Why would a squirrel screw up a perfectly good gig?

[John Kavanaugh]

We have had a wonderfully warm winter and nuts will soon abound.  It is a beautiful day and just as I was driving no more than 20 miles per hour through a wooded residential neighborhood a squirrel placed its once fur covered skull under my front left tire.  As far as I could tell it was not an act of suicide, greed or defense of property.  He came from an old tree and given the average lifespan of a squirrel being 6 years he should have been no less than an eighth generation descendant of the development.  Can every stupid act be laid back purely on stupidity?  Does a life in the trees make one lose their sense of fear?  How does this relate to the risk/reward choices you make while playing golf?

[John McCarthy]

If there is potential Mrs. Squirrel across the road...

[Peter Pallotta]

Squirrels may in fact be smarter than us, though they tend to panic more and run headlong into the very object of their fear. In the great economy of the natural world, however, it may be that your squirrel was simply (and selflessly) helping to ensure a proper balance and sustainable numbers (albeit, completely unconsciously).  In a way, so are you and me. 

Peter  

[DMoriarty]

We all overestimate our ability on the golf course, to our demise.  Sometimes we get run over by the near side tires, sometimes by the far side tires.  Sometimes, when we are lucky, the car passes over and we emerge unscathed. 

[Mike Hendren]

I'm ashamed to admit my first thought was "did you keep it or throw it back?"

http://www.nashvillescene.com/nashville/road-kill-bill/Content?oid=1182884

[Bill_McBride]

I'm ashamed to admit my first thought was "did you keep it or throw it back?"

http://www.nashvillescene.com/nashville/road-kill-bill/Content?oid=1182884

Somehow everything always comes back to the Hillbilly Tour!

[Dan Kelly]

I don't know the answers to any of your questions, John, but I do know that this fellow, photographed last week just to the left of the 3rd tee at The Zollner Course (Angola, Indiana), seems to have figured things out quite nicely.

There were probably squirrels, too, in the HUGE tree whose HUGE roots gobbled up and then held on, like Velcro, to my daughter's tee shot on that hole -- beginning a sequence of unfortunate events that might have left her preferring to sprawl on a nice, sturdy branch in some tree somewhere else.

[Ben Sims]

Can every stupid act be laid back purely on stupidity?  Does a life in the trees make one lose their sense of fear?  How does this relate to the risk/reward choices you make while playing golf?  

I consider stupidity and being unprepared for a given situation to be different things.  One person may look at another as stupid, while that person just doesn't have the requisite tools for the situation.  This squirrel was just outgunned in this situation and he didn't know it.  Much like someone that plays all of their golf on an easier course might feel the first time they play Oakmont or Pine Valley.  Living in the trees is a fantastic existence unless you decide to come out of the trees.  Opening yourself up to disaster is stupid to some, visionary to others.  So I determine that the squirrel felt that the juice was worth the squeeze.  Diagonal angles on golf holes probably illustrate this better than anything else. 

[Tim Martin]

Many acts of stupidity in golf and life can be attributed to good old fashioned greed. How many times have you hit a shot when the risk/reward factor was clearly against you but you tried it anyway. Risk analysis is a gift imparted on some and lost on others.

[Tim Gavrich]

A guy I play golf with a lot--pretty good player, too--pulls out his driver on every tee of a par 4 or par 5, whether or not it's the prudent play and no matter what you say about it being the prudent play.  He is the squirrel.

[John Kavanaugh]

While I can't lay this on the squirrel I have found a fear of success leads to most golfing failures. Of course this may also explain why it is the squirrel who hesitates that is the one who you can not avoid. If they would just point their nose and go instead of all this and that.

[Mike_Young]

Can every stupid act be laid back purely on stupidity?  Does a life in the trees make one lose their sense of fear?  How does this relate to the risk/reward choices you make while playing golf?  

I consider stupidity and being unprepared for a given situation to be different things.  One person may look at another as stupid, while that person just doesn't have the requisite tools for the situation.  This squirrel was just outgunned in this situation and he didn't know it.  Much like someone that plays all of their golf on an easier course might feel the first time they play Oakmont or Pine Valley.  Living in the trees is a fantastic existence unless you decide to come out of the trees.  Opening yourself up to disaster is stupid to some, visionary to others.  So I determine that the squirrel felt that the juice was worth the squeeze.  Diagonal angles on golf holes probably illustrate this better than anything else.  

Ben,
It doesn't matter if one is stupid or unprepared.  The thing we have to avoid in life is placing ourselves in situations whether out of stupidity or lack of ability and in many cases people get into bad situations because of the decisions of others they are hanging with or because those others are not prepared for a situation and the one that is has to save their butt..I think the squirrel had been watching squirrels with better peripheral vision....

