The Wyndham Championship at Sedgefield Country Club is next week. The tournament has been beefing up the celebrities coming to the pro-ams on Monday and Wednesday. I’ve heard a lot of great rumors about who may be there but can’t get confirmation. I may have to go out for myself and see if any of the rumors are true.
The field for the tournament, which runs from Thursday, August 18 through Sunday, August 21 is really coming together. 2016 PGA Championship winner Jimmy Walker, former Wyndham winner Brandt Snedeker, Wake Forest alumnus Bill Haas, former US Open Champion Webb Simpson, Grimsley High School alumnus Carl Pettersson along with a host of players with US Open and PGA championship trophies will be there. One of my favorite Wyndham winners Arjun Atwal will be back.
The field is getting stronger every year. Last year’s champion, Davis Love, is recovering from surgery and can’t play but says he will be in attendance.
First responders can get free tickets for themselves and a guest by going to will-call or to the course and showing valid identification that they are a first responder. The tickets are courtesy of Bee Safe Storage & Wine Cellar owned by The Carroll Companies, which also owns this newspaper.
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I keep reading in various liberal publications about how downtown property owners with vacant buildings are holding the downtown back. To read the articles you would think that the property owners want their buildings to remain vacant and not produce income.
Owning a downtown building and getting tenants is not as simple as these articles make it out to be. I owned a downtown office building for seven years, and during that entire time, despite trying several commercial real estate companies and doing a lot of advertising, we always had a lot of space for rent in our building.
I’ve noticed that these folks making noise are not downtown property owners. My suggestion is that if they think developing property downtown is so easy, instead of complaining about the current owners, they should bite the bullet and buy a building themselves.
Here’s a hint. The city may give a lot of lip service to protecting and preserving old buildings, but that’s all it is. Wait until you have to deal with the city’s inspectors. Of course, if you happen to be a member of the City Council then you might find things to be a bit easier.
So perhaps the best bet is for those complaining to get elected to the City Council first and then develop downtown property. I wish I’d thought of that earlier.
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Evidently I was right when I wrote that former News & Record Publisher and Editor Jeff “Grits” Gauger really liked his nickname. In his first column for The Times in Shreveport, Louisianna, Grits wrote this: “I favor grits over oatmeal, but prefer good oatmeal to bad instant grits. Grits are best with lots of bacon crumbled and stirred into the porridge and then sprinkled heavily with pepper. Never any butter.”
But I don’t think the news that Grits Gauger has eaten grits is going to impress his new readers. I’ve never heard anyone call grits “porridge.”
Grits should have read my advice for young journalists and he would have known that the thesaurus is not your friend. If the idea was to impress upon the people of Shreveport that he was a Yankee who knows nothing about the South, but did down a serving of grits or two while sojourning in Greensboro, it’s a job well done.
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If you’d like to hear a first person account of what happened at Benghazi on Sept. 11, 2012, when US Ambassador Chris Stevens and three other Americans were killed in an attack by terrorists, you have the opportunity on Sunday, August 28 from 5:30 to 8:30 p.m. at the Koury Convention Center.
Kris “Tanto” Paronto, one of the Americans who fought the terrorists at Behghazi, is speaking at the Greater Greensboro Republican Women’s Club Gala. Tickets start at $75 per person and go up to $235, which includes a photo taken with Paronto and an autographed copy of 13 Hours, which Paranto contributed to.
For more information or to purchase tickets, go to www.ggrwc.org.
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Here’s question to ponder. Much of the controversy about the well water near Duke Energy’s coal ash ponds was caused by one toxicologist for the Department of Health and Human Services, Ken Rudo. He used standards 1,400 times lower than the federal threshold. He also, according to Tom Reeder, assistant secretary for the Environment, NC Department of Environmental Quality, and Dr. Randall Williams, deputy secretary of Health Services, NC Department of Health and Human Services, refused to use to use the same standard for the other 900,000 North Carolina wells. Rudo used that standard only for wells near Duke coal ash ponds, a rational he could not explain.
So the question is, why does he still have a job with the state? Is it impossible for a state employee to be fired? It appears that the old adage is true: If you get a government job you are there until you retire or die.
