Fire Drill 072: The Ball in the Air: A Golfing Adventure {BOOK PREVIEW]

drill with a Michael Bamberger, perennial wingman. This we're not talking about curt events. We're not talking about live golf. I'm not talking about the FedEx Cup. We're talk about something that matters more here Michael's new book, The Ball in the Air, which comes out this week. I just finished reading it. It's an absolute joy. We thought. We talked about the book, about the craft of writing, about

our various obsessions and books and golf and writing. So Michael, thanks for doing this, Thanks for having me do this with you again. We did it last time when we were both in New York and both at Sports Illustrated for a book called Men and Green, and we took a thirty minute conversation got it down to eight. That's probably about the right length. But anyway, Yeah, that was that was fun. It's there's two parts of writing a book.

There's art and there's commerce. You know, the writer controls the art, the typing, and then you got to sell the book to Michael's a great credit. He doesn't even really care about selling the book. I had to talk him into doing this, so it's kind of a funny deal. But Michael, for those two I would say more accurately, you reminded me that it might be useful. Once you reminded me that it might be useful, I was all in.

But I did kind of got about it. And the other part was the fire Prollective is very nicely excerpting the book as well. That definitely you didn't have to sell me on it. But I had forgotten that that, traditionally, speaking was a very conventional way to try to get people to read a book. And of course I always tell people, you know, hopefully your local library will have it. I guess you could say that's a passive aggressive way of saying, but maybe you'll buy it, But I do

hope that your public library will have it. But anyway, it's a it's a funny business. Um. I never ask our mutual editor. We'll talk about him. I'm sure, um, how many copies are you're printing? Because that's their thing. A more savvy writer than I of course asked that question because you can't sell more. But of course I would kindle books and electronic books. That's less meaningful than it used to be anyhow, like for instance, with Phil what was your with your with your with your fill

sales work percentage was electronic versus hardcover actual book. Okay, first of all, this is very clever. If you, Michael, now you're asking me questions, I'm a suppos to ask you questions. Don't turn this around. This is your time to shine. But yeah, that it came in, Yeah it came in. I do know how it goes. It came in a pretty close to fifty fifty, which is they were they were thrilled about because over time, I think it traditionally it's almost like seventy thirty now tilting in

the direction of electronics. But um, I think because golf tends to reach possibly an older audience or more traditional audience, people still like to hold the book in their hands, and so publishers always happy to sell actual books. I'm sure they do better on that as from a mark you'd think so, I would think they do better off the electronic book because there's no paper, no ink. Yeah, that's true. Maybe a better way of putting is, once they printed the books, they really want to sell them.

They're committed, so they because of all the energy around Phil they'd printed a lot ahead of time, so they were delighted to be selling them. That's yeah, that's a good correction on your part. But I'm surprised to hear that fifty fifty would have thought that there was so much news value. Uh you know in the film book, I would thought people, oh, download it now, read it now, you know, don't want to wait for the hardcover and

lug it around. I actually said that because if you call that excerpt came out in February and the book wasn't released until May. I said to the to the publisher or the editor. Uh, remember, I said, why don't we just release electronic a version right now? It's like, no, we gotta sell the books like we gotta sell the paper books. So it's it's a funny industry, but it's it's still very old fashioned in a lot of ways. But all right, what are you doing with your now?

You got? You got a paperback version coming out here? Yes, Michael's supposed to be about you. Yes, the paperback additional film comes out May second. There's a very juicy hey, hey, can I refer? Can I refer? And I guess get filled or write an afterward. I think that's unlikely, but it would be amazing. I've actually someone I was at the live event in Tucson, and this is crazy. Someone was lugging the book around in their backpack. I hope

I was trying I heard you here. I was hoping I'd bumped into you, which actually happened to be also in St. Andrews, which is also even more bizarre. But so I signed the book, and I told the person, this guy who's probably about my ages, that if you can get Phil to sign this book and I've signed it like that might be one of one and the whole universe. I don't think. I don't think Phil's is signing too many though, But okay, the ball is in the air. It's it's such a charming tale. I have

my my thoughts about it. But for the person who's listening to this podcast, how would you how would you describe it? I mean, it's it's an adventure, it's it's personal. You get into the lives of different people. But what is your elevator pitch out on this book? Wow? Okay? Uh?

