Rites of Spring

Some people think it's Baseball. The sound of the ball on the bat, the Hot Dog guy, the beer guy. Not in my house. For us it's the spring Re-gripping Party.

Ahh...the smell of Solvent...the stickiness of old grip tape stuck on your fingers...the opportunity to cut yourself using the wrong blade to cut off the old grips. These are the things that starts an old man's blood to boiling...when the yard is still covered with snow, but there's one little corner of the yard where the grass is peeking through, and there's a feeling that Spring is actually going to arrive at some point. Sometime during the Florida Swing I pull out the knife, the tape, and the Solvent, light a fire in the fireplace, and while the wind still blows cold in Western New England, I rip off the old grips and put on the new.

This year is no different. I got up this morning, looked out the window on a blustery, but sunny, early March morning (yep, I did remember to set my clock ahead) and it occured to me that today was the day for re-gripping. I loaded up the woodbox with firewood, checked the TV schedule to see what time the Pods Championship was going to start, made sure there was some cold beer in the fridge, and started looking for my re-gripping supplies. I couldn't find my hook-bladed knife anywhere so I started the process with a straight blade. Didn't take long before I sliced one of my fingers and thought I was done for the day, but I found the hook-blade right where I'd organized it, and got back to work.

So while I watched Stewert Cink crash and burn, and young Mr. OHair (will someone please explain to this young man the correct spelling of his name?) hang on for his second victory, I sat on the couch and pulled the grips off both my and my wife's clubs. Three hours later I had 30 clubs lying, gripless on the floor. It's not the grips that take so long, those are easily removed, it's the old grip tape on top of the build up tape that takes forever. When I was done, I put them away. We'll get to the actual re-gripping another day.

After all...if we did everything today...we wouldn't have anything left to do.