06 Buick Open

This weekend was so cool. I really had alot of fun. On Friday I talked to my buddy, Kenny on the phone. He told me that he was going to go to the Buick Open, which is a PGA (professional golf association) event. I told him that I would love to go to that and he said he wished he would have known because he would have bought me a ticket when he got his. So I got off the phone with him and about an hour later he called back saying that he managed to get an extra ticket. I drove down to Grand Rapids on Friday night to get a frame for the Trans AM drawing and I went shopping with my mom for a while. I had planned on going to either Dave's house or Kenny's that night but decided to just go home and get some rest. I knew Saturday was going to be a long day. So I woke up Saturday at around 6 AM. Got all ready and drove down to Kenny's house. We hit the road for the Buick Open at around 8. The event was in Grand Blanc which is a couple hours away. We finally arrived. I have a little bit of a phobia about big crowds so when we got there I had a couple shots in the car. Then we got out and walked over to the shuttle busses. On the way over to the busses an event worker told us that we could jump into any of the Buick Lacernes that were lined up. So we jumped in a car and the guy drove us over to the country club. We got there and walked up to the front gates. Kenny's fiance's mom was at the Open too and we had to wait for her to bring us the tickets so we waited by the entrance and watched some of the pros on the driving range. I was really star struck at first because I see all these guys on television but it's totally different seeing them in person. Fred Funk was driving about 20 feet from us. So his future mother in law finally showed up with the tickets and we were admitted. We started walking around the place. Made our way over to the practice green where there were TONS of people. I saw John Daly immediately. It was so cool. Then John packed up his stuff and he was walking to his first hole. We followed him because his group was first. We folloed him for a couple holes and then moved on when we got word that Tiger Woods was going to be starting his day. We got over to his hole and stood by the ropes. I don't think many people knew where Tiger was going to be because it was pretty dead over there at first. We saw a group go past us but no Tiger. Then I saw a really dark guy coming over the top of the hill. Tiger?!! Nope. But it was Vijay Singh!!! He had a really tough second shot underneath a tree. He swung his club and THUMP...hit the tree and ricacheted over towards where me and Kenny were standing!!! Me and Kenny both looked at eachother and he said "dude, he's going to walk right past us!". So he came looking for his ball and I actually got to hold the rope up for him to get to his ball!! It was really crazy how close I was to him. He nodded to me too when I held the rope for him. I actually might have been on television at that part of the day if they were following him at that time. So finally Vijay figured out his shot and hit. Then the next group was Tiger!!! I was really star struck seeing him. He walked right past us and I yelled out "C'mon Tiger!!". He tipped his hat in my direction. It was really surreal. Then we followed him to the next hole. After the next hole he walked right past us...like 5 feet away from me. Again I yelled to him..."Yeah Tiger!!" and then started clapping. Alot of other people started clapping too. I started a gallery applause for him as he walked by!! Anyone reading this is probably like "what a nerd for getting so excited about this" but I love golf. I watch it whenever it's on tv and these guys are heros to me. We followed Tiger for a couple more holes and then decided to go watch someone else. So as we were walking I saw Jim Furyk on a hole and told Kenny I wanted to watch him for a while. He was a really nice guy. Always said thank you to people if they said encouraging words, always aknowledged people's applause. I yelled out to him a couple times too. Then we got a little bored with watching him. I think we were both a little sick of standing in the middle of mobs of people too so we went to watch some of the lesser known players. We made our way over to a group with hardly any spectators. One of the players hit his ball right by the ropes so we walked over to check out the lie and watch him hit his next shot up close. He came over and I nodded to him, he nodded back and conversed with his caddy for a second. Then he chose a club and hit his shot. It really wasn't a bad shot but he got EXTREMELY pissed off and threw his club and started swearing. He was a really young guy, probably younger than me and Kenny. His name was Jeff Overton. Then on his next shot he did the same thing, cussing and throwing his clubs. I couldn't believe they let him react like that in a professional event. He was like the real Happy Gilmore, hahaha. We followed him for a while and then got tired. We watched Kenny Perry then. He was a really nice guy too. Then we both were really tired from being in the sun all day and decided to call it a day. We made our way to the bus and it took us back to the car. It was a day that I won't soon forget. I really had a good time. I am already looking forward to going next year!! The only thing that sucked about the event was that you were not allowed to have a camera or a phone. I really would have liked to get some pictures of these guys :(

Saturday night we went back to Jennie's house. We just swam in the pool and went in the hot tub. Everyone was drinking but I was too tired, didn't even feel like drinking. I stayed the night over at Jennie's house and then the next day me and Kenny went golfing with his uncle. We went to a course called Mulenhurst. I brought my camera with me but only took one picture. We played 18 holes, it was really fun after watching the pros the previous day.



I delivered the Trans AM drawing too. The customer was really happy with it. He liked the framing and matting too. I'm glad I got to draw another car. Hopefully I will do another one sometime.

After all the golf action this weekend I decided I wanted to do a portrait of Tiger Woods. I looked around for some pictures of him online. I thought it would be pretty cool to draw one of him from Saturday so I found one that I liked and started it tonight. I am not really far enough to show an update but I will soon.