Did you see the gentleman walking by just as I did? Yeah, in the in the fact, I'm at the Marriott Courtyard in Daytona Beach and that gentleman's in the lobby here, and he's definitely I would think a college basketball coach, head or otherwise. And the reason I say that is because he was talking baskets with somebody and he said, what was your mother athletic? That's always a tell. Oh, well,

I'll take that even further. You know, coaching high school girls basketball, the coaches we would scout like the middle school moms because if there's a really tall mom, you know, maybe the daughter hasn't had a gross spur like that would factor into the who's going to make the team? How tall is the mom? So all right, so tell us about the book, Michael. The elevator picture is that I grew up with the phrase and Alan maybe you did as well, that golf is the game of a lifetime,

and like a lot of cliches, it's actually true. And so they did here and it really began with our mutual editor Jofie Ferrari Adler at Avid Reader Press, which is part of Simon and Schuster, that this might be a great time to celebrate the amateur game. That's where that was the starting point. Jophie says, let's celebrate the amateur game in a book. Let's right about the amate game in the book. When he says let's write, he really means you write a book about That's okay, That's

how it works. He's got to edit it. So so then I started. I started thinking about one of the great unique qualities about this amateur game is that you can start young and play it right through old age. And then the idea developed further as said, well, how can you actually express that in story form? And then I settled sea to find one golfer who's starting out in his or her golfing life, one in the middle and one in the end, not the I don't want to say the end, but one who has a lifetime

of experience in the game. And I know you'd be going here next Alan, So I'll just jump in and say so I I after thinking about it for you know, some months, I settled on three. Just think people. One is brought Timus Scherpa and some people would know the name. Maybe well, some people would definitely know the name because she was part of an extraordinary documentary that Tomer Naldi produced with his ESPN colleagues. She and that came from and he got data to do that from an all

of her. Har of its story that ran and golf died just before that. And she is a woman who grew up truly in poverty in a maintenance shed on the Royal Nepal Paul Golf Course in Katmandu. Alan, I know you've traveled the world. I don't think you've been to Nepal. If you have, I've never heard it. I'd like to get there. You know, who would even think, who would even think there is a nine whole golf

course there? But there is. And she grew up in right on the property and she developed her game to a point really with Harves his help, where she could play college golf. And she's now a senior at cal State LA. She's going to graduate in May. So she represents the first chapter of a of a golfing life. Our colleague Ryan French UM. But we'll always think him as a colleague because he's in the fraternity that we're

in of sports writers. And everybody who knows the name Ryan French knows that he is the Monday Q guy, as people would say, and people always say about him. And Ryan's life has had a lot of turmoil and a lot of difficulty in it, and a lot of great moments as well. But at one point his life in his thirties was really going in a chaotic direction and at the and not overstating it, in a suicidal path. And he got his life back on track. And I'm not going to say golf saved his life, but golf

contributed to the saving of his life. And then and then I have an eighty eight year old friend, and some people will know this name, a man named Sam

Reeves who grew up in a small town in Georgia. UM, grew up in a cotton family, grew up in the segregated South, and it was a very good is a very good golfer and played a US amateur and life has enriched every aspect of his life and exposed him to all the things that you and I know, Alan, that golf can expose you too, which is people from all sorts of backgrounds playing golf in all sorts of different places, and golf has enriched every aspect of his life.

