EXISTIMATIO: Urban Golf

A month or two ago, the Chicago Urban Devils Golf Enthusiast League friended me on MySpace. Intrigued by C.U.D.G.E.L., I overcame my distaste for anything golf-related and clicked on their profile, and thence their website. How I'm glad I did!

Urban golf is a phenomenon in San Francisco and London, but this was Chicago's inaugural tournament. All I knew was we'd be whacking tennis balls down back alleys, and that we were supposed to dress up. Each of the three groups (consisting of 4--5 teams of two) were shepherded around the 6-hole course by two guides, who awarded bonus points for great shots--and for one of the members of team Red Seal (arf!arf!arf!) bringing us thirsty revellers a 12-pack of Coors and a bottle of Jagermeister halfway through the second round. In case you were wondering, I was on Team ARGHyle.

After the first three holes we stopped at a pub to refuel and to meet up with the

organizers; this put us in a great mood for the second half of the game, which saw us not only passing around the brown bag of hooch, but picking up a dilapidated drum kit and hauling it all the way to the second bar, where we concocted an off-key a cappella round (yes, a round) as an ode to C.U.D.G.E.L.

My favorite bit was the last shot of the last hole (a 'hole' being a circle drawn on concrete). I'd done sufficiently poorly prior to that, but we were still under par. 'Do a wrist swing,' my partner said, resulting in my getting the ball through the hole 300 ft. away. Everyone clapped and cheered as I was spun around by my caddie, deliriously happy from the cider and the summer--and in love with urban golf.