He Is Not Here...

 

...for He is risen, as He said.  Come, see the place where the Lord lay.

    - Matthew 28:6

"The Greatest Man in history had no servants, yet they called him Master;

"No degree, yet they called him Teacher;

"No medicines, yet they called him Healer.

"He had no army, won no military battles and committed no crime...

"...yet kings feared Him, He conquered the world and they crucified Him between two thieves.

"He was buried in a tomb, but death could not hold Him;

"He rose again and lives today.

"His name is Jesus;

"Do you know Him?"

Happy Resurrection Day, y'all...hope you celebrated the most important event in human history with those you love.

It's been slow coming, but Spring is gradually showing signs of creeping across the countryside.

We now have some lovely purple flowers covering parts of our front lawn...

...and bright yellow daffodils sprouting in our back yard...

...along with gorgeous red bulbs proliferating in...

...uh...no, wait a minute; I'm wrong.

Those are just some old cherry tomatoes Karen asked me to throw in the woods, but I didn't quite get there.

Well, anyway; the point is Spring has sprung 'round these parts and that's a good thing.

In casual conversation I recently remarked to Karen,

"One of my favorite calendrical expeditions is the exhilarating, annual journey to which all of us acquiesce as we venture across that immutable boundary between the meteorologically barren wilds of March to the lushly vernal expanse of April!"

She replied, Say what??

Translation:

I'm happy when April finally arrives.

To which simplified sentiment everyone should lend a hearty "Amen".

Here in the northland we do have improving weather prospects; it's normally mid to late April when I'm finally able to get back on the links...

...often with <less than spectacular results>.

But there's another aspect to that boundary crossing that used to be a much bigger deal back in the day than it seems to be nowadays:

April 1st, aka April Fools Day, and especially the "mass market" variety.

One of my favorite April Fools pranks came courtesy of the traditionally stuffy BBC on April 1st, 1957:

the annual spaghetti harvest in Ticino, Switzerland

<Watch It Here>

No doubt their reputation for stiff upper lips contributed to the widespread acceptance of this farcical two and a half minute mockumentary on harvesting spaghetti.

However, for my money the all-time best April Fools Day prank was perpetrated in 1985 by the once great/now worthless woke trash sports mag, Sports Illustrated:

that's 6'4" jr. high art teacher Joe Berton in 1985, friend of SI photog Lane Stewart, posing as Finch.  Berton wears a size 14 shoe. 

You can <read about it here> but the gist was the NY Mets had discovered a reclusive, free spirited rookie prospect named Hayden Siddhartha Finch who practiced yoga, played the french horn, had a pitching style that bore an alarming resemblance to <Goofy>, but could throw a 168 mph fastball.

George Plimpton was the author, which should have been a dead giveaway (check out <Paper Lion>), along with the brief paragraph on the very 1st page:

He's A Pitcher, Part Yogi And Part Recluse.  Impressively Liberated From Our Opulent Lifestyle, Sidd's Deciding About Yoga - And his Future In Baseball.

HAPPY APRIL FOOLS DAY A(h) FIB

Widely believed - photographs in the article included actual Mets players and coaches (who were in on the gag) hanging out with "Sidd" - the issue created a firestorm of interest and activity, as both jubilant Mets fans and dispirited opponents scrambled to learn more about this freak of nature.

To SI's credit, they played it close to the vest, admitting nothing publicly, and let the furor ensue.

Then a week later in their next edition, they published a brief statement that Sidd Finch had retired from baseball; a week after that they admitted in print the whole thing was a hoax.

Ah, the good ol' days, before humor succumbed to the suffocating ideology of woke.

There hasn't been anything that comes close to either the BBC's or the former SI's pranks in years, for good reason.

With hordes of AWFL*s on high alert...

...searching high and low for new and exciting ways to be offended, most folks have simply opted to seek cover and stay out of the line of fire.

* AWFL - Affluent White Female Liberal

Speaking of retirement, let's put this edition of the AMC to bed with a big fat helping of 23 Skidoo:

like most problems...

...if you don't tend to them post haste...

...they tend to spread

#4 son and his wife (not to be confused with Ward and June Cleaver) gave us a very cool Christmas gift - a "Frameo" - which I finally got around to setting up.  it auto-downloads pics they specify so we get a constant slide show of them and their kids...super cool idea.

a few Easter and Spring motif decorations have cropped up lately...

...lightening the mood a bit...

...as we finally exit winter...

...and happily embrace the new season.

not mine, though I'm told there's a striking resemblance...just something our little eyes spied at the eye doctor's recently

dinnertime at the ok corral

and finally, the long awaited return of enjoying a Parodi Kings cigar from my vantage point in the command center

Judging by this Easter morning's cold and windy weather, April is stealing a page from March's playbook and has "come in like a lion".

No doubt 4 weeks from now we'll have warmed up nicely and April will "go out like a lamb".

It's interesting that Jesus is called both the "Lion" and the "Lamb".

You can trace this seemingly contradictory imagery from the beginning of the Bible to the end.

In Geneses 49:9,10 Jacob blesses his son Judah (from whom Jesus descended) as a lion that will retain the scepter.

In Revelation 5:5-9 the Lion of Judah opens the scroll of God's judgment and is worshipped as the Lamb of God who was slain to redeem us by His blood.

Today - Easter - we celebrate Jesus as the Lamb of God, our Redeemer and Perfect Sacrifice, who died on Calvary's cross for our sins and then rose to life again on that very first Easter Sunday.

But He's also the Lion of Judah who will one day return in glory and administer God's judgment on an unbelieving and unrepentant world.

