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About this blog

Randy and the gang at Rockbottum Country Club pontificate on Rockbottum wisdom and skeletal golf, among other madness.

Entries in this blog

GOLF IN 2044--PART SIX

continued from...   Wen studied the people being herded through the course like cattle and for the first time, he became aware of the uncomfortable sense of being constantly observed.  He felt like . . . a kind of golf lab animal, watched by cameras, computers and--Nanel Bree of the Corporate Golf Secret Police. "What do I do now, Grandpa?" Wen contemplated. "Boy, when you're riding something and you tell it to 'whoa' and it don't whoa, sooner or later, it's gonna kill you."                
Randy Wilson

Randy Wilson

2

GOLF IN 2044--PART FIVE

continued from...   Settled in front of the wall screen in the maintenance office, Wen glanced outside for a moment.  Judd was toting his clubs, headed out to play with his buddies, and Kelly was watching a remote screen on her truck, making sure the retriever didn't run over some hapless golfer.   Wen reached for the keyboard and disengaged his system from the Corporate Net.  Next, he silenced the ever-present computer voice and brought up surveillance data from the previous night, the cam
Randy Wilson

Randy Wilson

0

GOLF IN 2044--PART FOUR

continued from...   Judd looked down at the headsets resting on the GV seat and noticed the monitor diodes were off.  "Do something good instead of living off the corporate golf harlot." "Like what, Judd?" Kelly said, her voice lowering to a whisper. "You could join GOOG."   "Join what?" Wen dropped his feet to the GV floor and leaned forward.  "Are you in GOOG?" Kelly was aghast. "Are you really?" "What's GOOG?" Wen demanded. "Golf Only On Grass," Judd answered.  "An organization dedic
Randy Wilson

Randy Wilson

0

GOLF IN 2044--PART THREE

continued from...   Wen decided to make the big move.  "Sir, if you remember, we talked about my transfer to a natural grass course last year, and I've fulfilled all of the requirements."   Tai smiled and leaned closer.  "Wen, there are less than a thousand grass courses left on this continent and we only own a few of those.  The majority of those relics are classics, protected by historic preservation status because they were built by the old master architects.  It takes a special kind of .
Randy Wilson

Randy Wilson

0

GOLF IN 2044 -- PART TWO

Continued from...   Entering the shop, Wen ran straight for the tool room and began rummaging around for something that might help.  He was on the verge of asking the computer's opinion when a picture of his grandfather entered his mind.  Grandpa Bolton was a golf course superintendent back before the turn of the century, back when things were simpler, freer, and more fun.  "What would Grandpa do in this situation?"   "Use a bigger hammer, boy."   Wen grabbed a sledge hammer.     The w
Randy Wilson

Randy Wilson

0

Golf In 2044

The following short story first appeared in the July, 2004 edition of SuperNews as "Blade Runner".  (My choice was Golf In 2044, but magazine editors will not be denied.)  It is a fictional piece dealing with one version* of how Golf could turn out.    This is part of our current emphasis at Rockbottum CC on the future of golf, the economics of golf, the environmental aspects involved in actual operations as well as public image, GCS fitness and family time.  Future, Fitness, Fungicides, Famil
Randy Wilson

Randy Wilson

0

Worst GCS Mistake I Ever Made

At the top of my list of golf course mistakes is one of those glaring errors that never seems to fade, but grows heavier and meaner with the passage of time.        
Randy Wilson

Randy Wilson

7

Fixated on The Future of Golf at Rockbottum CC

The internet, pronounced: Inner-nayut hereabouts, has had a serious impact on golf, triggering a fearsome fixation on futurism around the woodstove in our barn Turf Care Center.   The Net (and the voices in my head) have been asking me:  What do we do?  Who are our customers?  What will Rockbottum CC be like in 30 years when I retire?   Golf has rapidly morphtastisized over the last 20 years, not just in the way the game is played, but how our product is brought to market.  As an industry, w
Randy Wilson

Randy Wilson

0

Where Are They Now?

Find out where Tiffany, Bodell and the other inhabitants of Rockbottum CC are today.   Watch this short film and learn the truth!  
Randy Wilson

Randy Wilson

5

YooHoo! Paging Eric Johnson and Mike Davis!

I cannot wait to watch the US Open at Chambers Bay.  I haven't been there, but I've seen the photos and my desire to play golf there borders on lust.  (Actual golf with shaped creative shots, not the mortar-launched version of lawn darts currently living on my TV.)   The USGA is to be commended for selecting Chambers Bay.  I had completely stopped watching the US Open years ago, due to the boredom of sling-blade wedge shots out of thick, deep steel wool and fairways resembling subway tunnels.
Randy Wilson

Randy Wilson

4

I've Been Conspiracized

A struggle for power has been going on behind the scenes at TurfNet TV.  It involves Kevin Ross, men wearing skirts, Hector, a warehouse full of popcorn from the Truman era and a plot against . . . me.    
Randy Wilson

Randy Wilson

0

The Old Bat

Over the years, we have received many complaints regarding the level of violence in our films.  Lately, however, during a spate of serious journalism, we lost sight of what is important and failed to reach our previous high standards.  In order to correct this oversight, we offer this short film.  
Randy Wilson

Randy Wilson

3

A New Bio-Weapon in The Rhizoc Wars?

