The Best In Golf

I’ve heard for years about The Country Club of North Carolina but never experienced it until my friend David Woranoff took me there last Saturday.

You would love David, one of his stories follows to show you why. He owns The Pilot…Pinehurst’s and Southern Pines’ daily newspaper.

Before you think he is a small town newspaper man, consider that James Dodson is among his columnists…not bad. Read Jim’s great columns here

My companions on Saturday were David, Blair Leburn (my favorite partner next to Ed Butler), and Laura Sequenzia, National Director of Travel for Golf Digest Publications, a Top 10 person as well as salesperson.

To digress for a moment, my friends will acknowledge that I am a +3 at giving it but a 22 or 23 at taking it…In fact Blair and my wife Audrey held a bit of an intervention at a recent holiday we took together. So, I’m working on it.

“Hello, my name is Rick, and I’m a baby” It’s coming around I think.

So we play the first 9 holes at CNCC and head into the halfway house. A nice woman is cutting up what appears to be her 6th dozen hard boiled egg and depositing them in the biggest stainless steel bowl this side of The Marine Corp.

Thinking of lunch at 10:00, I naturally say “Oh, are you making egg salad?”

I knew what was coming next…not a chuckle, snigger, or guffaw, but the more simple (and deeply cutting) from Laura…”Hard to get anything past you Ricky”.

I’m working on it…that didn’t hurt.

In the meantime, Blair orders a hot dog…innocent enough. What emerges is at least a one-half pound of pork-beef-whocares , toasted bun smeared in butter and grilled. It’s too much even for His Fuzziness so I get a bite. Man that’s fine.

Storytime…Dave is in New York with a fellow newspaperman when they find themselves alone in Times Square. The ladies had made their way to American Girl for a doll facial and manicure, I’m down with that.

Dave’s pal decides that they should head on over the The New York Times to see some fellow Brothers in Print…when they reach the security desk of the hallowed grounds, Dave’s friend says something like “Hey there, we’re a couple of news guys from down south and thought we would stop by and see yall’s shop”. Yall’s shop?

The security guard was impressed to say the least and, dare I say, inspired and sympathetic. He knew in his heart of hearts that a gatherer and distributor of information to the public is at the very heart of our Constitution, our values, and our way of life. Without a free press we would be void of Patrick Henry, Benjamin Franklin, Abraham Lincoln, Studs Terkel, Saul Bellow, Walter Cronkite, and Snoop Dog.

He rose from his post, pointed east and replied “Yous two, get the f— outta here!”

Now, that’s a story that is at once touching and poignant.

OK, not really , but the hot dog at CCNC rocks.