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I have gotten addicted to golf over the last year and have now sucked in my wife and all three kids. With 5 golfers in the household, I'm thinking seriously about a country club membership. Our local club is pretty pricey. Since everyone has different economics, rather than state the price suffice it to say that there is no way that I could financially justify it on pure economics (i.e., rounds played * greens fees at even a very nice public course will never equal buy-in + monthly dues). So the question is whether the other benefits outweigh the cost issue. Here is my short list and I'd appreciate hearing from others who have made the decision one way or another: Pros: easy access; club is 1 mile from our home; less crowded!; flexibility to play on the spur of the moment; chance to play the occasional 5-some with the whole family when the course is slow; beautifully maintained, challenging course Cons: once you pay that much, probably want to play your home course all the time and miss some variety; buddies from work who I like to play with are not members; $$$$ In any case, would appreciate input from the group. I played 40 rounds in 2012 and took my average score down from 125+ to high 90's and legitimately broke 100 several times. I have LONG way to go, but I think I've crossed over from "hack" to "golfer" and I absolutely love being out there. I expect I'll play at least 50% more this year now that my wife has the bug too.

Playing with the family yesterday. Par 3, carry a small creek to an elevated green with a higher "shelf" across the back. pin was forward. Hit the pitching wedge and landed the ball on the edge of the shelf about 5 yards past the pin and dead on. The ball rolled back to within 2 feet of the cup. My first ever backspin shot like that. I couldn't believe it. Of course I duffed the two foot par and blew the bird but it was still magic.

full 52 for me love that shot.

yeah, I know it's going to be a LOT harder to go from 98 to 89 than it was to go from 125 to 98 but I'm going for it...

My two goals for 2012 were to get to a level where (1) I could comfortably play with different groups without being the worst player in every foursome, and (2) to break 100 in a legit round. After a bunch of 101s and 103s and 97s with mulligans, today was the day. A legit 98 on a tough course 70.6/131 from the blacks. I know there are tons of people on this forum who are scratch or single handicappers so it probably doesn't sound like much, but a year ago I was 125-130 on any given day. Booyah!

ugh - played a normally quite nice public course today and they had loaded so many people on - including a 6-some - that it took 3+ hours to get through nine holes after waiting on every shot. They were good enough to refund our $89 greens fee which we gave them a lot of credit for but that's maybe the first time I've ever thought a golf outing just wasn't that fun. Slow play is absolutely drives me insane.