(Day 3) John day

 I begin with food porn, as it was good food porn, AND I know a lot of my audience reads this for only that.  So, here’s today’s thumbnail.

(GB has told me she can make a single-shot collage of all of our meals — the bottom right is sticky toffee pudding — from top left, cod, branding, rhubarb ice cream and the 1,000 pound sirloin)

But today has to start, for my friend Michael, with breakfast.  :)

Short version: we stopped in the village of Hoylake, where the golf course was, at a place with good Google ratings for breakfast.  OJ actually scarred the front left tire (we aren’t commenting) parking on the side street next to it.  Well, I walk up (OJ is often laggging, “burning one”) and there’s a sign that says “Sorry, closed for the day.”  A middle aged (cough) fellow is wondering around.  As I’m standing there, he folds the sign and says come on in.  And then did hello in French and German.  “I can do Greek, too…”. And, as OJ walks up, he rattles off, “my name Nick.  Just Nick.  Or lovely Nick, but NOT fat Nick.”  OC OJ calls him Fat Nick the rest of the day. 

Well, Nick is not only the wait staff but the cook and he takes orders and the radio is on and he starts singing — first the song on the radio (oldies) but then into his own riff, from like one line from a song to another.  Incessantly.  It was funny. 

I asked if he had decaf and he said ‘only on Saturdays.”  I didn’t know what to say.  Then he says “not really…of course we have it.”  I heard that line two more times to other customers while we were there. :)

The second customer in was clearly a regular, a middle aged fellow who looked like the local barrister . “And there’s the happiest man in Hoylake,” Nick said.  The man responded “hardly.”  

It made for a fun opening to the day.  And the food was pretty good. :)

And now for John. 

We were supposed to have caddies.  But they were busy and the pro shop told me that John would be our caddy. I asked if he was double bagging and the pro shop guy said yes. 

John shows up and is almost my age, an average (i.e. not terribly fit) guy.  When told he’s double-bagging he has no idea.  The starter gets him a trolley to help him push one bag.  John then tells us to aim for the out of bounds stake on the right for our first tee shot and OJ promptly nails one way right, out of bounds, with screams of fore, fore right, fore right!!!  

On the third tee, OJ mumbles to me “worthless as tits on a boar…”. I thought he was talking about golf, then I realized he was disparaging my caddy. 

Here is a list of John’s failures: 

• He never read a putt right; or he made egregious mistakes.  OJ made video of me putting for a birdie and John has me aiming the wrong way!!! At the end I say “it broke the other way”…OJ told the clubhouse guy that John could have read putts better with his eyes closed;
• Several times he didn’t know what hole we were on!  He had a yardage book from the Open that was played there last July, but the tournament hole routing is different.  John was confused what page he should be looking at ):
• If you don’t know, OJ’s surname is John.  When i said “John…” John the caddy would say “what?” And I’d have to tell him that wasn’t for him. ):  context clues, bro! I don’t know you well enough to ask what your family might be doing right now; :)
• Most annoying of all to me, John liked to pull my putter out and walk around with it as he read both our putts.  As OJ has put it three times so far, “leaving Steve standing there on the green with nothing to hold but his d**k”…WTF, dude! It’s MY putter…I guess it was because he plumb bobbed to read putts (inside golf stuff)…

So, I paid him the minimum and let him leave us, without a hint of ever having to see him again.  But OJ got to ranting about how the day was great but would’ve been better with a caddy who knew what he was doing.   The clubhouse guy heard and wanted his name — I supplied it.  OJ said “I don’t want to get him in trouble” but then dropped the “read better with his eyes closed line.” :)

It was a glorious day.  The picture tells you.  And the course was very enjoyable — we both liked it better than Birkdale yesterday. 

While we were doing this, EH went to Dublin.  She had to wake me at 430 because “my alarm didn’t go off”…She had a good day. Here’s her photo du jour.  From the Trinity College library.

The others kicked around Liverpool, including seeing the new cathedral — the largest in Europe. 

 It took over 70 years to build in the 20th century.

When we were all back at the flat, we decided to try the restaurant John recommended.  Maybe the 100 quid I paid him was worth it because dinner was nothing short of fantastic.  :) There was even some silliness as the tired and beveraged hung out. 

The Uber ride home was hilarious, as first GBRM and I fought over which way to go to meet it (he was right 😢.   Then, after some scuffling, I said they weren’t letting me chat up the Uber driver.  RRNL said “that’s for the best” (traitor!) and I said that we were so busy arguing I hadn’t gotten his name, which was my usual banter starting point.  It was Abdi.  Shortly thereafter he said something and asked my name and I said “aren’t you supposed to know that?” And he says “aren’t you supposed to know mine?” Touché.  He asked where we were all from and when MOJ said Texas he went “yee haw!” LoL.  He said “you know how I can tell you aren’t from the UK?” How? “You are friendly.” 😂😂😂

Which rather closed the circle with the happiest man in Hoylake…:)