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Category: Commentary

  • The Doubles Conundrum

    It was Pro To Go, aka Chris Phelan who laid down the truth for me.

    “For guys our age, doubles is our future.”

    Now, PTG might be 50 but he sure as hell isn’t 65, like I am. My natural response was, “Yeah, fuck you, buddy.”

    Thing is, I really like PTG. He spoke a good deal of truth to me about my tennis game. I’m not sure when, but I know I will make it back to visit him next time and I’m in the desert.

    But, what he said implied I was rapidly getting too old to play singles. That’s what generated my somewhat tongue-in-cheek FU.

    Right or wrong, I still believe I can play singles. I know there are guys at my club who are 65 or older who persist in playing singles. But, when the opportunity to join a Tuesday mixed-doubles group was presented, I jumped at it. The experience would be good for my game.

    It’s fun and unconventionally challenging. The other guy doesn’t hit the ball real hard either on his serve or with his ground strokes. I can hit pretty hard on both fronts and occasionally do. But hitting consistently hard is a horrible idea when it comes to mixed. Male players have to constantly judge just how hard they want to hit a given shot while visually scanning the other side of the next.

    If a female player accidentally (or purposefully) hits an opponent with the ball, she might offer a smiling apology, but she probably won’t mean it. If a male player accidentally grenades a female he will instantly apologize and swear to all manner of excuses.

    I’m so sorry — I totally missed that. It was supposed to be between the two of you! My Bad. Won’t happen again. I’ll be more careful. I promise.

    For the record, I am completely OK with this double standard. Still, it is an ongoing challenge to judge exactly how hard to hit the ball and at whom when playing mixed doubles.

    Last weekend, the females of our group played in a doubles tournament down in Orange County. When I asked how the tournament was, they turned sad. Turns out they lost in a tiebreak. In my mind, this was a big success. Forcing a tiebreak means they were competitive throughout the match. Whether or not they came out on top at the end of the 7-point tiebreaker was far less meaningful in my mind.

    We sometimes finish our hour and a half session with a few games of the men versus women. But, most of our time is spent playing mixed. But, since the women had worked so hard prepping for their tournament, they decided they wanted to play against the men from the get-go. And this was fine by me. It wasn’t like I expected the men to win or that I expected the women to win. It was enough to be confident things were unlikely to end with another heartbreaking tiebreak.

    1-0 Men

    2-1 Men

    2-2 Men

    4-3 Men

    In between games my guy comes up to me and says, “I’m not hitting my returns hard enough.” I nodded and told him it could be a tricky balance. But, I thought it was Ok for him to hit with a bit more pace. As I said before, he is not a hard hitter.

    5-5

    6-5 Men

    Then my guy lost his serve, by overhitting as you might have guessed.

    Tiebreak.

    During the tiebreak, I was hoping the women would find a way to pull it out while trying not to hit obviously stupid shots. The tiebreak sea-sawed back and forth, just like the rest of the set but it ended 7-5 men. Ouch. My guy and I tapped rackets in muted appreciation for our play. For the women it was an obvious reminder of the USTA tiebreaker they lost over the weekend. I hoped they could find a way to be happy for the way they played if not the outcome they had hoped for. Tt

  • Toroline Mint Overgrip

    Man, this stuff is tacky.

    Mint is the tackiest of the three Toroline colors, along with Lavender. Neon Pink is aparently less tacky but it’s Neon Pink, which doesn’t work with any of my rackets or Kimony dampeners. Toroline, being a clever group of folks does things a little different. Their overgrips are tapered on both ends so, in a better world than this, you wouldn’t have to trim the top part before you put on the finishing tape. But, reality intrudes and I ended up having to trim mine anyway.

    I prefer two overgrips to any replaacement grip, grip. Toroline does not spec their overgrip’s thickness but I would say it’s on the thin side side two of them render my 4 3/8 grip comfy but firm and the bevels easily felt.