So these three stories get interwoven, are interwoven through the book, and that is really the book in a nutshell. But I think the reason one, if one is a reader, one might write to read the book is that their stories are rich and the golfing experience I think for anybody who's serious about it, is a rich one. And so I hope I don't expect a lot of people

will find their way to this book. I'm glad that you did, Alan, but for those that do, I hope they come away feeling like, whether they're golfers or not, that yeah, I can see why this game has such

a hold on people. Yeah, there's a fourth character in the book, and of course it's you, because you you mix your story in as well, and it's very charming to follow your travels and to be along for the ride as you revisit uh Macrahanis and some of these other places that were part of your own golfing life and education and um, and there's others, you know, Lee Trevino kind of pops in and out, Butch harm in Tiger Woods, Jack Nicholas, There's there's a lot of characters

that that enrich the whole tale. But what what But you know, the common thread is that everyone loves golf. Everyone's been touched by it, and it was a delight to read it. It's actually been very stormy here in California.

We have a little sunshine today, but I mostly read it uh while uh the windows rattling and I had a fire going, and it was it was the perfect sort of companion because it the whole book kind of gave me a warm and fuzzy feeling because it is I mean, there's as you say, there's there's challenges, and there's they're suffering in the stories of some of some of your protagonists, but uh, there's a hopefulness and like an optimism that runs through the book that I found

very very winning and life affirming. And even if you're not a golfer, I think their stories would would would touch you. And you know, Sam Reeves, I've been around him just a little bit you know where we both live in this in this area, and I've heard his beautiful his beautiful drawl, and I've seen his his lovely golf swing and just the way he carries himself. He's just the absolute classic golfing gentleman. And um, but I didn't really know his whole tale. And it's you talk

about a a quintessential American story. I mean, this guy came from a kind of average background and had spectacular success in business. And but what's what's most oppressive about him is the way he lived his life and the way he gave back and how much his concern for his his his fellow man and intellectual curiosity. I mean that that was that was a revelation. And uh, you know, what would you say about Sam, who's really an all

time character in this game? Yeah, he really is. He. Uh, There's so much I could say about Sam, and I'll just try to limit it to the first anchors to me to Sam, where you have a person who's serious about life. He is a serious person, but he has a tremendous sense of fun. He just has a fun spirit where he's a member of all sorts of nice clubs, one of which is Cypress Point Club down the road from where Alan lives, and he lives on the Cypress

Point Club, of course, right above the eighth Green. And we were having lunch at Cypress Point and Kandye Race was one table over and she came over and said hi to Sam, and she said, Sam, can I visit with you? And Sam said, Sam's got one word in his vocabulary, absolutely love. He's got a lot of words, but this one in particular, and this is how it's s U r E. But this is why he says it. Shure. He's happy to say yeah, he's there's something I'd like to ask it. Sure, So Condie leaves and we leave,

We get cookies to go for our dessert course. He's always on the move. This guy's eighty eight and he's always on the move. And then Sam says, I don't know what she wants, but the answer is yes. So he has that spirit about him. He has a great friendship with Fred Couples and Jose Maria Ott the ball and as you are alluding to later in life when I say later, so one thing that developed in this book in through Sam is that he views life is let's say zero to thirty thirty to sixty and sixty on.

And there are different stages in life and different goals in those different stages, different ways to think about what your role is on this earth in these different stages. Preparation, implementation, and valid are the words that he uses for these for these three stages. And when he yeah, there's a lot to it. And uh, he's an original thinker. And in his early this is all like he didn't pick this up from doctor Phil. You know, this is him.

This is how he thinks. And um. Uh. And one of the things that he uh discovered in his uh, in his in his early sixties was that golf meant. He put golf on on the shelf for a while, and when he got into his early sixties he sort of committed himself to golf again. Uh. And along the way he developed two great friends late in life, which is not necessarily a common thing. Both happen to be

golf professionals. And I think you'll know have you'll definitely know of and I think you probably knew both men and I've known both men. Um, they could not be more different. And the two men are butch harmon and all our listeners would know the name, Butch Harmon UH taught Tiger Woods and and and Davis Love and Greg Dorman UH most notably after Tiger UM profane, macho, tough,

