Kama Sutra
Weather
The weather is taking its toll, they say its the El Nino effect making us feel like slow loris or watching ourselves as a sloth in the wild on Animal Planet or Discovery Channel. It is literally raising temperatures which I hope will not lead to raised tempers. The irony is that golfers who always pray for no rain are now praying for some as a welcome relief. The other relief being that you can now find your ball where it used to be water, it has receded and just dropping off the green into the water may still offer you some scant hope.
World Cup
With a 100 days to the World Cup in South Africa, the English has been rocked by sex scandals. Ashley Cole may be ruled out or may return too late to get back to top shape while Wayne Bridge, his most suitable and stable replacement wanted out. There is now Villa's Stephen Warnock (ex Liverpool) and Everton's Leighton Baines both having a good season but haven't played enough with England. If I were Capello, I would return Man City's Gareth Barry from midfield back to his original root of being a left back and he would be the perfect replacement. Rio Ferdinand's recurring back problem is a worry not that he is the best in the world but on his day he could be. He may lose focus at times but he's a stylish defender and very comfortable with the ball on his feet and you need this at World Cup level. "Don" Fabio Capello is a task master par excellence as he handled JT's case. England, 9th ranking on FIFA's world list won 3-1 against 10th placed Egypt the first 3-time winner of the African Cup and that's a good result but they have learned nothing as Peter Crouch scored twice to put himself in contention for a place. More on the World Cup later.
Automobiles
If you are thinking about owning a car and haven't had one, abandon the idea. Why? Everyone's doing the recall thingy these days and it's no longer funny. Toyota, Honda, Hyundai, GM and who else? I mean just "when you thought it was safe to go back into the waters" and "Jaws" rear its ugly fin and head. Its no longer safe as steerings, brakes and accelerators don't work no more. I hope they do not start to recall buses and trains then we have to go back to horses. Can you imagine when you need a 100 horsepower or more?
What's more, with GPS technology these days, they can soon do away with ERP and zap you in a microwave oven with GPS. When I first moved into the residential neighbourhood there was only our premises. Then a school was build nearby and next a condominium. The school main gate was further up and the other condo's main gate was just opposite and slightly to the left. I leave it to your imagination how things look like during morning peak hours. I mean I was afraid they will come and erect an ERP gantry right at our main gate! How do they urban planners plan? On paper or do they get to feel the vibes? In all modern estates, all carparks are one way in and one way out. What happens during an emergency? Is this the best way? Even for our human bodies, we can come out with different things in several different ways! Our architect must be top notch! Why do the corner car park lot still have a sharp pointed angle and make it harder to turn in the direction you are heading when getting out of the lot? Can't they just slice off the tip of the corner a little. Is there a lack of common sense or there are things I do not know.
Apples
When we were very young, we offer ourselves as apple and orange for the team captain to make a lucky pick playing "police and thieves" or forming two sides in a soccer game. Things are a lot more sophisticated now. Have you gotten your iPad? Does it have wings (haha). Wasn't it said that an apple a day keeps the doctor away? Should I get an iPhone or iTouch? What about the older iPod? You can carry the iPad to the loo when you do your business on the iPotty. Next? An iron that can play music and watch video - the iRon. You can also use it as a phone but make sure it is cool off first. You won't want to let me see you with a red, cooked, lobster face. Do you know that when I had all these crazy ideas, dreams and talk like that about such things, from young to older now, everyone said I was crazy and stupid. They told me why don't you just shut up, study and work really hard like everyone else and now they say no, no you have to work smart. If only Steve Jobs hasn't beaten me to it. As you can see, the following is my favourite apple store.
This is the place that gives me the freshest fruits from all over the world. It's like the World Cup of fruits is here. Each time, they would recommend what is the best of the day and they were never wrong. I trusted them entirely. They would put little signs that proclaims that the apples are very sweet, oranges are very sweet, pears are sweet and only a few without signs. So, one day I told them that since everything is so sweet why not just put one large sign stating that everything is very sweet? The guy seen at the back of picture told me: "I'll be honest with you, our lemons are not sweet". Great truth was uttered. Hey, this is the place to be for fruits man!
Golf
Let me first give you a lowdown on what Lee Westwood is using so that you have an idea what it is like and may find a few surprises too. He has been using Ping since 14 and was European Tour's leading money winner in 2009. It will give you an idea from your own perspecive:
Driver - Ping G15 (not the player's type i15, and this one's at 11 degrees so that the higher loft adds more spin and to shape shots and fitted with an Aldila VooDoo X shaft and this gives him 300 yards or about 270m). Surprise?
3-Wood - Ping i15 (15.5 degrees) = 270 yds (240m) 5-Wood - Ping Rapture V2 (17.5 degrees) = 245 yds (220m) 3-iron - Ping i10 (225 yds = 200m) 4-iron - Ping i10 (214 yds = 190m) 5-iron - Ping i10 (200 yds = 180m) 6-iron - Ping i10 (185 yds = 165m) 7-iron - Ping i10 (173 yds = 155m) 8-iron - Ping i10 (160 yds = 145m) 9-iron - Ping i10 (148 yds = 135m) PW - Ping i10 (130 yds = 120m) SW - Ping Tour-W specially bent from 54 to 52.5 degrees (115 yds = 100m) AW - Ping Tour-W 58 degrees (95 yds = 85m) Putter - Ping 35 inch Redwood Anser (milled).
