Golf Pencils

I missed writing yesterday because I spent my morning on the side of an ice covered mountain helping coordinate volunteers for a ski race. When I got back to my office after lunch, I had a pile of work which took priority.

Coordinating volunteers for a ski race is a fun job if you know what you are doing. I had to train new people on the basics and then talk to everyone about new rules instituted this year. Finally I had to give everyone their paperwork that needs to be filled out on the mountain. If a skier doesn't ski the course correctly, it needs to be recorded.

Standing on the side of a mountain filling out paperwork for a ski race is very enlightening. For instance, did you know that a ball-point pen doesn't work below 32 degrees Fahrenheit? The ink freezes. NASA knew that a ball-point pen wouldn't work in zero gravity and spent millions of dollars coming up with a pen that would write in space. The Russians just brought a pencil. Ski racing officials use the low-tech solution and bring a pencil, which works great in the cold.

A second discovery that every ski racing official makes is that it is very cold if you have to take your glove off to write. After half a decade of helping with races, I have learned to write with my gloves on. It is a useful skill that recently came in handy when I was playing a party game and was asked to remove some candy from a foil wrapper while wearing thick, winter gloves. The only exception to being able to write with gloves on is if you get stuck with a golf pencil.

Golf pencils are those half-pencils without erasers that you get for free. They are called golf pencils because you most often see them at golf courses and are used to keep track of your score. If you go into an office-supply store, you can buy a huge box of them for less than an order of french fries. In fact the cheapest thing in the store is a gigantic box of golf pencils.

For the record, I hate golf pencils. They are only useful once. The moment you try to sharpen one, it becomes too small to use again. There is no eraser and so if you make a mistake, you're screwed. Well, unless you are carrying an eraser in your pocket. But who carries an eraser to a ski race? Hand warmers, candy bars, and goggle scrapers, yes. Pencil eraser, no.

The whole reason for the invention of the golf pencil is based on the idea of creating a writing instrument that nobody would want to steal. If golf courses gave out nice pencils, they would never get them back. However if you are done playing a round of golf, get in your car, drive an hour down the road, and then discover that you still have your free golf pencil, you will go all the way back to the course to return it because nobody wants such a useless thing.

As the new volunteer coordinator I'm going to go buy a big box of real pencils. Full-sized ones, with erasers on the end. Then I am going to drill holes in the backs of them just below the eraser. That will allow me to run a string through the pencils so I can attach them to clipboards. If that doesn't keep the writing instruments from disappearing, then it is back to golf pencils. But only as a last resort.