Best Course you have played in 2011: Pacific Dunes
Best Course you played for the first time this year: Pete Dye GC
Best Club in your area (within 30 miles) never mentioned in GCA: Sharon GC - all male club that wants no publicity
Best "Guilty Pleasure" course (course that is not great architecturally, but quite fun to play): I disagree with the premise. Golf courses should first be designed to be fun to play. Any feature that is fun and wants you to play it again should be deemed good architecturally. Now there is a fine line between silly and fun. Unfortunately, many fun ideas are just silly and makes for a bad experience. Wolf Creek in Mesquite, NV is the best example. It rides the line between fun and silly. I enjoyed it because I was not looking for a MacKenzie design. I accepted the beautiful area and a fun experience and looked past the 4-5 silly holes. I would not rank it in any top 100, but if you accept it as just fun golf, you will enjoy it.
Course you most want to play next year: Pine Valley. It is the gold standard. Just reading the Sebonack string today has me thinking. Sebonack was a collaboration of 2 designers. While Pine Valley was orchestrated by George Crump, it involved many of the great designers ever - Colt obviously, Alison, Wilson, Flynn, Tillinghast, Thomas.
New year's golf resolution: To focus on the friendships that golf provides more than the golf courses.