    Did I mention this stuff is tacky? Who knows how long it will stay tacky or how durable it is or even, at this point, if it’s too tacky. We will see. Thing is, in golf I was grip obsessed, always trying to find the perfect combination of durometer, compound, texture and tackiness (or smoothness in some cases). I guess it should come as no surprise I’m the same with tennis, always happy to try something new and different. If you’re at all like me give these Torolines a try. Oh, a couple final notes. First, the inner plastic is extremely thin. How thin? I almost accidentally wrapped the grip with it in place. I would love it if someone would come up with a grip that had less plastic. Of course, I am sadly doubtful the grip material itself is exactly Earth Friendly. Tt

  • The Head Radical MP Graphene Touch

    Thing is, I don’t get many warm fuzzys from new rackets. No, for some reason I get the biggest charge out of rackets that are a few years old but still in great shape. That accounts for the appeal of my first (as in first racket purchased by me) racket, a Wilson Six.One 100, codename: Battle Ax in Tennis thing the audiobook. There’s a graphics sweet spot I like and it’s exemplified by my latest purchase, a Head Radical MP Graphene Touch. I snagged it for $50 at the Tennis Warehouse Store in SLO and had it strung today with Toroline K-Pop. Check it out:

    I mean, come on, Daddy-O, that thing is damn sexy! The racket itself is in amazing condition considering it’s eight years old. I was a little worried if my stringer, Jason, would say the grommets are done but they’re just dandy. The label on the throat shows a restring date of December 2018, so there’s that. The white Head Hydrosorb grip appears original with the white Head finishing tape applied in a neat & tidy way usually confined to original grips. Initial results are quite positive. If there’s anything worth adding about Toroline K-Pop I will comment in a separate post. Tt

  • Old Pete likes to hit hard.

    Let me back up.

    Right around New Years I took a lesson from Chris Phelan, aka, Pro-To-Go in Palm Springs. At one point Chris met me at the net and said, “Look, you hit the ball great. You move Ok. But, you work too hard.”

    I admit it. I didn’t get it. In fact, I thought about it a great deal for the rest of our trip and after we got home. Gradually, very gradually, I came to understand. The point Chris was trying to make was, that at my level, what I needed to do is hit the ball deep, with top spin rather than always, or at least usually, putting great value on simply hitting the ball hard.

    Today I hit with Old Pete, an off and on student of Caesar.

    As we walked onto the court he said. “Listen, I like to hit hard.”

    I said, “Rock on, dude. Hit it as hard as you like.”

    And, he did.

    Chris Phelan in
    Palm Springs

    It took me about five minutes to find myself wondering what, exactly, was the point of relentlessly trying to hit the ball as Old Pete? I still do not have an answer but when I shared my experience with Chris he said: “Sad, but his loss. In the bigger picture, consistency equals a longer tennis life. Since no one enjoys self-destruction, the real fun is in developing a more versatile toolbox—one that includes a soft grip and relaxed wrist to get you out of trouble and make your opponent play one more ball, maybe one more than he’s able to return.”

    Sure, I am pointing the finger at Old Pete, and he deserves it. His style of play is neither effective nor enjoyable but if I am being honest, I’ve been guilty of something similar. It says something about me and my development as a tennis player that I didn’t get what Chris Phelan said when he said what he said back in January, in a sincere effort to help me play better tennis for longer.

    But now I do, and I’m happy about that and endlessly thankful to Chris Phelan. I can’t wait to get onto the tennis court with him again — maybe this fall. Maybe over the winter, it doesn’t matter.

    This time, I’m gonna get what he’s telling me without having to mull it over for a few weeks or a month.

    This time I will pay attention, Chris.

    I promise! Tt

  • El Shifto: Saying goodbye to the Wilson Shift. We hardly knew you!

    My experience with the Wilson Shift started when I flew home from Detroit with MIB’s personal racket. I guess it wasn’t his personal racket if we are defining personal as the racket he was using at the time. Long story short, Jonas at tennisnerd steered MIB toward the Shift 99. I found it a rather odd suggestion, knowing MIB’s game first hand. At the same time, I was somewhat heartened MIB had reached out to someone for racket help when he already owned a fantastic tennis game, especially in doubles. As good as he is, MIB was still striving for improvement!

    By the time El Shifto (300G / 16×20) was in my hands it had been through some changes, courtesy of the MIB. It had a leather grip and a Tourna overgrip as well as significant quantities of lead tape at 3 and 9. It felt a little like the tennis racket equivalent of Manny Sanguillén’s bat from the 70s. If you don’t get the reference, oh well. The point is that MIB’s Shift was heavy.

