People who don't play golf purchase homes on a course for the nice views and the expected appreciations for their properties.  When we push the occasional drive beyond the OB stakes and into a backyard, we can always tell if the home is owned by a golfer or not.  The golfer, if he is out back, will be holding the ball and toss it back to us, a knowing smile on his face.  The non-golfer will have a scowl on his face, not acknowedge the location of the ball, and grunt (or worse) if we move to retrieve it.
    Should any non-golfers be reading this and in the market for a home on the course, here's our take on the best positions for your home.  First, behind a tee looking down the fairway; the views will be great and you'll have no chance to be in the way of a 100 mph pellet rocketed at your home.  Next choice is at greenside on a par 3, preferably left of the green (ball flights from those who hook the ball, we all know, are more predictable than from those who slice).  A body of water separating you from the green adds an extra measure of precaution -- and helps with the view as well.  The worst place for your house is about 200 yards down the right side of a par 4 or par 5; if you must have your house there, have a strong roof, preferably not metal, and shatterproof glass.  Avoid the ubiquitous stucco exterior so popular in Florida and Arizona lest the outside of your house wind up looking as if it were in downtown Baghdad.
    Consider yourself warned.

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Two degrees of separation:  If you need to live at mid fairway, try to get a body of water between you and a big slice.  This home at Debordieu near Georgetown, SC, is well positioned for dent-free living.
    We have all been there.  We are playing a two-dollar Nassau and it comes down to that three-foot putt on the 18th for a tie or a win.  Our partner looks at us expectantly.  We feel confident, or maybe not.  But it is only three lousy feet.  We've made them all day.  Perhaps we think about what it might be like to have that same putt to win the Masters or the U.S. Open.  How the crowd will erupt, how our wife or girlfriend will rush the green, throw her arms (and maybe legs) around us and we won't even be embarrassed because we have won the whole thing. 
    And then we miss the putt.  We slink off to the 19th hole, our partner's "that's okay" small compensation (and we don't believe him anyway).  But a few beers later, the pain dissipates and we get on with life, never to remember the missed three-foot putt until, of course, the next crucial three foot putt.
    We thought of this yesterday after watching Heath Slocum miss something a little over the dreaded three feet which would have sent him into sudden death with Mark Calcavecchia at the PODs Championship, one week after Boo Weekley missed the same length putt that would have won the Honda Classic, what would have been his maiden win (and all the riches and security that would have led to).  He lost in a four-man playoff the next day (how excruciating that night's sleep must have been).  The next time I stand over a three footer for the win, I'm going to think about Weekley and Slocum, about how much a missed three footer cost them relative to what it will cost me, and I might, just might, do a better job of getting the putter head through the ball.  Unless, of course, my partner threatens to throw his arms and legs around me.