I have taken the big dog for a walk. What happened at the range with the Taylormade R9 460 driver has been replicated. I would happily report that I have hit 14 fairways out of 14 (10 par 4s and 4 par 5s). In some cases, I have even been to places I have never been before - totally uncharted territories. It sounded less loud in the open course than at the range but still it gave a very nice sound and the feel is as we say "Shiok!" Such "shiokadality" has to be experienced if you were to know what I meant. On a few occasions on par 4s and with back wind, I took a tiger line risking trees and bunkers.
I thought I cleared both bunkers and trees and could not find my ball. When the other golfers found and played their second shot, there was one ball left standing 20-30m from the green! This is exciting!! Once you get acclimatised and lovey-dovey with the club, season the shaft, get a hang of it and you are going to do more wonders. In the army the rifle is your wife. So is your race car or sail boat and therefore your golf clubs.
Somehow handling the sails of your own sail boat is special as you get to know the characteristics and intracies of the relationship. You know how to make the cat purr. Ditto the wifey. If you want to play good golf at least keep the wife happy and if the golf club is like your wife, keep it happy too. I am expecting an extended honeymoon with this driver! As I have told you, all of them have been snapped up from several retail shops. Not sure if there were any left standing. It wasn't my intention to be "the fool where his money was soon parted". I tested it and it was so good and so smooooooooth I lost count of the Os in smooth.
Then I enquired the price which was not the usual normal price for one of the latest and yet so new drivers and I was like, "Hmm, well maybe I should take a more serious look". It tipped the scale when I was told that it comes with a free TaylorMade Raylor hybrid (any hybrid would cost more than $200) and if you consider the price of an older on sale at say $299, this would be outrageous! Unfortunately, they went short of the hybrid and now they claimed they may not have the Raylor and may replace it with the "Rescue" instead which incidentally is also out of stock. What did they say about the quality of customer service here? I am still waiting for TaylorMade.
By now, you are wondering why the subject header is Kama Sutra. That is because sex sells. I will not disappoint you. The ancient sages knew a thing or two and many of their ancient wisdom have been adopted in modern times. Confucianism is never more relevant and important than today because it touches on filial piety too. I have read and heard that some people let their dogs live in hotels, eat at restaurants, go for shampoo treatment but no money to give their parents. Ditto for their cars. Sun Tze's Art of War has been adopted in modern military doctrines and even corporate warfare. Kama Sutra is still being taught and in some instances turned into food cravings as in Makan Sutra. Either our ancient ancestors are truly smart ass humans or the human race is running out of ideas.
Kama Sutra is an ancient Indian/Hindu sanskrit literature on human sexual behaviour. A chunk of the portion centred on practical advice. Kama basically means "sensual" and sutra literally means a thread that holds things together, like a manual. This is where the English word suture was derived from. I mean like any manual, Kama Sutra can be complicated involving so many things. When you buy a DVD player or a new mobile phone, do you really scan through the entire manual? You would probably fiddle with it, later learn some advance strokes, etc. But eventually what you really get to use on your DVD player are the Start, Stop, Pause, Forward, Back, Skip, Volume buttons or maybe just Stop and Start. So when you hear the words "Kama Sutra", what comes to your mind? Sex? Oh no dude, not sex. What comes to your mind should be about "positions". Why are you always thinking sex? Positons, variety of positions in play to maximize results.
This are the positions from fade, neutral to draw:
Better players know how to play a fade (right), draw (left) or straight by tweaking the positions of their feet/shoulders, grip and club head. Soccer players like David Beckham can let fly an inswinger - that's a draw and when Brazilians send a banana kick at goal - that's a fade. A draw shot in golf is the longest as it imparts side spin to the ball and will continue to roll on landing.
Fade is the shortest but pros prefer a power fade as it offers the most control on landing. Technology today offer all these to you in the club head alone. Among the brands, TaylorMade, Nike and Cobra are offering you these features as such and TaylorMade is offering all these in MVT (Movable Weight Technology) and FCT (Flight Control Technology). Their latest R9 Super Tri incorporates bothe MVT and FCT to give you 24 flight variation while the previous but only recent R9 460 offers you 8 flight options with only FCT. Now don't you think that Kama Sutra has come to golf? If you are a slicer, set it to extreme draw and you should get it straight.
If you are a hooker (no pun intended) meaning that you hit it more than a draw giving you a wild hook too much to the extreme right, you can set it to fade to correct it to moderately straight. Or you may lose you swing tempo sometimes and want it back to your own default, you can. That is the beauty of it all. However, you have to do all your settings before a game as once you hit it you are not allow to change. Welcome to the world of Kama Sutra golf. The only question left begging for you now is - is it going to be kama sutra or kena susa (having trouble). Check it out mate.
Golf as in life, play as it lies.
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