TERRIBLE times we live in. The other day, while attempting to buy a new tootbrush, it began to dawn on me that the type of toothbrush with which I was brought up is no more. All I look for is a no-nonsense article, generously bristled and with a straight handle which can be hung on to when wet. As far as I can make out, the articles on offer are, for the most part, curvy, state-of-the-art creations featuring a lot of handle and a tiny outcrop of bristle. They are the manual jobs.
Toothbrushes, of course, are but small beer in the context of humankind's inexorable march to technological mayhem. During a recent round of golf, it was my lot to play with a man who had just come into possession of a small handset about the size of
a mobile phone which, when the appropriate buttons were pushed, provided details of yardages on a screen. No doubt everybody else knows all about this piece of equipment, but it was a new one on me, though, by the time we were through, I felt I'd lived with the thing since birth.
From the opening drive to the final unavailing putt, this man recorded yardages with a feverish enthusiasm, informing the members of our three-baller of exactly where they stood in relation to the tee they'd just left, the place they were trying to go to next, the green, the flag, the burn and that big tree over there. His voice droned on relentlessly throughout the round, a sort of charmless golfing version of Gregorian chant. The fact that his playing partners were not in the least bit interested in where they stood and never have been, did nothing to moderate his steady rant.
Of course, as the gizmo was newly acquired, it was natural for our man to be intrigued by it on its first outing. We must make allowances – he's only 60 after all. However, it is devoutly to be hoped that once the novelty has worn off, the droning will stop and we can all return to our normal state of uninformed bliss. If the experience told me anything, it is that there are some things it's better not to know about.
For example, on one hole, a testing par 4 into a stiffish breeze, I hit one of the better drives I've managed so far with my new legal, if rather uninspiring driver, and when we reached the ball I was informed, a trifle gleefully, I thought, that it had travelled 163 yards. This is probably the norm for drives made by me in such circumstances, but I don't necessarily want to know that. Until the droner told me, I'd laboured under the cosy illusion that I'd probably hit it somewhere around the 230-yard mark. It's getting to a sorry state when you can't give yourself a treat without some bore with a meter stepping in and spoiling it all.
Help is at hand, though, and already I'm planning retaliatory action. It so happens that some young relatives who regard me with the sort of wonder with which an archaeologist might view the remains of a mammoth in a remote dig, are anxious that I don't miss out on the technology they feel might bring a little pep into my bleak existence. Accordingly, they gave me a gizmo of my own at Christmas – an instrument which, when aimed at a desired target by someone who knows how to use it, will, so the story goes, come up with the required yardage.
(It should, perhaps, be made clear that this concern with yardage is purely academic. I have only the vaguest idea how far I hit the ball with any given club. My repertoire of shots is varied and from one particular 150-yard marker I have found the burn with everything from a 4-wood to a 6-iron.]
Compared with the complexity of the droner's handset, my contraption is very basic and, I like to think, cleaner-cut. As an irritant, I feel it could have the edge over the droner's instrument, as it is used like a small telescope and has to be sighted through. If and when I decide to go into action with it, I intend to sight through it mercilessly and unceasingly. No blade of grass will escape scrutiny and the very presence of this unblinking eye could prove unnerving to golfers of a sensitive disposition. I don't plan to speak during its use, as I think a brooding silence might be more effective than the drone.
There are a few teething problems to be overcome. For example, as things are right now, I don't actually know how to use the gadget. Still, I've never allowed lack of knowledge to deter me in the past and if the worst comes to the worst, I'll give in and phone the young relatives. They'll snigger a bit, no doubt, but then, they're at that age. We must let youth have its fling. If they can help me put one over on the droner, they can laugh themselves silly.
The full article contains 866 words and appears in The Scotsman newspaper.
