What are your hobbies

mamameya

Registered
When I joined this site, I wanted to make more friends here. Let’s talk about our hobbies firstly so that we can know each other more.
In my spare time, I like walking, making delicious food, watching TV and doing some exercise, like badminton. Just enjoy the life.
What about you?
 
Some of my hobbies (?):
Learning to sing a holiday song in a different language each year ( This year - Es ist ein Ros Entsprungen)
Learning basics of another language (some mandarin - Wo ai ni! )
Continuing with enjoying new (for me) styles of music, such as modern (also classical) tango (Astor Piazzola is amazing), and pre-war vocal groups, such as the Boswell Sisters (amazing sound, despite the limitations of music recordings in the late 20's/early 30's)
Expanding my Tai Chi moves past the 24 or so that I usually do.

Finding time to practice with my barbershop quartet
Searching for interesting music to share with the mixed choir that I direct.
Realizing, after numerous attempts that I am NOT going to get the technique that is needed to re-solder surface mount chips - :(
 
What I like changes over time.
In summers, definitely swimming (I'm not a fan of cold water). All year around running is fun (when I'm not too lazy). As is being owned by cats.

I'm rarely seen without a book - analog books usually. Digital ones don't cut it for me. Analog ones are easier to absorb into (and much cheaper. I buy mine second hand and usually give to friends or leave some to travel after I've read them, as bookcrossing can be fun), and I find them much less distracting. My comfort genre is noir and crime, set in somewhere odd or exotic, the more exotic the better. Like Jo Nesbø's Harry Hole series, or James Thompson's Kari Vaara series, or something along those lines. With random books between them about anything as long as it's interesting: history of some cooking ingredient or some mobster, deep secrets or oddities about how bodies work etc. My cats like (to sit on) books too, especially the ones I'm reading. Anyone else in Goodreads?

Hmm... what else? Food, I guess. Cooking experiments (last two tried home: kimchi and sauerkraut from scratch, and experimenting what I can do with a dehydrator). If eating out, stuff I wouldn't know how to cook perfectly home, like Korean, Vietnamese, Sichuan... still some food shows in Travel Channel or Cupcake Netw.. I mean Food Network (rarely nowadays. Iron Chef got boring, and all the other shows seem to be about cupcakes. I'm not a fan of those glorified muffins).

Other random stuff: older James Bond movies. We usually do a Bondathon about once a year when we watch all the Bonds in chronological order (of when the films were made, not when the books were written). Each time it's fun to watch and notice different things in the movies. So many awesome designs for eyeglass frames, clothing, interiors of the villains caves etc especially in the old ones. Of Bond actors I'm strongly a Connery fan, and for other favorites... villains - definitely Blofeld, of sidekicks - Blofeld's cat and Oddjob perhaps, the favorite Bond flicks... I can't pick even just two but the two that would definitely be in my top 7 would include From Russia With Love and Diamonds Are Forever. Probably Dr No and Thunderball as well.
I often like quiet, but when I pick music I don't find one common theme in my preferences. Astor Piazzolla is great, and so to my surprise is classic jazzy stuff like Louis Armstrong, Dinah Washington, the Ettas (James & Jones), Public Enemy, Apocalyptica, Kronos Quartet...
I also plot murder and write. And I like gardening (currently just a balcony, so only lemons, pineapples, hot peppers, catnip etc), and like hacking every day objects to different uses, and I crochet and sometimes knit. Mostly bags and toys recently.
 
My main hobby year around is woodturning as evidenced here.
I enjoy fishing now and then, but I'm afraid that advancing age pretty much keeps me close to home these days.
 
I am deeply envious - jbarley, what a great avocation to expose the life that is buried in an random bit of wood.
Not sure if I would call it a hobby - but a calling.
 
I am deeply envious - jbarley, what a great avocation to expose the life that is buried in an random bit of wood.
Not sure if I would call it a hobby - but a calling.
thank you for the kind words.
Odd you should mention "random bit of wood", because most of these pieces I originally acquired from 'firewood cutters'.
They were more then glad to sell the wood to me for a token amount because as they put it, "it doesn't split worth a damn".
 
Last edited:
....favorite Bond flicks... I can't pick even just two but the two that would definitely be in my top 7 would include From Russia With Love and Diamonds Are Forever. Probably Dr No and Thunderball as well.

Despite George Lazenby's wooden acting I would say 'On Her Majesty's Secret Service' was by far the best Bond movie.
 
Back
Top