Don’t forget where you parked your car. The daily lot holds up to 10,000 cars. After 30 minutes of searching, they all begin to look alike.
Turn off your engine and take the keys if you park your car and lock it. It won’t be funny when you are tired and ready to go home and then discover your car parked, with no gas, turned on, and the keys locked inside.
Put your car’s top up if you drive a convertible, even if there is not a cloud in the sky when you park. Murphy’s Law dictates that if you leave your top down all day, it will rain.
Remember your golf shoes if you are a contestant in the tournament. Christina Kim was spotted playing in her sandals.
Leave your cell phone, camera and pager at home. Or if you try to bring them inside the gate, but end up checking them in Lost and Found, remember to pick them up when you leave for the day.
Teen-Age Moment
Morgan Pressel was seen having a teen-age moment during the tournament.
She got chewed out when she accidentally crossed a fellow contestant’s putting plane. A typical 13-year-old, she merely shrugged and was heard to remark, “Whatever.”
Almost Famous
Remember this name: Ashlee Dean.
The 18-year-old high school golfer will be heading off to UNC-G next fall on a golf scholarship. She boasts a 4-5 handicap and is proud that her golf team at West Henderson High School won its conference championship and its regional championship and placed finished 6th in the state tournament.
She wanted to try out from this year’s Women’s Open, but exams and graduation got in the way. She’s definitely planning to try out next year.
Whistles Own No. 4
Walter Maurer of Pinehurst and David Silver of Greenville were taking a break in the shade. They are gallery control marshals on the 4th Hole. “The 4th Hole is the Tin Whistles’ hole,” Maurer said. “We have 35 volunteers staffing this hole.”
The Tin Whistles group is 96 years old and boasts associate members like Arnold Palmer and Jack Nicklaus. The group raises money to send Moore County youths to college. Maurer is a member of the group, along with Silver’s father, who lives in Pinehurst.
Drawing the Famous
Michael Hieronymous of Southern Pines got lucky on Saturday and was picked to be the standard bearer for the Championship leaders, Si Ra Pak, Karrie Webb and A.E. Eathorne. Saturday was his second day on the job. He carried the standard that bore the names of Nikano, Dillon and Scranton in Thursday’s action.
“It’s fun to watch the best golfers in the world,” he said.
He described what it is like to walk around a 5-mile golf course carrying a big sign:
The caddies will talk to him, but the players usually won’t.
The standard is a little heavy, but not too heavy. He has a chance to rest at the green on each hole when he puts the standard down.
The standard bearers have the responsibility of changing the numbers on the display. They carry 12 sets of double-sided cards bearing the numbers in a pouch they wear around their waists.
The standard bearers have help out on the course. Terry Wade of Pinehurst also had a lucky day on Saturday when he was chosen to assist Hieronymous.
Journalistic Ingenuity
When you work for a worldwide news service, you have to work with deadlines in time zones all over the globe.
It can make for a harrowing afternoon at a major international golf tournament, where scores, and the news can change by the minute. The media center at the Open in Pine Needles is outfitted with satellite dishes, phone lines, work stations, staff, food, and everything the media needed to all but live on the course grounds for a week.
But when you are a photographer stuck out on the 14th hole, and you need to transmit a photograph to Europe in 15 minutes, the media center can seem mighty far away.
Photographers with the worldwide French wire service AFP hit on an idea that made other news organizations with multiple deadlines wish they had thought of it first. Combining technology with a little brainpower and some muscle work, these intrepid photojournalists just took it all with them on the course.
They took their photos with digital cameras, loaded them into a laptop computer on which they adjusted color and lighting, digitized them, and finally rigged up an electronic transmission setup using a modem and a cellular phone. It was perfect.
Not only did they look like heroes to their bosses, but by being first out of the gate with their photos, they were able to knock off before any of their colleagues.
On Saturday evening, they were sweating out the end of the tourney, hoping to capture the leader on film before their East Coast deadline. Some things you just can’t control.
Vantage Point
Dale and Paulette Bryant of Sanford found the best seats in the house Thursday at the Women’s U.S. Open.
After walking around at the tournament for several hours, they discovered an empty park bench. They claimed it quick.
The bench affords a view of the 4th hole. It has a flowerpot to its right for decor and concession stands to its left.
The Bryants, who were rooting for Juli Inkster, stayed for the rest of the afternoon.
“We’re just hanging out,” she said.
Her husband added: “You can tell we’re not avid golfers.”
