The trials of herding cats

So my daughter had her 6th birthday party last weekend and great fun was had by all. By all, I mean the kids. We took them all to a glow-in-the-dark mini putt place around town here. Now, mini-putt is not the easiest thing in the world to do. Putting in general is one of the toughest parts of golf and is something I'm always struggling with in my golf game. Now throw 5 and 6 year olds into the mix and you have organized chaos with just a hint of anarchy.

We all split up in 3 groups of 4 (12 kids in total) got our balls and putters and off we went. It was me, my wife, a family friend and a host bringing the kids through the course. We had cake and pizza...it was all good and a job well done by the establishment we went to.

The three of us had a talk in the van on the way home, and it was amazing to me how similar our groups were. We each had one hyper-active kid who obviously forgot his/her Ritalin that day (I say that tongue-in-check of course) . This kid was usually all over the place...using the putter as a sword, a bat, a spear or a sledge hammer. You usually had to tell this kid one or a combination of the following phrases every 2 minutes:

• put that down.
• move out of the way so others can hit.
  
• no, its not your turn yet.
• we're over here...no, over here!
• don't pick up your ball.
• stop climbing on that.
  

The other three kids were usually fine....but there is always one kid in every bunch who acts like his/her pants are on fire.

In the end, the only that is important is that these kids had a good time and that the Birthday Girl remembers this when she's 80. The fact that mom and dad were sapped by the end of this will be nothing but a footnote in the end.

D out.