U.S. Open Week!

Hi everyone,

It's been a crazy couple weeks here at Golfdom. I took a few days off in late May to unwind with the family (my daughter caught her first fish, then quickly reeled in two more for good measure.) Then last week I was in Chicago and Indiana on business. So I'm just now getting reacquainted with the home office.

It is U.S. Open week and as you know if you read this blog regularly, I will not be attending. It's with mixed emotions that I won't be there. It's hard work covering a major, but it's also a lot of fun... and let's face it, any time you can be at the U.S. Open and calling it "work," you make people jealous.

Could this be Phil's year? Magic 8-Ball: "Ask again later."

But we will keep a close eye on all things U.S. Open-related this week. Starting with this piece from GolfWeek's Brad Klein on the fairways at the Olympic Club. And here's a fun apparently outdated column from Rick Reilly at ESPN.com about some of the bad scores (and ensuing excuses) that come from U.S. Open qualifying tournaments. Update: here's Deadspin's take on Reilly's column, explaining how dated this column is. Ouch! I knew I shouldn't have linked it!

Here at Golfdom HQ we're less excited about who comes out as the champ and more excited about our friend Pat Finlen's moment in the spotlight as host of our nation's championship. Best of luck to all the men and women out there working their tails off to make the course look its absolute best!