Rhizoctonia used to eat most of my spray budget and keep me from ever taking a summer vacation.     That's why I took a Rockbottum CC film crew and spent several days documenting Mark Hoban's latest experiment.      
Randy Wilson

Randy Wilson

4

Curing The Penal Minded

As a young golfer/indentured walk-mower driver in the Sixties, I grew up on big, wide, roughless golf courses.  In those days, the expansive meadows of golf were fun to navigate and the game was much more relaxed than today's neurotic version.   Certainly maintaining the course was more fun, as golfers were yet to be contaminated by a constant weekly cathode-ray barrage of perfect greens, bleached sand and lush fairways mowed in argyle sock patterns.  The modern golfer, faced with wild inconsi
Randy Wilson

Randy Wilson

6

Invisible TD Sand

Yesterday, Rockbottum's top covert film unit returned from Rivermont CC with footage of Mark Hoban, MGS, (Mad Golf Scientist) using his Invisible Soil-Feeding TD sand.   The film you are about to see is one of several updates of ongoing research testing taking place under Mark's control.  Next week we intend to reveal where he's getting this stuff . . . unless he comes up with some serious compensation.    
Randy Wilson

Randy Wilson

0

The Environmental Stewardship Toolkit

Have you ever wondered how to go about setting up an environmental stewardship program?  Anthony Williams, CGCS of Stone Mountain GC, wrote a comprehensive book on the subject and a Rockbottum film crew went down to check it out.  
Randy Wilson

Randy Wilson

0

Rumblings of Unrest?

The Mystic Order of Greenkeepers is currently locked in a bitter, divisive conflict with . . . ourselves.  We can't decide whether to maintain our traditional entrance requirement or just charge an application fee.   The traditional criteria for MOG membership required either the accidental release of blood in an irrigation hole or an electric shock capable of inducing the white light tunnel effect with Old Tom beckoning at the far end.   We resolved the problem by using the conflict resolut
Randy Wilson

Randy Wilson

0

Unconventional Tactics

If you've been paying attention to my columns and short films for the last 15 years, it has probably become apparent that I am not of the conventional mindset.  There's a reason for that.   I spent my formative pre-teen/teen years on a US Army Special Forces base, deep in the Bavarian Alps.  Known as Bad Tolz, it was 10th Special Forces Group Hdqtrs and had once been Himmler's SS Officer's Training School.   Years later, after too much walk-mow-cup-changing, I enlisted in SF and somehow mana
Randy Wilson

Randy Wilson

0

Top Greenkeeper Award!

Our normal practice at the Rock is to wait until all the ordinary awards have been handed out and then bestow ours upon the winners.   Without further delay, we present The Mystic Order of Greenkeepers Biggest Award of The Whole Year.       
Randy Wilson

Randy Wilson

6

The Day Our CEO Learned Customer Service

Once upon a time, back in '86, our struggling golf course was absorbed by a mighty Japanese course management operation.  They were inebriated with financial success and very quick to deny purchase orders of any kind, but especially the irrigation or insecticide kind.   Now it was about this time that the fearsome Fire Ant, (pronounced Far Aint) overran golf courses in the ATL area, especially courses with their shields down.  These little insectoid Visigoths and their mounds were everywhere a
Randy Wilson

Randy Wilson

0

Rockbottum Banished From GIS?

Learn the shocking truth behind the biggest scandal to hit Rockbottum since Ludell got caught stealing goats!   Well, actually, it's not really that shocking and there's not much truth involved.  It's just that I've been practicing Yahoo-style click-bait headlines and I couldn't figure out how to fit Kim Kardashian into the headline.  
Randy Wilson

Randy Wilson

6

May--The Dead Zone Month For Rockbottum

For some odd reason, some of our best films go unnoticed if we release them in the month of May.   We have racked our collective brain, yet still can't figure this out.  Buddy suggested we ask TurfNet Members to help us solve this mystery.   We have decided to re-release our Three Best Films of May, while we wait for your analysis.  Feel free to email or PM if you would rather not have your judgement publicly impugned.   Up First, "Golf Course Patrol", from May 2013.  
Randy Wilson

Randy Wilson

0

The Resurgence of the GCS/Pro/GM?

Back in the 60s, Dad left the US Army and tried the pro golf tour, but burdened with a family, he soon found himself the patriarch of a migrant golf family in an updated version of "The Greens of Wrath".   In those days, the smaller golf operations relied upon what was then called The Pro/Super.  (Looking back, the title should have been The GCS/Pro, but the inevitable nickname "SuperPro" would have just sounded . . . wrong.)   Dad was an expert Pro/Super, very capable of the simultaneous cl
Randy Wilson

Randy Wilson

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