steak eater, always has the need to all out. But then his other great friend UH in later life was the longtime head professional at Cyper's Point Jim Langley UM. Although he was a monster on the basketball coat basketball court, he played for UH for cal in the in the late fifties. UH and they won a national championship UM over Jerry West West Virginior team. But that aside, Did

you ever know him? Al? Yeah, I had a great pleasure of sitting in his office one time and we talked for a very long time because he's from Selina's as am I and we had that connection and UH and it was just Uh, he likes Sam Reeves just exuded a gentility and a gentleness and that was I can understand why people were so drawn to Jim and then still are to Sam, because there's just something almost They're down home and they're they're they're comfort comfortable to

be around, but there's almost a regalness about them that is really unique and special. So so here are these two two great friends. They developed in his sixties, both both professionals. Could not be more different personality. But it shows you, it shows you the range of Sam and it shows you that in our own relationships, we need a range of people in our lives. What was the occasion that got you into Langley's office? You know, it's it was the first time I played the course. I

knew his son, Brett, who worked at Pebble Beach. He came in after I was a cartboy, but we kind of had that connection, and I was talking to him and came up that I never played Cyprus. This is probably the mid to late nineties. He said, well, he said, let me call my dad, and I said okay, And so he calls his dad and he said, he said, come on over. He wants to talk to you. And so,

of course I had my clubs in the trunk. I wasn't prepared to play or anything, and it just kind of fell that way, and so we just we just talked and and it's finally and I didn't know I was even gonna play. I thought were just gonna have this conversation. She said, I want you go and play the course. Tell me what you think, I said by myself. He's like, oh, I'll get your caddy. And I went out and played Cyperus alone first time. It was it was pretty special. And wow, um, that's neat. You never

told me that story. That is really neat. Yeah, yeah it was. It was. It was special and and uh, he was there when I got done and we chatted some more. So that that was my exposure to Jim Langley. But that was one thing that that I really moved me in the book was that the the connection that all these that you know, the protagonists, whether it's it's it's Pratt Toma, or it's Sam or it's Ryan, it's

what makes their lives is the people around them. And even though you know the material circumstances of Sam Reeves and and Pratt Muster, it could not be any more different, like what the connective fiber is, like the love they have for their family and how that inspires them and they're there's just desired to see the world but also to share it with their family and um and of course you know you mentioned Ryan's ups and downs, and you know it's basically through Stephanie then and his parents

that he kind of saves himself. And that's what I found really moving about the book. And the golf stuff was cool, and I learned some new things that I enjoyed hearing some of the stories again that I've heard from you over dinner, but it was it was the personal level of the book and and that that that need for connection, that that was super moving to me. Alan, that is an incredible insight, um and what you're sharing.

I was not aware of it while I was writing the book, but I've since become aware of it, the very thing that you're talking about, and it just kind of really dawn to me. When it's really really really all said and done, it would be very easy and very true to say it gets you outdoors, It gets you to compete against yourself. It gets to see if you can have this brain to body connection where you can send a message, you get that golf ball to do what you want to do. It explores every facet

of really the human experience pretty much. But when it's really, really really all said and done, you do play golf with other people, and you do make relationships through golf unlike you would in any other place, and you'll carry them around with you for the rest of your life, even if you're only play with that person one time. I don't know why that thought didn't really accredit me while I was writing it, But what you just said is exactly what I believe. It really, really, really is

about relationships. So like, even if you look at and let's not do a whole thing here unless you want to, if you look at Wor's supporting the USGA in this ball effort that they're talking about, I can see the fingerprints on it. Um his relationship with Fred Ridley, a former USGA president, with Fred Purpaul, the current USJA president, with Jimmy Dunn, a new PGA tour board member, Um all his dad, of course, all these elders that are in his life. Tiger, of course that he thinks for himself.