By the grace of God, we all get to choose where we'll spend eternity; it's part of God's plan for "free will".

My advice?

Trust the Lamb of God at the foot of the cross in faith and enjoy the glories of heaven.

Otherwise you'll face the Lion of Judah in judgment, and you do not want to end up in the smoking section.

later, mcm fans...

Happy Easter, Y'all...

...it's the weekend we celebrate the resurrection of Jesus Christ.

Because of what He did on Calvary's cross - 

“But he was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities: the chastisement of our peace was upon him; and with his stripes we are healed.”

                   - Isaiah 53:5

- we can have peace with God through faith in His Son.

I hope you have experienced that reconciliation in your life, and wish you and yours a very blessed Easter.

I should not be allowed to talk to people sans supervision...

...but more on that later.

Know what those are?

They're called "featheries" and they're the type of golf ball used prior to 1850.

They're made of leather and stuffed with - you guessed it - feathers.  Lots and lots of them.

Then they're sewn shut and "finished" yielding a playable golf ball that's about 1.8" in diameter and between 1.2 to 1.4 ounces.

By way of comparison a modern ball is 1.68" in diameter and 1.62 ounces - and a McIntyre gutty is about 1.7" and 1.34 ounces.

So featheries are a little bigger and a little lighter than modern balls, but about the same weight as a gutty.

They're also mostly, but not necessarily perfectly, round.

How do I know all this?

I talked to the good folks at <hickory lane featherie> -

Denny and Cathy in 1840's garb at their featherie golf outing

- who are very helpful and uber knowledgeable.

They should be, because they make each of their featherie golf balls by hand, just like the old masters from 200 years ago.

As I said, they're playable balls; in fact, they're one of only two brands that are approved for play in the National Hickory Championships (pre-1850 "featherie" era).

devotees of the featherie era putting on a "green".  note the marked difference between greens back then - a place on the course where a hole was located - versus today's well defined, super manicured, smooth as glass versions.

So...what does any of this have to do with my 1920's era hickory golf hobby?

Funny you should ask, since that's the subject of this week's blog entry.

And it's a bit of a tangle, so first, a golf history lesson:

From the 1700's through 1850 or so, the featherie ball ruled supreme, and clubs were predominantly long nosed woods with names like "play club", "long spoon" and "short spoon":

Around 1850 the gutta percha ball was introduced...

...its main advantage being that of its hard shell durability and some increased distance.

Clubs retained their basic long nose spoon shape, but became sturdier and heavier.

Also, irons like the "smooth face lofter" (about a 7 iron) and "rut irons" or "track irons" (used to get balls out of wagon tracks that often criscrossed public land golf courses)...

...started popping up.

By 1900 the gutty was being pushed off the stage by wound core balls due to vastly improved distance, and club makers once again adapted.

The long nose spoon shapes morphed into the driver / brassie woods that you see in my bag (above) and irons became much more common.

Finally, due to the advent of metal shaft clubs, the hickory era ended around 1935.

And that, of course, was the end of golf as we know it.*

So...why does any of this matter?

Because my hickory playset is comprised of 1920's era clubs, but I hit gutta percha golf balls from the 1850-1900 era!

I know; I'm scared, too

Ok, this may not be as big a crisis as say, running out of your favorite sedative just before The View comes on, but it has stuck in my craw for a while now.

And as it happens, when I was procuring a driver from a fellow hickory golf enthusiast, he mentioned he'd participated in a <featherie golf event> last year...

video taken by <The Hickory Hacker>

...raving about how relaxed it was and how much fun everyone had.

Thus began my journey that so far involves purchasing a couple of Hickory Lane featheries...

...and committing to building an historically accurate gutty era playset (which has the benefit of working for featheries as well).

My new playset - which, Lord willing, should be complete by July or August - will consist of a long spoon (from the tees), short spoon (from the fairway), and smooth face lofter (around the greens), all supplied by <Kelly Leonard>, a clubmaker extraordinaire from Canada.

He specializes in gorgeous 19th century clubs from the featherie and gutty eras; I purchased this putter from him back in 2017...

...when I was just getting started with hickory golf.

Kelly even supplied the period correct clubs for the award winning movie Tommy's Honour:

Worth a look if you haven't seen it yet.

What all this means is I will soon be able to play historically accurate golf from the 3 best eras of golf:

Featherie, 1700-1850, using Hickory Lane featheries

Gutta Percha, 1850-1900, using McIntyre Park guttys

Vintage Hickory, 1900-1935, using a modern, low compression ball (like Callaway Super Softs)

It's uncertain if this personal realignment of my hickory golf equipment will yield a significant improvement in cosmic harmony and therefore usher in an unprecedented age of world peace and universal prosperity.

If it does not, at least I'll feel better about assuaging my CDO:

As I said to begin this segment, I should not be allowed to talk to people unsupervised because I end up doing stuff.

*opinions expressed in this blog do not always reflect reality

Ok folks, time to 23 Skidoo, and last one out's a rotten egg:

rotten /rŏt′n/

adjective

1. Being in a state of putrefaction or decay; decomposed.
2. Having a foul odor resulting from or suggestive of decay; putrid.
3. Made weak or unsound by rot.

Sounds unpleasant, so better get a move on...

a friend from work attended the Monster Jam recently...

...he's the one with the ball cap on

taken with my reto 35mm from our backyard...can't wait for some leaves on those skeleton trees

more from the backyard golf course

That, dear reader, brings us to the end of another excitin' foray into the world of blogging excellence:

Don't act so surprised; someone had to win it, and Cousin Jed said hands down we had the best bribe blog.

So take that.

later, mcm fans...