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What do you do in the off season?

MCDavis

The Plaid Duffer
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Moderator
Oct 19, 2006
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Sanford, NC
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MOST of us have a period of time each year that we can't play golf due to cold, wintry weather. I know some of you guys hunt, but what do the rest of you do? Do you have another hobby that fills your golf slot in the winter, and that you abandon for golf in the spring?

For me, my kids activities have pretty much taken away my golf game for the last 2 years. In 2 weeks, I'll have 4 teenagers between 13 and 17, and all of them play sports and/or cheer. Oldest step-son is actively being pursued already for college soccer scholarships. So, that's my "other hobby" year round, for now.

So, how about it?
 

mddubya

Hybrid convert
Nov 6, 2007
6,029
2
Normally I'd do a little hunting during our brief winters here in central Ms. But to be honest, we usually don't have enough really cold snaps that last long enough to not be able to squeeze a round or two of golf in. Of course, we pay for the mild winters with VERY hot summers.
 

eclark53520

DB Member Extraordinaire
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Dec 24, 2007
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South Central Wisconsin
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Hunting in the fall. Ice fishing in the winter while there is enough ice on the lakes. Xbox360. Reloading. Indoor coed Volleyball. Bowling.

The only one's i really 'abandon' for golf would be volleyball and Bowling..but really, those seasons just end so i'm not really abandoning them. Hunting seasons close. Ice fishing, well, there isn't much ice during the summer. Xbox is great year round, especially when it's miserably hot outside, the basement is nice and cool.
 

warbirdlover

Ender of all threads
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Jul 9, 2005
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central Wisconsin
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Hunting in the fall, shooting at the range in the winter and looking at clark's pics in the secret forum.....
 

nututhugame

Winter Sucks!
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Dec 29, 2008
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Work, hate winter, help kids w/homework, hate winter, putt on the carpet, hate winter, Ice fish if there's safe ice, hate winter, spend quality time with family, and wait for spring. Not necessarily in that order.
 

anonymous golfaholic

Refusing Recovery
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Feb 10, 2010
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Illinois
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I draw, paint, collect coins, play Xbox a lot and I've hit a lot of putts this winter in the house. Other than that, I don't do much for indoor activities. I like to hunt deer and waterfowl. I also love to look for indian artifacts. We have some farmland in the river bottoms close to where I live that is great for finding arrowheads.

This season I have a new interest though. Treasure hunting, lol, my son is all about it. There is a place on our property that used to be the site for The Potts Inn. It was an infamous place where a guy named Billy Potts would murder and rob unsuspecting travelers. It took place in the late 1700's. Supposedly, he accidentally killed his son because he didn't recognize him. When he found out he murdered his son, he turned the gun on himself, thus leaving behind his gold. That's the story I hear anyway. My son is after his gold. I'm after old US coins. A 1794 penny can bring thousands. Anyway the spot is really cool. The foundation to the Inn is close to a big bluff line, with natural springs and 70ft waterfall. It doesn't put out much water until it rains, but when it does, it's a site to see. My wife and kid love going there. I recently bought a metal detector just to take down there. It's fun...something to do.
 

azgreg

"Don't count that."
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Sep 20, 2007
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Phoenix, AZ
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My off season is July and August, too frickin hot to play. I spend as many weekends during this period as possible in the mountains trout fishing with the Scouts.
 

SilverUberXeno

El Tigre Blanco
Jul 26, 2005
4,620
26
Gym gym gym for me. 8-12 hours a week. I also play a little basketball, and I'd bowl if I didn't screw up my wrist. See some chicks here and there. Putt a lot.

I love golf a lot more when I can't play it. Lol. Two weeks into the season I'll probably hate it again.
 

limpalong

Mental Ward Escapee
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Oct 18, 2006
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We've not had much of an "off season" in Kansas this year. Extremely mild winter. I don't chase many hobbies, other than golf. I read. I'll average at least one novel/week... many times two. All the ladies at the library know me by name. And, we play SuperScrabble. My wife and I will play a lot of SuperScrabble on weekends, with our two grown daughters joining us when they can. A couple weeks ago, my oldest daughter turned 40. Her birthday wish??? A Scrabble marathon. She, her sister, her mother, and I set up the SuperScrabble at noon and played until midnight. 12 hours of non-stop Scrabble.
During the week, I do lots of Suduko and Crossword puzzles. I live in fear of the mind going... going... gone. Hopefully, playing word games and reading and doing puzzles will keep the mind from going stagnant.
 

limpalong

Mental Ward Escapee
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Oct 18, 2006
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Winter what the hell is that? :D

The SuperScrabble has twice the number of letter tiles as a regulation Scrabble game. The board is larger and the game can take 3 to 3 1/2 hours for 4 to play. The mind can become pretty "mushy" after 12 straight hours. Neither of my daughters like losing. They are extremely competitive. We are known to "sneak" in bogus words. Every game will see challenges by one player against another's played word. You don't dare let your mind stray or you'll get blindsided by another player sneaking a word in.
We all play quickly. If it seems one player is "Ben Crane'ing it", we'll begin using the timer. If someone goes "on the clock", the timer is then used for the remainder of that game... for all participants.
It's intense competition.
 

Augster

Rules Nerd
Supporting Member
Mar 9, 2005
1,473
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My offseason is just spent waiting for any trips I have planned and the next season to arrive. I go down to Texas over the Super Bowl to play and see my dad. So I always have that to look forward to. Leading up to the trip, I usually hit balls in the I/O range a couple times a week in January.

I was trying to get back into Racquetball again to stay in shape, but my knee just can't handle it. It'd be play racquetball for 2 hours, then limp around for two weeks. Terrible. The cure, supposedly, is to ride stationary bike. So I'll ride bike for 20 minutes once, then want to kill myself. So I put off riding again for two weeks or so. God I hate stationary bike. Needless to say, my quads never get any stronger, so my knee can never stand the running.

Mostly though, I watch a lot of movies. When they release the list for the Golden Globes, I try to get to most of them that look interesting. Same for the Oscars. I try to see all the nominations if they look interesting. Not just best picture, but musical/comedy for the Globes and Documentary for both. If someone is nominated for actor/actress, supporting etc. but the picture isn't nominated for best, sometimes I'll try and see those also. Moreso if they're already out on DVD/BluRay. Once the Globes happen, if I haven't seen their best picture winner, I go see it.

I don't watch the ceremony. Unless I turn it on right at 10PM and they are announcing the best picture winners, then maybe I'll watch for 3 minutes. Mostly I'll just look it up online at 11PM to see if anything unexpected happened.

To consider myself "in the know" I've watched every Golden Globe best picture winner. I've watched every Oscar best picture winner from 2010 back to 1938 I think. When did Mutiny on the Bounty win? That was the most recent one I've seen.

Netflix keeps track of all the movies you rate. One time last year, at an average of say 2 hours per movie, of the ones I've rated so not ALL of them I've seen, I figured it out and I've spent a solid FOUR YEARS of my 40 years watching movies. 24hours per day, 365days a year. That was eye-opening. And that isn't including all the movies I've seen. If you add in TV, yikes. But, what the hell else are you going to do in the winter?
 

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