But he's but like any person, especially an intelligent person like Worry, he's taking in information all the time. But part of taking information is trusting the source. And you trust the source when you have a relationship with him. And these relationships come out of golf. And just to finish that one, the one thing I explore in the book is that for whatever reason, I'm born in nineteen sixty, I have a lot. My wife, Christine, is born in eighteen sixty. I have a lot of great friends who

were born in nineteen sixty, sixty one, fifty nine. That we've been on this earth literally that you know, the same amount of time. And it's not just like, oh, do you remember the Mannix episode where blah blah blah. It's much more. It is a little bit of that, but it's much more than that. And something that comes to mind is I played at macrahanas you mentioned it before with this summer with a man named Tommy Blue.

Tommy Blue, like me, was born in nineteen sixty didn't have the benefit you know, went to high school and then and then went to work as a roofer on the Mull of Kintyre, southwestern coast of Scotland. Played on Paul McCartney's hit The Mule of Kintire when he was a kid. He played the kettle drum on or played the drum on it. And we were together for one three hour period and we were comparing notes on marriage and health and raising kids and golf. We met one time,

we had one round of golf. We may never meet again. I hope we do, but we may never meet again. And I guarantee, I can't quote guarantee that, miss silly. I just know that the round enriched me, I would say forever, actually, And I don't know what other sport could do that. So what you said Alan about relationships

is exactly what I feel. But and you wrote about that round and it made me smile because I on your recommendation, I went to Macahonist and like the nineteen ninety seven or ninety eight, and I just I just rocked up on the first tea and I got paired with a couple of local guys and they were a total delight and they invited me to dinner afterwards, and and we had a whole connection, And yeah, it is it.

Golf is unique that way. And I'm not as adventuresome as you are, like I when I'm traveling, I often, not often, I sometimes get invited to play really nice places with total strangers. I did you know. The invitations come through social media and I almost never do it, Like I really just want to play golf with my friends, like and because I don't get to play that much and it's kind of a special thing for me, so I don't play by myself like the most fundamental thing

about golf. To me, it's not the swing, it's not making putts, it's just being with people that I love and so um it's I've I definitely felt that in reading the book, because there's there's so much love in the book, not only from the protagonist, but it's it's your love affair with the game. It's the the esteem you hold the characters. It's uh, you know, you talking

about your honeymoon with Christine. The reader's kind of along for the journey, Like I would say, the book is sort of about golf, but it's mostly about like, it's like a love story in a lot of ways, and I think that's why I was. I was so charmed by it. That's neat. Oh yeah, we can end it right there if you wish. It would be absolutely fine

with me because that's lovely. Okay, well, okay, sure, but let me just ask you one thing, because you reference our conversation men in Green a lot has changed in in our in our typing lives and in the world. And do we write the Swinger before or after that? Let me think here, it was well before yeah, that's yeah, that was like two thousand. Well, if you if you're not so well, But I remember asking this question. We

talked about, like why do books even matter anymore? Because you know, my kids are teenagers were talking about on different podcasts that they love to read books, but almost none of their friends do. I mean, everything's on the phone, and you know, I look, I look around. There's it's it's not the there's just not the number it used to be. Feeling like there was a dozen golf books that came out every year. Now you get two or three or four if that. And I don't are we dinosaurs?

Like why are we still doing this? Like you and I both love to write books, but but why I don't know. And and you said this when we were doing that last time. We were talking about Ben and grind some well, getting on ten years ago, down it's a grind writing a book as a grind, I will say this book and you and I shared this, Well, this book was not a grind to write. And I've had that experience at your time. When you and I wrote The Swinger, it wasn't a grind. When I wrote

to the links Land, it wasn't a grind. Men and Green wasn't a grind. The Tiger book was a grind. I mean I could go right through it. I wrote a book about the film director M. A. Shamalan. It was a grind. It's a grind to write a book. But I would say, you know you and I've written literally thousands of short, medium and long magazine pieces and now for the Internet, and of course you done a lot of podcasting. But when I think back to my writing life, the thing that gives me the greatest pride

