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The Villages: Florida's friendliest hometown! You know the jingle and the associated montage by heart now. People driving in golf carts everywhere. Playing golf all the time. Nancy Lopez and Arnold Palmer joking.

Not filmed? Burglars jacking golf carts for stealing sprees.

A suspect described as "a heavyset white male, wearing a blue shirt and blue jean shorts" stole a golf cart from a home in The Villages, went to strip mall, stole a couple hundred bucks of stuff from a restaurant shed - food? - and then ripped off a VA hospital.

Just in case you're in the area, the surveillance video is at the link.

Rory McIlroy is being paid handsomely this week to drop down a level and play on the European Challenge Tour - their Nationwide Tour - in Egypt. He's also working with the Egyptian Board of Tourism. Naturally, that means the firm that heads the agency wants to promote Rory hitting golf balls in awkward places where none of us will ever play golf (except drunkenly on a Golden Tee machine).

So, here's a video of Rory McIlroy hitting a golf ball at the Great Pyramids.

I always enjoy these kinds of stunts - at pyramids, atop buildings, in a warehouse - because the caddy has to wear a bib. Why is he wearing a bib? There's no second shot. There isn't a yardage book in the pocket. And there will be no lobster.

Colin Montgomerie was involved in an automobile accident this morning in Scotland. His BMW sedan was ravaged by a van of some kind. Monty was sponsored by Lexus for many years, but drives a Beamer. 

Montgomerie had some cuts and scrapes, while the van driver was taken to a local hospital for precautionary measures, according to STV.

Anthony Kim is a 25-year-old three-time PGA Tour winner with a reputation as a partier. Remember him staying out til 3:30am at the Presidents Cup in San Francisco? And then administering a beating to Robert Allenby that got him in a fuss until the PGA Tour made him apologize publicly? He's such a rebel, that Anthony Kim - James Dean wishes he could be AK.

Really, he's not, though. He's a 25-year-old guy who does what a lot of them do: party, drink, and gamble. Example A? Me. Yeah, I'm 27, but I have been to Vegas almost a handful of times since I turned 21 for that very reason. My bachelor party was there. I had a blast. I have friends there. I also played quite a bit of blackjack.

Blackjack, for the unaware, is a game of chance in which players try to beat the dealer - "the house" - in a race to 21 by adding up the values of cards. Players wager on their ability to do so in each hand. It's quite exhilerating, really. Usually, it draws a lot of hooting and hollaring. Then add in that some casinos have "party pits" in which scantily clad women throw beads off of a stage and, well, you can see how this much become a rambunctious activity.

Re-enter Anthony Kim. He's in Vegas for the Timberlake and on Monday, a pro golfer's off day, went out with Phil Ivey to gamble. It got a little rowdy - so rowdy that Norm Clarke of the Vegas paper (a) recognized the guy and (b) wrote six paragraphs about AK drinking and cussing up a storm.

Let's sum it up: "His salty language and screaming was so bad that Kim, 25, was asked to tone it down Monday by Bellagio management."

Now, I want to play blackjack with Anthony Kim. He would make a great anti-MIT blackjack team member. There is nothing more boring than a quiet blackjack table. There's nothing more depressing than walking into a Native American casino just miles from Lambeau Field and play 21 with five other guys who look like they just went on a Neil Young bender. Booze, chatter, and fun - that's what makes blackjack great. (The losing makes it painful.)

When I go on heaters or coolers at the table - runs in either direction - I can get a little chatty. I've seen guys have outbursts probably 100 times worse than whatever Anthony Kim said or did, and the dealer and pit boss took it with a grain of salt. Booze plus gambling means strange things are done and said.

Just ask the lady at the table I played at the Borgata once. You know, the one with the voodoo doll for the dealer, who screamed "monkey!" after every card.

Bottom line, AK has had a roller coaster year - a big win after a tough '09, a bigger letdown to have to undergo thumb surgery, and the biggest letdown in not making the Ryder Cup team. Seems like the blackjack table is very fitting for him. Keep a seat warm for me, AK.

Justin Timberlake is host of this week's Justin Timberlake Shriners Hospitals for Children Open. Good thing, too, 'cause otherwise I'm not sure why his name would be on it. Anyhow, Timberlake was at the event today in Vegas doing his host thing when he spoke with the press about his field.

Timberlake is a big fan of Rickie Fowler, still riding high off of his miraculous Ryder Cup singles halve and his great finish at the Frys.com Open again this year. In fact, he's a bigger fan of the Orange Blur than teeny-bopper hero Justin Bieber.

"I think he's cooler than Justin Bieber," Timberlake said. Did I throw the gauntlet down? Whatever. I'm taking Rickie Fowler."

How heavy is that?

Justin Bieber went on the record recently in lyrical form as saying he's cooler than Tom Brady. Well, at least his hair cut is.

Therefore, by the infallible Transitive Property of Dissimilar Things, Rickie Fowler is cooler than Tom Brady.

... What's that? Gisele Bundchen is calling? Oh. Right.

Sorry, Rickie. Not so sorry, Bieber. Talk to me when you're not afraid of cooties.

Current Golf Channel president Page Thompson is on his way out of his current gig with the Orlando network. He's moving up in the world to take on a different post in the new Comcast-NBC Universal company after the merger is approved by regulatory agencies. But, he's not leaving without some thoughts for his rumored successor, Dick Ebersol.

Talking to Golf World Monday, Thompson offered these tips:

• Offer different tournament formats - Thompson says match play draws the best ratings. And I'm suggesting that all Fall Series events could go to 54 holes with birdie-friendly setups to encourage the kinds of finishes we saw at the Frys.com Open.
• LPGA and Champ Tour events should end on Saturday or Monday - This idea has been floated for years, particularly as a contrast to my Golf Channel 2 idea. If I had to modify his suggestion, I would say move the PGA Tour finishes to whatever channel replaces Versus to get it more exposure. Then have the LPGA and Champ Tour finish on Golf Channel. An occasional Saturday finish - like the LPGA used to do in Vegas - never hurts, though.
• More innovative features like mic'ing players - A big 10-4 on that.

What else would you offer?

Yesterday afternoon, I saw a couple of allusions to the existence of a video featuring reforming slowbie Ben Crane in a workout video. This morning, I finally got a chance to watch it. Take a look.

It's a hilarious video - well put together, almost in the spirit of a Tosh.0 sketch. Crane with a helmet on could be a dead ringer for the comedian.

Honestly, I pegged Crane for a speed walker, or someone really into yoga. I had no clue he was so angry. (Serenity now!) But I suppose he was exposed to working out like the rest of us were: in the ball pit of a Chuckie Cheese.

UPDATE 2:01pm ET 10/15 - Steve Elling caught up with Ben Crane and his representation to get the backstory to the video. It was filmed in May and just kind of lingered for a few months before Crane's representation asked his sponsors if it was ok to release the video. He got two thumbs up, and the video is going viral.