    Me? I like a heavy racket as much as the next guy but Michael’s tuning of it felt more than a little off to me so bit by bit I undid what had been done. First to go was the lead tape. Then I lost the leather grip. That’s when things got wild. You see, MIB uses a 4 3/8 grip while I prefer a 4 1/4. My solution was to go Modified Djoker. I heard Novak Djokovic used two overgrips and no main grip. True? False? Who knows or cares? But I added a twist. I placed vertical strips of blue masking tape on the bare grip (five layers to be precise) and finished the grip with a single Yonex Super Grap Wet.

    Before I get to the results let me tell all of you who don’t know and, really, why would any of you know, I find the grip sizing system to be totally stupid. I think tennis grips should be sized by measured dimensions rather than a reference to something that’s actually not a reference but a simplistic effort at correlation, in this case a bizarre attempt at correlation between the length of one’s palm and the added length of their ring finger and the correct grip size.

    What?

    I’ve probably lost you by now and that’s Ok since this is my tennis fever dream. Back to the five layers of blue masking tape. Quality 3M masking tape actually builds up quite a bit of cushion, especially five layers of the stuff so once I had the Yonex overgrip installed the Shift’s grip felt pretty much like a 4 1/4 with nicely pronounced bevels.

    Voila!

    MIB’s El Shifto with a couple grams of lead tape in the throat now tips the scale to a svelt 310 grams.

    Not quite. But here’s the thing. El Shifto felt and played great. Even though at 310G strung it was my lightest racket it felt exceptionally solid on volleys and quite precise on groundies. My serve had great pop and El Shifto rewarded a smooth stroke, happy to do a good deal of the work for me. Notwithstanding my general disinclination against Wilson tennis rackets I have to say the modified El Shifto has become my favorite racket. It has me thinking about grabbing a Son of El Shifto or hunting down a Wilson Labs version. As if I need another tennis racket. Then, right as my enthusiasm for the Wilson Shift was in its ascendance I read that Wilson had ditched the racket for a yet unnamed successor. I say unnamed even though I’ve read rumors that Shift’s replacement will be called the Python.

    You know. Snakes. Tennis. Sure.

    This is what I don’t get. Wilson, by all indications, did a lot of work creating the Shift, similar to the effort put behind the development of the Clash. The Clash is now in Version 3 but Shift has been unceremoniously consigned to the ash heap of tennis racket history without the common courtesy of even a Version 2.

    Why?

    I’m sure Python or Viper or Garter Snake or whatever Shift’s successor is called will incorporate some and perhaps many of Shift’s innovations. Abandoning Shift bothers me as a marketer and I think it makes Wilson look bad, at least in my eyes. If they knew they had a good racket in the Shift, and they obviously did and likely still do, what’s the hurry to dump it? Is the Wilson Burn really flying off the shelves? I don’t think so.

    Maybe Wilson thinks the Shift is too close to the Clash, but I don’t think that’s correct. Obviously, the Blade V9 is a darling of the professional game for both women and men. For a while, the Ultra V5 with its flashy blue paint, looked like it was going to catch on for both pros and recreational players but its appeal to both sectors seems to have flattened somewhat.

    The Shift deserved more respect from Wilson. At least it has mine. Tt

  • Sometimes a one-off tennis lesson comes with a dose of just plain weird and that’s OK.

    I really enjoy taking one-off tennis lessons. I like to see how I will respond and I also like to see how a tennis pro facing the challenge of helping a student they are unlikely ever to see again faces the challenge. This time the fun took place during an unusual heatwave that made it all the way to California’s Central Coast where we have had a four-day getaway planned for months.

    The pro was a lefty and even older than me, if you can imagine. I was quite upfront that I was looking for someone to rally with but that instructive comment was always welcome. The rally lasted all but five minutes before the question, “Can you slice your forehand?” I said I could but found the shot less than common. Sure, it’s fun but it’s seldom needed or effective. But, I was game so I hit a few to show the shot was no problem for me

    Here’s where things got weird. The coach wanted to talk about the split step. It seems that a lot of his students land flat footed when asked to split step. He then asked if I knew about split step and float? I confessed that I did not. The coach went on to say that split step and float means the player lands on one foot, so as to aid their ability to move in that direction.

    No.

    That’s what I said, for a couple reasons. First, how is the player supposed to know which direction they need to know at the moment they split step? Second, the idea of hopping off both feet and landing on one seems like an unwise practice.

    Sorry.

