[Jeff Higgins]

Well, dang it, it looks like my hunting season is over before it ever really got started. I've been having periodic, very intense, localized pain in my right hip for almost a year. It's funny, it would sting me, I would shake it off and keep walking, and it wouldn't come back for days sometimes.

Well, late summer / early fall, I wasn't shaking it off so easily anymore. It had reached the point where sometimes I would go a few days unable to put any weight on it, but then it would completely disappear and be fine again. Not anymore - it's here to stay.

Turns out the OEM hip joint has exceeded its service life. I need a new one. It seems early - I'm only 58. My wife tells me it was all those early years of soccer, bicycle racing, backpacking, hunting in some pretty rugged country, and, most of all, 20 some years of extremely heaving squats in the gym. I done wore it out.

The question now, of course, is what to go with. Stock rubber, neatrix, poly bronze (I'm not real keen on the zerk fitting, though). Pros and cons?