Went down to the pub—my mate Jamie, oldest Edinburgh mate, had submitted his thesis, and that's pintworthy ain't it?—it was Beers of the World—Kwak, Hoegarden Verboten, Anchor Steam Stout—and so we had a couple of those each and talked japes and wheezes and once or twice made a nuisance of ourselves and the good people of the Brauhaus tolerated us happily on a Thursday night of the Festival, and then we got to talking with this happy guy—top button down, dead ringer for Hugh Grant, I told him so, good chap, and his friends, and that was nice—and then got to chatting with this girl on the other side, a Chicagoan—my mom's from Chicago, I'm from somewhere overseas—a furrinner—but I know a bit about Edinburgh—and we got to talking about the Fringe and the Festival and art galleries and shows on in the city and hey she was a swell gal and her man there, she met him last night at Moishe's Bagel—good klesmer, that (or so I hear)—good people both and I like them and got on well—some point late, my boys deserted me, understandably, what with the barman shouting HURRY UP PLEASE IT'S TIME—but we kept talking Chicago and Edinburgh and web programming languages and graphic design and fun times, Frisbee tomorrow, all the good coffee shops and Real Ale pubs and that was fine. So we buggered off and I walked down through Tollcross and there two young chaps—20?—21?—were coming up the way, from the Links, with golf clubs and said HEY they said WILL YOU HIT THIS BALL THAT WAY? Okay, yeah. BUT WE HAVEN'T GOT A TEE. WELL, HE'LL HIT IT UP AND YOU JUST SMACK IT. Wow, okay, I'll try. HE'LL HIT IT UP AND YOU JUST HIT IT THAT WAY TOWARDS RBS. Yeah, okay. YOU'VE GOT TO HIT IT FULL SWING. Okay. SO the man launched up the golf ball and I did my best to make contact—9 iron or so, I must have been swinging—THIS IS A REALLY TIGHTLY SPRUNG BALL, the 21-year-old said—and after the third or fourth bounce against that hard rough pavement—paving stones—yeah, club hit ball and away it went, several inches per minute I'd wager, almost pressing as far as the kerb before its happy recovery by the other mate. Problem solved. Hey mate, good to meet you. Yeah, mates, good show. And we all went on our way and had happy sleep after blogging.