse comes to worse I’ll use it in cooking.

In colour black cherry. On the nose blueberry, black cherry, blackberry and a bit of charcoal. On the palate mild tannins. One gets the sense of very ripe grapes used to make the wine and there is no problem with that unless they are simply too ripe and the sugar content is upped making many cheaper wines tasting like cough syrup. This wine is not chop and screw for sure but it is has a rather whopping 10 grams of sugar per litre. That is quite high as most red wines of the dry variety come in at 2-3 grams. Its palate lacks character. Short finish. On deeper reflection there are notes of prunes and coffee which are for me indicators of wine made from overly ripe grapes.

The wine was aged for 10 months in French, Hungarian and American oak 30% which was new.

Monterey is in the Northern Central Coast. The Central Coast of California is a huge wine producing region.

If you were eating a burger either a veggie or meat one or a simple pasta sauce with fresh Ontario field tomatoes this would be a palatable match. However taken on its own it is nothing special an attribute of the majority of wines on the market.

(District 7 2018 Cabernet Sauvignon, Monterey, California, Estate Grown, Scheid Family Wines, Greenfield California, $12.95 with manager discount down from $17.95, LCBO # 10473, 750 mL,13.5%, Robert K. Stephen A Little Birdie Told Me So Rating 85/100).

“My Life as a Golf Marshall” :Rain, Sleet or Snow: The Unpredictable Canadian Spring! (April 11, 2021)

I notice I am paying very close attention to the weather as I’ll be out in it as long as it is not pouring rain, there is lightning or snow is falling. The weather forecasts are atrociously inaccurate The golf season will run from April 1 to sometime in November when it is simply too cold to golf.

Today I drove to the course in medium velocity rainfall asking myself who on earth would be golfing on a day like today? Well there are golf fanatics that would play in their snowshoes if they could and yes despite the rain there are a dozen golfers on the course and when there are golfers in action you need a Marshall for safety and liability purposes.

I drag a towel from the back seat of my car we use for the dog but I could not find my rain pants so I pray to the golf gods the rain lets up. And thank goodness an hour later it’s gone and the golfers increase in volume but nothing too much to handle.

An overjoyed young lady tells me of her first birdie ad I congratulate her. A birdie is always a special feeling. Another golfer on 18 tells me he’s just played the best game of his life.

My hands take an hour to warm up. I had to return to the car and get my gloves.

I chat here and there and even those having a bad game are in good spirits. Golf can do that to you. But it also has the possibility to turn you into a raging maniac and golf clubs can be thrown into the water!

So today I have ordered a Misty Mountain set of rain pants. I am ready for anything in this unpredictable spring. You have to be prepared or mother nature will kick your ass. You can’t underestimate the wind chill created by zipping around in a golf cart.

Of course, there are viciously hot days coming and I have an unpleasant feeling a light snowfall and the inevitable frost delays as fall creeps closer.

So by way of analogy, I am part of the US Mail slogan that neither rain, sleet or snow will keep a golf Marshall from being on duty. On those cold or rainy days have pity on the golf Marshall. As a last comment a Golf Marshall should enjoy dealing with people. There is no room for confrontation or argumentation. You may need a thick skin! Time will tell. But poor weather may mean less golfers which might lead to loneliness and too many may lead to frustration where the weather is fine as the more golfers the more problems such a jam ups and more beer consumption which are the biggest sins a golf Marshall will have to deal with