and satisfaction are the books. And I think you have to be very aware that it's a very egotistical proposition to say I'm asking you to spend you know, the time it's going to take you to read a two hundred and sixty page whatever it is book. You know, some people are read in three hours, but most of people it's gonna take longer than that. But part of the part of the contract is, but I'm telling I worked hard enough on this book that I think it's

going to be worth your time. And that's a great feeling to know that you have the confidence to feel that, to actually believe that. And I find that very satisfying. And then and I know you have this experience too. The full circle of you have an idea in your head, you're ported out, you're write it up, the book goes out, people respond to it, the response comes back to you. There's almost nothing in life. I can't really think of

anything in life like it. And I've had a correspondence now, going back to the mid eighties with literally thousands and thousands of readers, some of whom I only hear. Many of them I only hear from once. But it's just a great feeling to know that whatever it is I tried to experience it, get down on a piece of paper, whatever form the paper takes these days, resonated with somebody. It's a great feeling. Actually, I would say I have almost I mean, so I would have a need to

have that connection with people. It's a differ, very different kind of relationship than what we were talking about before, but it also is very much relationship, whether you hear from the people or not, because that relationship starts with the idea of bringing this book out and into into the world and what you're saying about yourself and the process of doing that, but at the same time being really, really really aware of the person on the other end

and what they are mayor may not get out of it. Yeah, oh, now we get end the podcast us. No. No, I think it's fundamental because the people who pick up this book, I mean, there's parts of you on every page in some ways, and I think it's nice to them to know how much you care and how much you've invested in it, because there are plenty of books that get written fast and they're they're um, you know, they're driven

by market forces. But this was obviously a labor of love, and in some ways it's it's forty years in the making. I mean, you talk about when you're caddying in your caddy days, going back to the eighties, and there's there's a lifetime of golf experiences on these pages. And so I think that's why it means so much too, because it's your life in one place. I mean, we're literally on our honeymoon with you on your honeymoon together. Like it's that's that's neat that that yes, that you know.

I mean, you know, things happen in the seventies that made me fall for this game, and and I hadn't thought about them at all until writing this book. Like, um, I went to a large public high school in Suffolk County on Long Island. Uh, you know, it was a different era. We three or four of us would sit in the in the flatbed truck of Bill Sweeney's struck going from the high school to the public course. We were playing our practice rounds. We went through this semi

rural African American ar biborhood. They Sweeney stops the truck one day and says, going to the Delhi. It's an African American Dela going to the Delhi. And you know, get me a jar pig speed. You know. They know I'm the only kosher kid on the golf team. You know, but just like weird, fun, happy odd stuff of life that you take that lingers with you forever. So yeah, it would be literally forty plus, you know, getting on,

getting on, I mean for me years in the making. Yeah, yeah, because I mean you go back to earliest days in golf and the high school. Reminiscences are cute and like it's a journey. I mean, of course, I've read all of your books. I love them all, and some of these, some of these there's yeah, of course there's I've in other places I've read a little bit about this or that, but it's neat to have it all in one place. I mean, I feel like, I know you're not done,

You've got You've got plenty more in you. But I feel like this book captured a golfing life and a really equay and it wasn't just yours, it was it was a bunch of them. But you know, you're the three line, so that's off. It's a great read. Thank you for your enthusiasm for my typing life. It's great to know I've got at least one reader I've kind of leave. I find it useful to think about one reader.

And I often think about Jophie or editor, because he's a very sophisticated reader and a very savvy golf person, and it's like, is he gonna get it? I've always had that like sort of one person in mind, is he or she? Like I would often think about my mom, who nothing about golf. And I remember, this is getting really off topic here, but I remember once reading a

letter to the editor of The Times. It was about and the woman was complaining about the sports section coverage, and she wrote, do you realize that in this story you never said what sport you're talking about? And I remember once being out of public course and it was a it was a public course outside of Baltimore, and it was a teacher teaching absolute beginners. And the question was, how do you tell the difference between a six iron and a nine iron? And the guy said, very patiently,

