Magic Milestone
"Food Glorious Food!" was a joyous line from the 1960 West End musical Oliver!
Who can forget the innocent face and angelic voice of the sweet orphan Oliver Twist as he sang about food and then had the temerity to ask for more. Bless the little cherub!
Of course this was before he went over to the "dark side" and embarked on a life of dodgy deeds and shady practices with his pals Fagin and the Artful Dodger.
In many ways, Oliver reflects the lifestyle of some of our Friday Club characters: an urgent preoccupation with their tummies coupled with the opportunity to play the odds and take a chance on Lady Luck.
Nowhere was the better demonstrated than last Friday in our "Play Your Joker" round of golf.
The joker doubled your score on a preselected hole. Players were also able to buy a second joker for a second hole and most of them embraced the chance to gamble and gain an advantage over their playing companions.
Where we differed from the innocents at Mr Bumble's orphanage is that Friday Club members were assembled for our annual luncheon in the club's majestic Pacific Room. Far from the gruel served up by the Widow Corney for the orphans, we were able to feast on fine fare prepared by Long Reef's head chef Michael and his accomplished team.
Our luncheon was also to celebrate Friday Club's 90th year. This would be a most impressive milestone making Friday club one of the oldest clubs of its kind in the country.
However, can you call it a milestone now that we've gone all metric and Eurocentric. The French would call it une étape importante. (An important step) but somehow that doesn't sing at all!
The club was created back in the days of the Manly-to-Narrabeen tram service. That was the time when Long Reef members, unable to play in the weekend competitions (the only ones organised by the newly-formed club), started their own "social club within the club". Our early members were largely involved in horse-racing (jockeys, trainers, bookies, bagmen and touts), hence the FC's enduring preoccupation with wagers.
The big winner on the day last Friday was the veteran Peter Verrills, a respected greybeard, who used to ride on the aforementioned trams as a young man.
Peter, as most people know, is fond of cards, games of chance and playing the odds. He returned a joker-inspired 42 points to have the last laugh on plucky John Williams and everybody else in division one.
In fact, Peter's score was the top men's score and earned him the special prize of a Long Reef golf shirt donated by Danny Vera and Teed-Up Golf.
Sharing this prize (not the same shirt ... please) was the redoubtable Sally Hill, who's been away recently on Ladies' Pennants duty, but returned with a bang.
Sally trumped division two and topped the women's ranks with an edgy 38 points to win on a countback. Runner up in division two was yours truly who discovered trying to skip balls across water hazards is not a good percentage play.
Paul Press, who's had a quiet year, played the odds rather well in division three, also winning on a countback. Michael Haysler, making yet another visit to the unsaddling enclosure, was second.
One of the highlights of the day was the announcement by Friday club vice-president Doug Mansfield of a $1000 donation to the Sargood Foundation.
Sargood is a registered charity, based at Collaroy, concerned with helping people with spinal cord injury. It does incredible work empowering people with SCI to live full and rewarding lives.
Friday Club is very happy to offer this assistance.
Friday Club would also like to formally thank Teed-up Golf for its support and Long Reef Golf Club for its ongoing help throughout the year and its donation of $50 vouchers for White Rock Café and some quality wines.
Standing tall
The winter solstice is as old as time. Academics have evidence of solstice festivals 5000 years ago and there are new discoveries pushing this date back further.
Pagans and Wiccans call the winter solstice Yule and are often depicted dancing around standing stones wearing not much at all.
Not to be outdone, Australians flock to Hobart where they terrify the wildlife by taking all their clothes off and running naked into the Derwent River where they shriek and frolic and pretend it's not cold.
Some Friday Club members have talked about giving it a crack but I'm not sure they have enough defibrillators on Fisherman's Beach.
The bottom line here is that the winter solstice has always involved some kind of feasting element. In most cultures the occasion recognized the middle of winter and the coming of warmer months, hence the feast.
Which is why the Friday Club, in its 90th year, organized its own feast for this auspicious time of year.
In last Friday's competition, we played a six-club format so our blue-clad fraternity could lament the choices they had made (sounds like a theme for philosophy 101!)
Who said "A poor workman blames his tools?" Apparently it was a Welsh religious poet named George Herbert. He wrote most of his academic works in Ancient Greek and Latin which is why so few people have heard of him.
However, he was right about the tools metaphor.
Quality players last Friday had little trouble posting rather meritorious scores, whereas the rest of us were left exposed (a bit like the unfortunate people at Hobart who can't locate their clothes after the nudie caper) ... awkward!
John Lennard, now hanging out with the division one crowd, made maximum use of his six clubs with an impressive 37 points to take the day's honours. John's been a frequent visitor to the winner's unsaddling enclosure and could be one to watch in the Winter Cup series coming soon.
John had a shot to spare over elite athlete Steven Hill, who's also been a frequent visitor to the podium this year.
Geoff Lowe, with 35, had two points to spare over Helen Ayres, which was no mean feat. Helen is the in-form player in this division.
The top score of the day came from Ted Talbot who used his six clubs to amass a most impressive 38 points. Our religious poet George Herbert might have said bene lusit! (well played in Latin).
Perry Yeldham | Friday Club President
.png)
