Lack of positivity

I seem to have developed
a nasty case of the Donalds

Now I don't normally go into much detail about my rounds but bear with me today as I need to vent a little. I was confident about today but disappointingly duck hooked my first, lost ball. Reloaded and drilled my tee shot onto the green and two putted for 5. My playing partner had a mare and scored 10. It set his mood for the rest of the round and meant a definite lack of positivity. Eventually it rubbed off on me as he complained about every bad shot.

Next hole is a par five. I hit two solid shots by thinned my approach and was unlucky to find a greenside bunker. Took me 3 shots to get out. 3rd is a par 3 queue another duck hook. Slice off the tee on the 4th before I got my tee shots straightened out. Only used my irons today and finished with an averaging driving distance of 171 yards and 62% FIR.

I scrambled a couple of pars including the 8th where I had my only stroke of luck. Hideous slice on my tee shot hits a tree trunk on the out of bounds boundary and bounces back onto the fairway. Hit a 5 iron 191 yards pin high just off the green, chipped to four feet and dropped the putt.

Putting was pretty solid today, well until the end of my round but I'll get to that in a bit. I was sinking a lot of good putts and had a couple of long ones lip out. Finished with 34 putts, should have been 31.

Anyway, played the front nine in 50 but with my playing partners negativity, the phonecall he made on the 3rd tee and him losing it on the 7th as he hacked his way through the rough and then couldn't find his duffed shot I'd done ok. I hoped that stroke of luck on the 8th would be the turning point.

Then the duck hooks returned on 12th and 13th tees and I hit three shots out of bounds. Card ruined and despondency set in, culminating in three unnecessary three putts on the closing holes.

I spoke to my playing partner afterwards and pointed out that we never play well when we play together and that maybe we shouldn't play together in medals.

So disappointed. Hoping to play in the extra medal in the middle of the month to make up for it.

107 (71)
5(3), 8(5), 5(3), 6(4), 7(5), 4(3), 7(5), 4(4), 4(4), 6(4), 4(3), 8(5), 10(4), 6(4), 6(4), 6(4), 7(4), 4(3)