With my Goodboys weekend in Vegas just days away it was time for The Great White Shank to crack open the 2012 golf season with the first trip to my favorite driving range since preparations for the 2011 Goodboys Invitational weekend ended. A few thoughts on this day:

1. The amount of weight I’ve lost is really noticeable in that I’m having to pull up my shorts after every swing.

2. The first swing of the year was a pitching wedge hit right on the screws. The old fella in the stall next to me asks what club I hit; after I tell him he says he’d love to hit his pitching wedge like that, but he’s not a lefty. Ha Ha.

3. I hit six straight pitching wedges just like that.

4. When I drop down to my 8-iron I’m starting to overswing a bit, and I can feel it. That’s my biggest weakness as a golfer.

5. I notice the old guy next to me hits five shots and then starts making notations in a little notepad. I couldn’t take my golf that seriously – I’d go out of my mind.

6. I’m on to the 6-irons and not hitting them bad. The only swing thought I’m taking into the 2012 season is something I heard Tom Watson say on a recent interview on Golf Channel: hit your woods for distance, your irons for accuracy. I think that’s damned good advice.

7. I can hit 5-woods as far and mnore accurate as I can a 3-wood or a driver.

8. While others beg to differ, to me the most important shot a golfer makes is the tee shot. They can say “drive for show, putt for dough” all they want, but if you’re not consistent making your second shot off the fairway you’re giving at least one shot, probably two, back to the field.

9. The sign around the putting green says “No Chipping Without The Accompaniment Of A Club Pro”. What a joke. What are they afraid of? I silently tell them to go screw and hit chip shots to my heart’s content.

10. Fellow Goodboy (and mentor) Ben “The Funny Guy” Andrusaitis may beg to differ, but to me the biggest defect in my game last year was my putting. Therefore, I spend 1 1/2 hours working on just my set-up and follow-through. Most of the Goodboys think The Great White Shank is just a hot-headed retard when it comes to golf, but the fact is, I know and can teach all of the fundamentals; my weakness is just not being able to adhere to them consistently.

11. From the first few putts I realize my problem from last year, so I shorten my stroke, work in just the slightest amount of lower body hip turn, and all of a sudden the putts are starting to drop.

12. There’s something humbling and personal about playing with bright orange balls. I’ll never play with white balls again, I’m not a good enough golfer to play white.

13. Last year I put too much pressure on myself to break 100 consistently. Fact is, I’m a 105 golfer: if I get hot and in a groove, I can shoot as low as a 96; if I’m out of sorts or managing the course poorly I can balloon upwards of a 110. After a year or two as a golfer you become what you are, and the best strategy is to do your best, realize what you are, and just try to enjoy it. Like Dirty Harry says, a man’s got to know his limitations.

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Super Bowl prediction: Patriots 34, New York 16. Tom Brady goes to Disney World and punches his ticket to the Hall Of Fame, first ballot.