Friday, January 22, 2021

On the Occasion of Donald J. Trump Leaving the White House


The Arbuckle Invitational Golf Tournament has been blessed over the years to have Walter Shapero as among other things: a Patron Saint; Finder of Green Jackets; pourer of Boston Coolers and now, Poet Laureate. 

Golfing with Trump

If off the tee you happen to hit a big slice
Trump might loudly say that was very nice
And if you happen to hit a shot into a trap
He will promptly give it an approving loud clap.

And if on the last hole you are about to make a short putt to win
From Trump will come disquieting loud noises and accompanying din
And if his golf ball's location escapes his playing partner's eye
Trump will just make it move and thus, as usual, improve his lie.

And even if on the previous hole his score was worse
On the next tee he will likely insist on shooting first
And he is never worried his handicap he can or will mar
Because his scorecard always shows that he shot under par.

Actually no need to keep a scorecard he
Because his score is always just what he wants or needs it to be,
And as we know he doesn’t really care much about the real facts
And thus from his actual shot number he usually subtracts
And of course he doesn’t ever count the shots that he muffed
Thus reminding one of the ballot boxes he falsely claimed were stuffed -
And therefore you should know from the round's onset
You are always going to lose whatever you've bet.

And while you're playing with him during any such rounds
None of his shots will be seen or called as out of bounds
And when or if Trump's ball perchance went over a fence
He will require, I believe, that it be retrieved by Mike Pence.

I would venture to say that it probably takes masochistic souls
To play golf with Trump for even nine holes.
And then after the ball finally goes into the last cup
You may be invited or feel obliged to then with him sup
Because you are or may be considered a Trump crony
And you need to keep with him a semblance of har-mony

And maybe indeed when you were golfing with him out on his club's links
You might have mentioned friends or clients then or possibly later
serving time in federal clinks,
Hoping that as a result they would be pardoned and otherwise set free
You can then go into Trump’s club Pro Shop and buy an expensive shirt - a tee
Colorfully emblazoned with the words "Trump Pardoned or Commuted Me"

All in all I am not so sure one should ever have taken his or her golf bag
And have played a golf game with Trump and then ever about it brag
.

 


Tuesday, January 19, 2021

Simple As ABC ... 2020/2021

COVID brought out a new side of the Arbuckle crew. Competitive reading. Here are the books the Arbuckle Book Club has read:

RCB & SLP

  •  A Long Petal of the Sea  - Isabelle Allende
  • News of the World - Paulette Jiles
  •  Everything Changes - Jonathan Tropper
  •  4-3-2-1 - Paul Auster 
PS joins....

  • Say Nothing - Patrick Radden O'Keefe
  • The Night Watchman - Louise Erdrich
  •  Loose Balls - Terry Pluto
  • Fourth Street East (Benny Kramer trilogy) - Jerome Weidman
  • The Cold Millions - Jess Walter
  • The Invisible Bridge - Julie Orringer
  • Fallout: The Hiroshima Coverup and the Reporter who Revealed it to the World - Lesley MM Blume
  • Deacon King Kong - James McBride
  • We Are Not Ourselves - Michael Thomas
  • Adventures in the Screen Trade - William Goldman
  • Hamnet - Maggie O'Farrell
  • Tigerland - Wil Haygood
  • Interior Chinatown - Charles Yu
  • From a Low and Quiet Sea - Donal Ryan
  • The Sixth Extinction: An Unnatural History - Elizabeth Kolbert 
  • The Lost Shtetl - Max Gross
  • Butcher's Crossing - John Williams
  • Any Human Heart - William Boyd
  • The Moth and the Mountain: A True Story of Love, War and Everest - Ed Ceasar
  • True Grit - Charles Portis
  • The Sin Eater - Megan Campisi
  • The Spy and the Traitor - Ben Macintyre
The Cat joins in the fun... via Zoom


  • How Lucky -Will Leitch
  • The Netanyahus: An Account of a Minor and Ultimately Even Negligible Episode in the History of a Very Famous Family - Joshua Cohen
  • Such a Fun Age - Kiley Reid
  • A Constellation of Vital Phenomena - Anthony Marra
  • Last Looks - Howard Michael Gould
  • The Women of the Copper Country - Mary Doria Russell
  • Klara and the Sun Kazuo Ishiguro
  • Cloud Cuckoo Land - Anthony Doerr
  • Damnation Spring - Ash Davidson 
  • A Calling for Charlie Barnes - Joshua Ferris
  • The Final Revival of Opal & Dev - Dawnie Walton
  • Thunderstruck - Erik Larson
  • The Pot Thief Who Studied Pythagoras J. Michael Orenduff
  • The Sea - John Banville
  • The Sweetness of Water - Nathan Harris
  • How the Word Is Passed - Clint Smith
  • Beartown - Fredrik Backman
  • The Books of Jacob - Olga Tokarczuk
  • Light Perpetual - Francis Spufford
  • Terror in the City of Champions: Murder, Baseball, and the Secret Society that Shocked Depression-era Detroit - Tom Stanton
  • Mercury Pictures Presents - Anthony Marra
  • Horse - Geraldine Brooks
  • West With Giraffes - Lynda Rutledge
  • Trust - Hernan Diaz