    After the lesson I really felt badly. You see, the coach had hit on two genuinely good points. The first was a more level driving motion on high bouncing one-handed backhands. The second was to use the ball point to rotate the off arm toward the striking arm to aid in spacing. Both of those thoughts worked great.

    Yup, I would take another lesson from this guy.

    Yes, I think he was dead-wrong about the split step.

    Yes, I learned something during the lesson and I enjoyed myself.

  • Long Term Follow-up: The Cancha Racket Bag Pro is a Year Old!

    Time flies!

    MIB, ready to be, well, MIB!

    MIB has been using the Cancha Racket Bag Pro for a year. I know because I shipped the bag to him last February. He’s been using it as his one and only bag ever since.

    Now, MIB is not your typical recreational player. No, he’s a three to four day a week doubles warrior. He not only admits to being hard on tennis gear, he occasionally celebrates the fact. Tennis racket blood sacrifices into trash cans and the like—you get the idea. When MIB told me he had shipped the back back to me I was expecting the worst. Instead, the Cancha Racket Bag Pro looked new.

    Have a look.

    MIB used the hell out of the Cancha Racket Bag Pro but you could not tell by how the bag looks after a full year.

    Zippers are perfect.

    MOLLE points are perfect.

    Fabric is perfect.

    Straps and handle the same.

    I am quite certain the bag could pass for new. Ok, so my trusty California patch would give it away but otherwise the bag looks like new. So, now it’s my turn with the Cancha Racket Bag Pro. It swallows up my rackets and two pair of shoes and everything else that needs to be inside. I am really looking forward to traveling with the bag on a tennis trip later this month and for my birthday getaway in April. I will report back once I get the Cancha Racket Bag Pro out on court. But if I were you, I would cut to the chase and expect me to be even more impressed with this fantastic bag once I have had the chance to use it myself. Well done, Cancha! Tt

  • Tennis Partners

    When I started playing tennis, MIB warned me I would find it a challenge to find suitable tennis partners. He was right. My plan, to engage in formal instruction rather than developing what I somewhat disparagingly have referred to as a park game was the right way to go—for me. The downside was that the social or networking aspect of tennis—the ability to get a game or a hit—had to be developed after I’d gotten fairly adept at hitting the ball. Connections are not always easily made. So, I want to write a bit about a few of the tennis partners I’ve shared a court with.

    Phil: I found Phil on the Tennis Players Looking for partners database at Calabasas. He was a commercial property manager. He emphasized that he only did commercial, no residential. When I asked him why he said it was because a commercial property manager didn’t have to listen to as many sob stories as a residential property manager. “You know, it’s not personal. You’re not paying. It’s time to move your business or go out of business.” It made sense. Phil was 45 I think, but his pattern of play has become well-known to me over the last year or so. Even though he was in decent shape, he didn’t move much. So, I either had to hit it right at him, preferably at his forehand, or my ball was going straight to the back fence. He did give two interesting bits of advice. First, was about two local guys who organized mixed-doubles meetups, one at CSUN and the other at Sherman Oaks Park. His other bit of advice was a good one. Phil said, “I’ll tell you what I’ve learned about doubles. Only play mixed. Taking out 50% of the testosterone out of tennis makes the game a lot more fun.”

    Stan / Johann: These guys were great fun. I started out with Stan, a mid-40s accountant. He’d been playing for years but wasn’t very good. He moved like a fit 40 year old, which I enjoyed. We were hitting once a week and chatted about the idea of playing doubles. As the birth of his daughter drew near, he was nice enough to pass me off to his buddy Johann. He was more fit but his tennis skills were a little shaky but he was such a pleasant guy. Then one day he just kind of vanished. When he surfaced again he said he’d been inundated by work and family life. I get it.

    Brisbane Stew: I was practicing my serve at The Rose Bowl, earbuds wedged into my ears, when I thought I heard someone talking to me from the court next to me. That someone was none other than Brisbane Stew. He was looking for a quick hit so we rallied for a while. Turns out he was a pilot for Qantas and found himself in Pasadena for a few days before flying back to Australia. A couple years younger, but a lot more fit, Stew gave me all I could handle. In fact, he was a big motivation in my (somewhat shaky) decision to convert to a two-handed backhand. We tried to meet up once a trip and I had gotten used to an occasional text from him saying when he would be in town. Stew has an excellent serve and likes to play angles you would expect to see in a good doubles match. Then one day Stew told me Qantas was changing planes for the BNE to LAX flight. I hope I’ve not seen the last of Brisbane Stew. He was great fun to play with.

