And you get to keep all the bananas you knocked down too.

Don't get me started on golf stories.

Figuratively speaking, I've played golf with the blind, the crippled and the crazy over the years. Most recently my companions, the Unusual Suspects, and I resemble the crippled and the crazy part although we're working, day by day, toward the blind part.

I've hit and I've seen other people hit golf balls that smacked into not just trees, oceans, streams, rivers, ponds and sand bunkers, but houses, cars and painfully, other people. Twice, not one but twice in my illustrious golfing career, I've hit a golf ball BEHIND me without hitting any other animate or inanimate object. (Email me and I'll tell you how I pulled that one off.) I've hit a ball off ice while standing in the middle of a frozen pond. Fortunately, I carried that off without becoming a statistic. I'm sure my close and dear friends would have sued my estate for the $3.00 they would have won from bets I lost during the match had I fallen through the ice and ended up in Davy Jones's locker, 5 iron in hand. Regretfully, I've hit a ball out of mud in a water hazard, in order to save a penalty shot, only to find myself, after the conclusion of the ill conceived shot, to be covered in said mud, much to the glee of my esteemed associates. Heck just last year, while looking for $1.45 golf ball of which I have many, my Catholic “There are poor starving children in Biafra without enough golf balls” upbringing forced me to pursue its retrieval in a slippery, muddy water hazard. Next thing you know I step on the golf hazard version of a banana peel and I'm flat on my back in the mud covered with cat o' nine tails fuzzy seedlings head to toe. When I surfaced, I looked like Big Foot after an illicit night with Princess Summerfallwinterspring. Subsequently, I was greeted by one of my fellow competitors, who upon seeing that I was still alive but somewhat sartorially challenged, gleefully ran back to his cart to grab his phone to take a picture and immortalize my buffoonery.

I've heard some great expressions on the golf course over the years like “That dog will hunt,” and “That's a two cheeker,” when someone has really tagged a drive. One time, when one of the regulars had a brain lock and stood over a putt so long I thought he was posing for an oil painting, he finally comes out with “I'll hit the putt in a second, I'm going through the 14 point checklist in my mind.” Another friend, after he hits a particular, if infrequent, booming drive and is reassured by the others on the tee that he really caught that one, is fond of saying, "I know.” It's that kind of crowd I'm up against. Everybody's a comedian.

Once, a long time ago I had the privilege to play St. Andrews. On the second tee my buddy hit a skanky little pop up drive that ignominiously traveled about 150 yards and ended up in the brillo like heather and gorse. Our Scottish caddy, without hesitation, said “No problem, laddie. With a pack of dogs and three days, we'll find that ball.” You can't make stuff like this up.

But my favorite expression on the course, I first heard when I slightly over powered a 150 yard shot about 180 yards, and, after it crashed into the trees behind the green, and ricocheted all over the place, seemingly for minutes, bringing down leaves, branches, acorns and perhaps an unsuspecting blue jay or two before the ball came back to terra firma. Then one of my friends uttered with a completely straight face, “The good part about that shot is you get to keep all the bananas you knocked down too.” I thought I was going to die laughing or at least soil myself. I couldn't wait to tell my wife and the urchins the story and the line when I got home. We all had a great laugh later that night.

So fast forward a couple of years later. My 10 year old son was caddying for me at the golf course I played at down the street. I'm in a group with a couple of familiar loonies and one guy, a guest who I knew from my town, that I thought was both co-captains of the All A-Hole Team. So, hey, I don't have to marry the guy I just have to play golf with him for four hours. No big deal. We came to a par three with trees on the left and right and up steps Mr. Wonderful. Unfortunately, Mr. Wonderful's tee shot wasn't so wonderful and he pulled it dramatically to the left and it goes crashing in, among, around and through the trees before splashing down in a nearby pond. And my son, the cherubic little toe headed altar boy looks at Mr. Wonderful and says, “No problem, Mr. ________, you get to keep all the bananas you knocked down.”

Do you know what it's like to want to tear off all your clothes, roll around in the grass, writhe in spasms and cough up your spleen in laughter until your throat is raw as hamburger? But I can't show any emotion. I have to keep my wits about me so that I can move quickly just in case, Mr. Wonderful, makes a move to eradicate the little nose picker that just humiliated him. God, he was red as a beet and because I was standing right there and was about 100 pounds and six inches bigger than him, all he could do was just make a noise out the corner of his mouth that sounded like air leaving a balloon when you blow it up and then release it from your hand.

The joke was immortal and my son's timing was impeccable.

I always knew “the apple didn't fall far from the tree.” He's just like his mother.

Until next time............