The arcane world of the Pringle sweater

IDON’T play golf and I have no intention of ever doing so, barring a complete personality transplant to insert an interest in any sport at all or the sudden acquisition of a basic sense of hand-eye co-ordination which currently I do not possess.

I know plenty of people who do, however, both male and female and none of them, so far, really seem that fazed by the idea of venerable and long-established golf clubs opening up their membership to women.

The great media fanfare that greeted the decision of America’s notoriously conservative Augusta National club to admit two very highprofile women (politician Condoleezza Rice and financier Darla Moore) has largely passed them by.

They certainly wouldn’t go all Gordon Brown over it although they would probably agree that in this day and age, it’s pretty much a good move and about time things changed. Then think little more about it.

Some people have strong views on this, obviously – that’s why men-only and women-only clubs still exist and, indeed, flourish.

Generally, however, it seems that there’s a kind of shrugging acceptance of the fact that there are a few institutions that favour single-sex membership, for women as well as men, and that for the most part, that’s really up to them.

The basic attitude is that if people want these things, let them have them, run them and pay for them themselves. There are more mavericks of the Groucho Marx persuasion (“I don’t want to belong to any club that would have me as a member”) than you might expect in the arcane world of the Pringle sweater and the mulligan.

However, I do wonder about the rather odd statement from Muirfield about the matter of membership not being “an issue for the outside world.” In spite of the protestations of a club spokesman that it really doesn’t care much about or gain much from hosting the Open Championship, as it will in 2013, I suspect that kind of premium event is exactly what gives a club like Muirfield its kudos and therefore, its attraction for some members.

Some, of course, won’t care about it and will complain about the upheaval to their usual routine every few years. Maybe you can’t blame them for that.

But might it just be that if that “outside world” in the shape of enthusiastic crowds, didn’t turn up to spend time and money and help to attract worldwide attention to the club, it might not find itself in quite such demand or remain quite so prestigious as it currently holds itself to be? Or is it OK to let the “outside world” – and his wife – in, just as long as they don’t expect to pick up a golf club? IF YOU’VE read my colleague Garry Fraser’s review of Judy at Perth Theatre in today’s paper, you will know that this is an excellent production, well worth going along to see tonight and tomorrow.

I saw it on Wednesday night and I can only add my fourpence worth in admiration of the dedication of Lesley Mackie and Terry Wale, their cast and crew, in creating, producing, directing and performing this memorable show.

Terry’s re-adaptation of his own origi- nal play was masterly and Lesley’s powerhouse performance as Judy Garland outstanding – and so fresh, in spite of a 25-year association with this awardwinning role. I’ve rarely seen better from a singing actress.

Take it on tour, folks. Like this particular audience member, they’ll be shouting for more. THE LATE and truly great Neil Armstrong, first man to set foot on the moon, always reckoned his most famous public statement was frequently misquoted.

What he said was: “One small step for a man, one giant leap for mankind.”

Apart from that and “Houston, we have a problem”, probably the most famous space-related utterance of all time comes from science fiction rather than scientific fact, when William Shatner’s voice-over for TV cult series Star Trek declaimed that the five-year mission of the Starship Enterprise was: “...to boldly go where no man has gone before.”

Whether you think that splitting infinitives is splitting hairs or not, there was a lovely case of life imitating art this week.

As well as sending images back from Mars since the beginning of August, the NASA Curiosity Rover probe has also been used to broadcast a message, using technology allowing the voice of administrator Charles Bolden to be radioed to the surface of Mars then bounced back to NASA’s Deep Space Network on Earth. (Deep Space? As in Deep Space 9? There’s a pattern emerging here . . .)

Be that as it may, part of the speech was: “Since the beginning of time, humankind’s curiosity has led us to constantly seek new life . . .”

Or maybe what he really meant was: “to Boldenly go where no man has gone before”.

Neil Armstrong; what he actually said was: “One small step for a man, one giant leap for mankind.”