    Pasadena Steve: The tennis gods take and then they give. Not long ago I was practicing my serve at Grant Park in Pasadena when Pasadena Steve strolled up, resplendent in his bucket hat, and asked me if I wanted to hit a few balls. Since then, we try to meet up every week or so. Steve’s a retired schoolteacher from LAUSD and is a relatively new Pasadena resident and a refugee from nearby Glendale. There’s a lot of talking during our sessions and that’s fine by me. It’s nice to blather on about politics, writing, baseball and Mexican food with someone who shares many of my same reference points. Steve plays in a long-established doubles group at the Rose Bowl that’s been going through some changes of late with one player going to the great tennis court in the sky and another threatening to move. Tennis is always about adjustment.

    MIB: I will always be able to brag that someone traveled 2,000 miles to play tennis with me, on my birthday no less. Sure, that was MIB. And, sure, he was in Los Angeles on business but he still went out of his way to extend his trip by a day so he could get all the way to hell and gone (Calabasas) on my birthday. We played during my lesson with Caesar and it was a great experience for me and one I detailed in Tennis thing the book.

    Then, last summer, following our family reunion in the QCs, we made the trip to SE Michigan to see the MIB in his own back yard. Yes, tennis was played. Yes, bourbon was sipped. Yes, LPs were played. Playing tennis with MIB was a hoot. He honored me by playing full out and I really savored the challenge. It reminded me of the movie The Rookie, where high school baseball players in a small Texas town in get better by trying to catch up with the major-league fastball of their coach, Jim Morris.

    I think you have to see high-level athletic performance to get an Idea for how close you can get to it yourself. Better than seeing is actually experiencing. I imagine some people would shrink from such experience, worried about proof beyond doubt that they could never deal whatever the athletic prowess they admire. Me? I think the experience itself can exalting, so long as one is serious, like I was when I played with MIB. Playing with MIB, even more so than Stew, gave me the sense of what I could do and what I could not. It clarified the size of the court and what it meant to actually cover it. One thing is certain, if I were lucky enough to play with MIB on a regular basis I would be a far better tennis player.

    Federer said that in tennis you could feel your opponent through contact with the ball. As soon as I heard this I nodded. The same is true in baseball. I can still remember the sense of hitting a heavy slider off some guys. My hands remember the feeling and in my brain that fragment of sense-memory connects me with those guys, even after all these years. It’s only been a few months since I played tennis with MIB but I still remember how it looked and felt.

    Lord willing, MIB and I will find ourselves on another tennis court someday soon. I’m looking forward to it.Tt

  • Tumble on down

    About a month ago, I was playing with Pasadena Steve when he lobbed me—successfully, as it turned out. I say as it turned out because I got to the ball in plenty of time. The problem was that I was still going back, well beyond the baseline, waiting for the ball’s first bounce to finally be in the zone for an overhead. It was the first time we’d ever played on this court and there was a lot going on. The adjacent court was full of kids taking a group lesson. A couple parents were using our court’s bench to watch their kid.

    Worse, as I moved back for the ball I had the sense I was getting close to the fence. I was, but I wasn’t so close that my next step would have me crashing into it. At the moment I was slowing down and raising my racket above my head, I lost my footing.

    It was a classic case of tanglefoot.

    I knew I was going down, but there was little I could do about it other than try to roll into my right side as gently as possible. I hit with the right front of my right knee, then the outer part of my right knee and then my right hip before settling onto my back to appraise the damage. My hip hurt and my knee started to sting. Then I realized I was bleeding from another abrasion on my right elbow. But, overall I felt Ok, so I got back on my feet. By then I could hear Pasadena Steve—three years older than me—calling out to see if I was Ok.

    In the moment, I considered asking him if I looked like a big fucking baby. Instead, I picked up the ball and fed him a forehand.

    “Right back on the horse,” Steve called.

    Yup.

    Steve’s a nice guy. He’d just finished reading my first novel and had pages marked with Post-its so he could remember his questions. As I drove him home, I felt just a little shocky, like I had just been in a fender bender.

