Tee'd Off

Golf and me have never really gotten along, though I do have a respect for the sport and a sense of nostalgia for it. My dad is an avid golfer. Some of my earliest memories of him involve listening to the dulcet tones of a TV golf announcer mixed with the jarring sounds of his snoring on a Saturday afternoon. Maybe that’s why I’ve never been a golfer myself—I’ve always equated it with naps in reclining chairs. That, combined with my fear of golf carts and my inability to hit the ball off the tee in the first 6 swings, makes my attitude towards golf very lukewarm. However, I do like golfers. There’s something about a polo shirt and a country club membership that just gets me. I’m usually not a fan of the prepster, but I can’t resist an argyle sweater vest or two-toned shoes.

The TV station that I work for has a daily morning show that includes guests from local businesses. One morning, a golf pro came on the show to discuss the activities going on at the Vail Golf Club. He had blond, curly hair, a strong jaw line, and looked to be about 17. He had to be older, since he claimed to have graduated from both high school and golf school. I had no intention of going any further than ogling him, but the producer of the show had other plans. She eyed him up, decided he wasn’t her type, turned to me and said, “Ohmygod you should totally go for him! He’s a total cutie and golfers are really hot.” I asked this love guru how I should go about “totally going for him” and she suggested that I just casually ask for some golf lessons. I ended up not getting the chance to make my ridiculous request because golf guy dashed out of the studio after his interview as if he could sense the female plotting going on. He ran out so quickly, in fact, that he left his fleece. The producer decided that the forgotten fleece was tangible destiny—a sign that golf guy and I were meant to be together. I just saw it as some more intern tasks to get done for the day. I called golf guy’s work number and cell number and sent him an email, informing him that I had his fleece of fate.

I finally got a hold him after undoubtedly freaking him out with my fervent concern about his outerwear. He said he would pick it up the next day. Sadly, I would not be at work the next day. But not to worry! The producer had a brilliant resolution! I could just leave my number in the pocket of golf guy’s fleece! Well, the jacket had no pockets, but I had just enough confidence to scrawl “Call me sometime if you want to hang out” on a piece of notebook paper with my name and number and stuff it in the fleece. Golf guy picked up his fleece 5 weeks ago. I have not heard from him. This might have something to do with the 80 degree weather we’ve been having. In the fall, when the weather is fleece appropriate, and golf guy slips his arm into his jacket and finds my number, I hope he calls. Then at least I won’t feel really stupid.

Another experience I had with the Vail Golf Club occurred at the actual golf course. I was assigned to shoot a 30 second commercial for an upcoming golfing event. The commercial had already been written, actors had already been provided. I was basically just a rented out body with camera so that the organizers of this event could shoot their commercial. I showed up to the driving range to find my crew: Bobby would be playing Bink, a clueless 70s news anchor (audiences should be able to deduce this from his ugly sport coat and one cartoonishly delivered line). Barbie would be the deliverer of information, annoyed at Bink for his earlier mistakes. Kirk was the director and creative input for this piece of art. Kirk had brought his own cables, microphone, and headphones, and insisted on using his instead of the one’s I had brought. He also insisted on calling Barbie his “mate”—not his wife, not his girlfriend, not even his significant other—his mate, as if they were actually two penguins who had exchanged pebbles. I could tell Kirk would be trouble when he asked me what my official title was. I daftly told him I was an intern, which apparently gave him permission to check all of my shots and only allow me to hit record. Kirk has no idea what a good shot is. When I would suggest ways to improve the composition of the shot or ways to simplify later editing, he would reply that this shoot simply did not allow for such artistic moves. If what I was suggesting was art, then it was minimalism.

The commercial started out with Bink saying “There’s a tick shot clinc going on!” Barbie then interrupts him with, “No, Bink, it’s a trick shot clinic!” and then continues on with the details of the event. When I first heard the script (and then heard it repeated 700 subsequent times), I had to restrain myself from offering to rewrite it to not sound like man’s first attempt at comedy. At the end of the ad, Bink gets his comeuppance for his earlier faux-pas when he gets hit in the head by a golf ball that flies in from off screen. I realize local commercials are usually not the greatest, but this has to be one of the worst attempts.

What made it even more excruciating was Barbie’s inability to master her lines combined with Kirk’s devotion to the execution of his “vision.” Barbie did not deliver her lines with enough excitement, or enough correctness, so she had to redo each line 1200 times, each time no better than the last. A particularly difficult line for Barbie started with “the beautiful Vail golf course”, which she kept saying as, “the Vail beautiful golf course.” She made this mistake at least 30 times in a row, frustrating both Kirk and those who had spent years teaching Barbie to deal with her dyslexia.

I thought the shoot would only last a half hour, an hour tops. It took 2 and half. After finally being released, Barbie offered to buy me a drink to make up the extra time the shoot took. A drink, even with these crazy folks, sounded better than going back to the office. I wanted a refreshing Tom Collins, but everyone else ordered beer and I didn’t want to be the only one to order hard alcohol at 3 in the afternoon.

I spent the next 2 hours, sipping Stella and listening to Kirk talk about his suggestions for local TV. Kirk has a problem with advertising on television, which is strange considering he claimed to have been working in advertising “since childhood.” His hope for the station I work with is that it avoids giving into the man and selling out. “I just want to see what your manager does when some really boring company comes to that station with a ton of money,” Kirk said. “Say I’m the Nazi party and I call up your manager and I say ‘Hey I’ll pay you $300,000 to run my ad. It’s a free country!’ Those corporate people in New York will tell the manager to take the money, but if he’s a real man, he will refuse it and be true to what that station really is. So I’ll be interested to see what he does when the Nazis come.” I nodded in agreement, because I truly would be interested to see what my boss does if the Nazis ever ask to advertise on Vail local TV, though my concern doesn’t have to do so much with selling out.

The conversation switched from local TV to the growth of the Vail Valley to horseback riding. I told Kirk my death-defying horse accident. He responded with a lukewarm, “Yeah, that’ll happen.” No, that will not just happen. Falling off, yeah that’ll happen. Getting kicked in the head, now that’s a stunner. But nothing could impress Kirk. I didn’t really even have the chance to try because I couldn’t get a word in edgewise. When he finally reached a pause in the conversation/stopped to take a breath, I said I had to get back to the office. Kirk invited me to film the actual golf event next week. I said I would be happy to. I’ll do anything to spend more time with people I can’t stand.