Four!

In Slate today, a wonderful Human Guinea Pig about the joys (or, more specifically, lack thereof) of the sport of golf. In particular, I am completely tickled by the utter Bob Wrightism she writes about in the second paragraph, when he declares, at the end of a bad round, 'this has been borderline unpleasant.' Classic Bob!

Any Faithful Readers out there who happen to be Drew are familiar with my general contempt for the game of golf. There are a variety of reasons for this: the tremendous use of resources it requires, in terms of land, water, etc.; the equipment-based nature of the game, where you can never be so good that you couldn't get better just by spending another $800 for a new driver; and its class- and gender-biased history (and, to some extent, present).

But mostly, it just seems so goddamned boring. You walk along for a while, then you hit a ball. You walk some more, and hit it again. You spent 98% of the time walking, the rest of the time actually doing the activity.

And yes, I know, it feels so good when you really knock that drive. I get that. It's why I snowboard; there's really nothing I've experienced quite like the feeling of linking a bunch of perfect turns together on a powder day. But when I snowboard, I spend about half the time riding, half the time on the lift. If you really want to get technical, I probably spend 1/4 of the time riding, 1/4 of the time on the lift, and half the time driving. Still much better than the 2:98 ratio of golf.

And don't even get me started comparing it to a game of Ultimate, where 1 acre of grass, 8 cones, 1 disc, and 14 pairs of cleats can keep 14 people occupied for an entire day!

And let's just say that, combining all these factors with my general lack of patience with things I suck at, and it seems safe to assume that golf is not anywhere in my near future.