    My elbow was still bleeding but Pasadena Steve went on asking questions:

    Now, was Ally based on a little girl you knew?

    Me: “Yeah, she was based on a kid my ex-wife taught, second grade, as I recall. Her name was Daisy and she had terrible asthma yet her idiot parents both smoked at home in their tiny two-bedroom apartment.“

    And what about the name, Gerry Garcia?

    Me: “I wanted a name that was a little odd, Gerry with a G, and Garcia, vaguely Spanish sounding yet the guy’s a pale-skinned redhead. So, nothing really fits Gerry Garcia, not even his name.”

    Steve’s what I call a kindly and gentle reader. Even though he reads a great deal (he’s in three book clubs) he’s not jaded. He’s still ready to enjoy a new book on its own terms.

    When I pulled up in front of his condo, Steve asked me to sign both copies of the books I’d given him. I pulled out my trusty N°BK92 All-weather pocket pen and composed inscriptions while my elbow oozed blood. I’m really sorry I didn’t manage to sign my name in blood. As I drove toward home, I was especially thankful we would be in time for the end of happy hour at our beloved T. Boyle. In my book, a tumble on a hard court earns a bourbon. And if one is good, two are better.

    I was very grateful I hadn’t hurt myself. I couldn’t remember the last time I fell on something as hard and unforgiving as a tennis court. Decades, for sure. As much as I don’t want to do it again, I was impressed that I’d gotten away with it even once. The abrasions are pretty much healed now. I still have a bit of tenderness in my right hip. The strangest part is the stubborn pain in my right side. At first I thought my right elbow had been driven into my ribs but the pain wasn’t exactly in my ribs. It’s still hard to sleep on my right side. No matter where it was, I was very happy I didn’t have to sneeze a single time over the next couple weeks. It would have hurt.

    Which brings me back to gratitude. And to the fundamental constant in tennis: uncertainty. Lord willing, as my father would say, I will be 65 in a couple months. As much as I hope to avoid another unplanned trip to the court’s surface, I am undeterred. Tennis and I are good. We’re both worth it, come what may. Tt

  • Tennis thing review of the Kimony Quake Buster string dampener.

    Kimony could be my favorite tennis accessory brand. There’s just something about companies like Kimony with just the right vibe (no pun intended). Plus, tennis accessories like grips, tools and dampeners can be so engaging on a personal level. As someone who has done a lot of business in Japan, both in my previous marketing life in high-end audio and later in golf, I appreciate the ethos of Japanese companies, especially small ones like Kimony.

    They know what they’re about.

    They know what matters to them and they know how to make it.

    I think I’ve used most of Kimony’s replacement and overgrips and each has been excellent, at least on par with offerings from much larger companies with more familiar names. But, this is my first experience with their dampener, The Quake Buster (or how I wish I could use the iOS Text Effects to make the letters in Quake explode!). As usual, I was first attracted to the available colors (I chose clear and black). But I had another motive respective to trying the Quake Buster and that was the way it attaches to the racket at the top and sides and the fact that it’s basically square (so as to maximize string contact) and also the fact that the experience of others who wrote about their experience with the Quake Buster state that the dampener is quite soft.

    The words quite soft translate to a thermoplastic that has a fairly low durometer (the lower the durometer the softer and more maleable a material). Harder dampeners (like Head’s)lack significant compliance to dampen much of anything. That said, the design of a dampener like the RTP Shocksorb may have gone too far, with a durometer that’s simply too squishy (and heavy). The question is whether the Kimony Quake Buster gets it just right.

    The Kimony Quake Buster in my Head Instinct MP

    The Kimony packaging has some copy on the back so I had a buddy of mine in Japan translate for me:

    Before impact, the mushroom, which was in a stationary state relative to the Quake Buster main body, moves its head in the direction of the ball due to inertia at the moment of impact.

    After impact, while interfering with vibrations from the strings and other sources, it absorbs (dampens) vibrations in all 360-degree directions.

    In other words, the mushroom works in a truly magical way.

    Come on, a magic mushroom! This is obviously the very best quality ever when it comes to a tennis string dampener. Seriously, I think the Quake Buster is a very well-executed product. The way it attaches to the strings, its shape and perhaps most importantly the durometer of its thermoplastic make it an excellent dampener. The sound isn’t dull but retains a slightly resonant thunk that is quite pleasing.

    Well done, again, Kimony! Tt