A number of years ago, we had a woman living in our house with us. She and her two children were in a toxic situation in the town where they lived, yadda yadda, and, after several months, my spouse and I figured out that part of the reason for her situation was, well, irrelevant to this post.
When she left, she left a fair bit of stuff behind.
Including a Samick Polaris recurve bow that is no-telling-how-old. I don't know how good it is, but it seems to do nicely for what I'm doing with it.
Because I'm getting Olde, and looking for some hand-eye coordination exercises in addition to the ten-yard cordless hole punches that some call pistols, I pulled it out of storage, bought a few $6 Aluminum alloy arrows from the nearest Academy Sports and Outdoors store, a bag target on special pricing from the nearest Cabela's store, and set up a little archery range in my back yard.
Not having ANY experience with archery, I did the YouTube thing and found a primer video or three, figuring to reduce odds of destroying the arrows or other stuff.
Then my spouse found a cluster of arrows at a thrift store for $25 or $30--roughly thirty arrows, if one counts the short things that I suspect are bolts for a crossbow. All of these new arrows are Carbon Fiber, and only a few had field points in them, so off to Academy for a $5 package of a dozen field points--all of which are larger diameter than the carbon arrows, making them a little bit more difficult to pull out of the bag target (I'm guessing it's essentially polyethylene "burlap" with some sort of filler, and the weave holds on to the field points unless the arrow is the same diameter).
I noted that some archers use a glove, some don't. Out of curiosity, I tried on a couple gloves, and found that my screen name is indicative--they were too small. But I found that there is an archery supplier that shares my name, AND they offer an archery glove that fits my, um, paw!
So, every day or three, I go out in the yard, put the quiver against the far fence, and shoot a dozen or three arrows across the yard (being careful to not shoot when the dogs are "helping" me entertain myself.
I've found a new exercise. It's interesting that it's relaxing.
Samick Polaris bow
1Eventually I'll figure out this signature thing and decide what I want to put here.