It’s time to replace my grips. I was considering this and other earth-shaking issues as I drove to the country grocery store for my morning paper, and remembered how long I played with the old leather wrap grips on my original set of Spalding Kro-Flites. When they started to unwind from the top of the shaft I’d just glue them back down.

(By the way, Bill, if you’re reading this I’d like those clubs back. That’s you, Bill. The high school trombonist from Houston back in the mid ’60s. The guy that found those old clubs in the worn out bag on his back porch that February when I moved to New Orleans. The Bill with the brother who lateraled that football to me in front of the entire onrushing team on that kickoff. I still limp sometimes. You.)

Anyway, my current R9 irons have the original stock grips. I liked the midsize New Decades on my old set of Clevelands, and I suppose I’ll go with those again. Anybody have any other suggestions? My hand size is right at the upper end for normal grips and the lower end for midsize. The regular size on my R9s are prone to slipping with minimal wear and sweat, and that’s why I’m replacing them.

(Does anybody else have this problem? Everything is almost but not quite? Hands almost big but almost not, just fast enough to be a rabbit but not fast enough to be on the team, tall enough that normal sports shirts are too short but not tall enough for big and tall shops so you have only one place you can order from and count on a fit, just good enough to get into the upper flight where you are just bad enough to get pounded?)

Back to grips. It seems appropriate that I need new grips while the Colonial is underway. As some might recall from an earlier post, I taught myself to play reading Ben Hogan’s Power Golf. My grip is still modeled on that book. I hung an old tarp between two trees in the back yard and pounded balls off bare lies for hours at a time. Balls finally started to blow through the tarp into the vacant lot across the fence.

(I think there’s a strip center in that lot now. Maybe Bill from Houston knows. How about it, Bill? You still there? I’ll settle for the 5 and 9 irons. They were my favorites.)