[Kalen Braley]

Its moments like this that remind  of Ron White who usually has a pearl wisdom for just about every situation.

He recalled a story in which he got drunk at a bar one night and subsequently arrested.  He explains that:

"I had the right to remain silent....but I didn't have the ability"


This story if anything asks us one fundamental important question.  Does free will actually exist, or is it just an illusion?

Everything we know in science so far, indicates that free will is indeed a fallacy, a cruel trick of the sub-conscious mind...

[Brad Wilbur]

You may not get to the bottom of this unless you find that he left a note.

[Tim Martin]

You may not get to the bottom of this unless you find that he left a note.

 

How do we know he didn`t do it on a dare?

[Kalen Braley]

After doing a bit more research, I think its this actually..

"“You see it every spring...squirrels racing in front of cars,
squirrels taunting cats, squirrels chasing dogs, and squirrels
stuffing their faces until their cheeks are on the verge of exploding.
Pretty normal squirrel behavior, right? Well, that's what I thought
until I read a very interesting report on the Internet. After yet
another near miss with yet another squirrel while riding in a car, it
occurred to the scientists that there might be a reason why so many
squirrels choose to run in front of cars at the very last second. At
first, they thought it might be a behavioral response to a fast-moving
object passing in front of them. Then it occurred to them that it
might be a desperate cry for attention. This of course led to the
belief that the squirrels are suicidal and are trying to end their
miserable lives. Exactly what was so miserable about their lives that
they would want to end it underneath a moving car?"

[Mike_Trenham]

If the squirrel had a device to measure how fast you were coming would be have made the same decision?

[Jason Thurman]

I was practicing in a bunker recently, fronting a stupidly placed practice green that had a driving range immediately on the other side.

I skulled a shot. With the ball in the air, I faced a classic risk/reward conundrum. Risk: Hitting the 12 year old shanking wedges. Reward: A near miss without anyone noticing. The conservative play would be to yell "Fore!," but couldn't handle the embarrassment of having to yell Fore! while working on my short game.

The blow to his head wasn't nearly as severe as your squirrel and I'm sure if he follows proper concussion protocol the risk of CTE developing is minimal.

Lesson 1: Architects should design practice areas with safety in mind.
Lesson 2: When the person driving the car lays up, everyone loses.
Lesson 3: When the person driving the car takes on the risk, only the squirrel loses. Golf isn't fair, just like life.

[Joe Leenheer]

The question is "why did the squirrel cross the road?". Like in the chicken joke.

Punch line. "To get to the other side."

The follow up question is what is the "other side"? Is it mearly the opposite side of the road or could the "other side" be in reference to a spiritual place.

Was the squirrel actually trying to cross the road or cross over?  We may never know.

[Pat Burke]

If the squirrel had a device to measure how fast you were coming would be have made the same decision?

Squirrel would have survived with such a device.
But Melvyn would say that the squirrel was not running from the tree in way
representative of its' ancestors.
OR...if we were still riding horses, the squirrel wouldn't need the device!

[Rich Goodale]

Pajo

Did you aim for the head, or was that just an accident?  If the former, you have retained great hand-tire coordination in your later middle age.  If not, you are just one of us wrinklies.....

Pajo

[Rick Shefchik]

I think Dr. Hunter S. Thompson provided the definitive answer to this question back in 1972 in "Fear And Loathing on the Campaign Trail." Substitute "squirrels" for "jackrabbits" and you pretty much have it:

“People who claim to know jackrabbits will tell you they are primarily motivated by Fear, Stupidity, and Craziness. But I have spent enough time in jack rabbit country to know that most of them lead pretty dull lives; they are bored with their daily routines: eat, fuck, sleep, hop around a bush now and then....No wonder some of them drift over the line into cheap thrills once in a while; there has to be a powerful adrenalin rush in crouching by the side of a road, waiting for the next set of headlights to come along, then streaking out of the bushes with split-second timing and making it across to the other side just inches in front of the speeding front wheels”

[Kirk Gill]

Totally agree with Hunter's assessment. I used to drive to Durango a lot, and there were long stretches of highway through South Park where birds would be lined up on the side of the road, waiting for a car to pass so that they could fly out in front of it and catch the air coming off the car and shoot up high and fast. The only thing I could think of was that they were bored, and looking for some fun and excitement. Every trip a bird or two would bounce off the windshield, paying the ultimate price for their thrill-seeking. Ending up in a bunker after going after a sucker pin pales in comparison.