well to nine. They put a little mine underneath it and that means nine six. But it's a great question you have to it is a great question. You have to allow for the reader's experience. And that's why so that that's the meeting of the minds between well, it's all a meeting of the minds. But anyway, I don't know where that I was going with that. Thank you for all this O. Yeah, I look forward to doing this with your When When when is your live book

coming out? Early November? I'm sorry we have settled on an exact date, but right around November first, I mean, speaking of grinds, it would have been nice to have a little more time. But in fact, I'm happy that I have this deadline because I could work on this book forever. I mean, it's um it's it's so rich and there's so many layers to it. And I did three phone interview today that we're just out of control. And I feel like the book got seven percent better

than one day. It's just like I'm constantly learning things and and and one person turns me onto something else and I go down these different rabbit holes. So it's an utterly fascinating project. But um, that book it Live is a lip Live is a litmus test for personality disorder. It will reveal, it will reveal everything you think about

the human condition. Live is a fascination onto itself. Yeah, well you don't you know, yeah, go ahead, yeah yeah, And it pops up in your book here and there, and I enjoy your your sort of disdain like and you're you're not not even for Live in general, but just like, like like, this is not the golf that I care about. I care about playing with my friends. I care about the soul of the game, you know, the people who are who are obsessed with a golf and and it made me laugh a few of your little,

your little commentaries. But yeah, it's yeah, I think. And and just to just to finish that thought, uh, from my end, I love professional golf and and I think the professional golfers should make what they can make, of course, but I think a professional golf at some level, not at every level, should be above the fray and should have a certain element of grace to it and not appear to be grubby and right now, as it has been said, on both sides, there are fine people on

both sides, of course, but there's a lot of money grubbing going on on both sides, and I do find that. Just say, but talent but as our as our former editor of Mark Mulvey used to say, talent must be paid, I do believe talent must be but there's still that within. Really. Look if some if Jophy would have said, yeah, well I want you to write a book about you know, amateur golf, and I want to pay you five billion dollars for I would say, please don't because I don't

want that pressure. One and two you'll go out of business. So it's just not it will never make any money like that period impossible. Uh so don't. Or I would say no, uh you know never. This is crazy. This is part of your charm though, because most people would say, okay, I'll take five million dollars and I'll write the book I want to write anyway, But you're it's it's a man's got to have a code to quote the wire, and you have a code, Michael, and that's that's one

of the things we appreciate about you. So all right, Well, the book is the Ball in the Air. Oh it was great fun and as Michael alluded to, um there is a an excerpt on fire picklet dot com will give you a little taste of it, but just a little one. It's I think sometimes when you when you watch a preview of a movie, after ninety seconds, you feel like you've seen the whole movie. But this book's

scene always we go to a lot of movies. Christine always says, I just saw the whole exactly, but we we we come in late after the trailers just for that reason they give away way to do. But in this case, have you seen this new Friary Brothers movie about the coach with the with the kids with the differences. No, but I've heard it's good. What do you think I'd like to see it, But they gave away so much

in the trailer. But I still want to see it because it's yeah, you know, Woody Harrelson, it's I know, yeah, No, I'm interested as well. But the point I've been trying to make you keep interrupting the Michael is that this excerpt, while very while very charming and fun to read, only hints at the depth of this book. So enjoy the excerpt, enjoy this podcast, but I would implore you to read the actual book because there's so much there, and I

think anyone who loves golf, loves writing, loves the human condition. Well, we'll take a lot out of this. So without embarrassing Michael any further, we're gonna we are now actually going to end this podcast. But thanks for timeing Mike, thank you and thanks for listening, and thank you all. It's another podcast and we'll keep we'll keep at it. That's the end. Thanks. Yeah, I played the win, made a fortune with my shot game. Man, I run the table.

Never thought I could fall down. The wintertime hit me like a cannon. The ball and now I can't shake this, losing the streak. Every road I take is a dead end stream. I got thoughts in my head, can't get them out, trying not to think what I'm thinking about. I got thoughts in my head. I can't get them out, trying not to think what I'm thinking about.