The blank and components were bought in late January. In early February, I went in the hospital with GBS. This affected my entire nervous system, including the feeling in my hands. I immediately realized I would not be able to turn the grip, so Noles agreed to do it for me. It is a modified Ritz grip that turned out very nice.
I tried something new, as I seem to do on every rod I build. To lighten the wraps over the dark blank I painted the area under them with silver paint. This ended up being a major problem in wrapping, but the end result was very nice, particularly in the sunlight where the silver shines through. The downside is I had to rewrap almost all the guides because the original silver paint didn't dry to a hard finish and ended up bleeding through the wraps when I tried to pack them.
Due to the numbness in my hands, I wasn't able to start wrapping the guides until the first of April. By his birthday, I had four guides wrapped. I finally finished the rod on May 21, almost a month late. Under the circumstances, it was quite an accomlishment. While it has some flaws due to the silver paint and problems with packing the wraps, overall it is very nice. The silver paint also gives it a very unusual look. I am going to try it again with better paint next time.
