Non-gaming hobbies

[Dioltach]

Much as I enjoy drinking coffee and cocktails, I couldn't find the energy to turn either into a hobby.

When I'm not working (or gaming), I tend to write. I used to read a lot, but lately I find that I can't concentrate on other people's words the way I can on my own.

Some years ago I became interested in gemmology, and I'm about half way to becoming a Graduate Gemmologist. Things are on hold because I spent all my money on gemstones and commissioning a goldsmith to make loads of jewellery for me.

Otherwise I enjoy hiking holidays. Several days of hotel-to-hotel trekking, somewhere hot and sunny, where you end the walk with a cool drink and a plate of local snacks.

And then there's just general travel with my wife. We're fortunate to both be self-employed, without children, so we can essentially take off whenever we want. Visit some new part of Europe, see the sights, eat the food and be back by Monday.

 

[Ralif Redhammer]

Gin is my spirit of choice. I quite like a Bees Knees, a Last Word, and there's never anything wrong with a simple G&T. An Earl Grey Martini is extremely tasty too.

My favorite changes from mood to mood, but right now it's either the Lena* or the Embassy Royal**

*2 oz Bourbon
1 oz Sweet Vermouth
.5 oz Dry Vermouth
.5 oz Campari
.5 oz Galliano

**1 oz Bourbon
1 oz Sweet Vermouth
1 oz Drambuie
2 Dashes Orange Liqueur (or fresh squeezed orange juice, depending on the recipe)

Most recently I tried a Trinidad Sour. That was a truly unique cocktail. Good, but so... weird.

To me the Trinidad Sour tastes kinda like a Christmas tree, but not in a bad way, if that makes any sense.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

RE: the negroni, has it taken a while because you've been working your way through other cocktails first? Or are the ingredients, presumably aside from gin, not easy to come by where you are?

I’m no mixologist- I don’t even pretend. There’s a few cocktails I make at home, everything else I get from bars & restaurants.

So- for whatever confluence of reasons- every time I’ve ordered a Negroni, the establishment in question has been out of at least one ingredient. (Or, more likely, the bartender on duty hasn’t a clue or is otherwise disinterested in making one.)

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

I’m no mixologist- I don’t even pretend. There’s a few cocktails I make at home, everything else I get from bars & restaurants.

So- for whatever confluence of reasons- every time I’ve ordered a Negroni, the establishment in question has been out of at least one ingredient. (Or, more likely, the bartender on duty hasn’t a clue or is otherwise disinterested in making one.)

Wow, that definitely varies wildly by region. In Southern California, if you don't want a margarita or a martini, the bartenders are actively pushing the negronis, because they know they're widely popular.

 

[Vael]

I don't drink enough to consider going deep into mixology, but I did take a bartenders course cough years ago, and I do enjoy the alchemy of it. So, I prefer sugar. I like to cook, but also bake. Baking can be quite zen for me, put a podcast on the headphones and it's just me, the voices in my head and the recipe.

But when I want to be less of an introvert, my other hobby is dance. Specifically partner dances. I started in Ballroom and Latin, even competed a little, but then found Lindy Hop (one of the first Swing dances) and it's been my fav ever since. It's less structured than the Ballroom dances, and I like that era of Jazz music. That said, I recently went to a Fusion dance event (so, dancers of different types dancing together) and had a lot of fun, but also inspired me to expand my horizons, I want to add West Coast Swing and Argentine Tango (very different than the American Smooth style of Tango I'm used to) to my repertoire.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

Some years ago I became interested in gemmology, and I'm about half way to becoming a Graduate Gemmologist. Things are on hold because I spent all my money on gemstones and commissioning a goldsmith to make loads of jewellery for me.

I’ve got enough stones to set up a booth at a trade show, and a bunch of jewelry as well. I don’t have the metalworking skills to do my own, otherwise I’d probably be richer…or poorer!

What stones do you favor?

 

[Dioltach]

I don't have metalworking skills either, sadly. Actually, just the other week I did a silversmithing workshop and it went much better than I'd expected. Usually I'm all thumbs, but I managed to make some stuff that wasn't half bad.

My favourite stones, wow, that's a tough one. Anything, really. Fancy coloured diamonds, tanzanite, opal (and fire opal), tsavorite garnet. Some of the less common stones like sunstone, moonstone, apatite. Some of the most unusual stones I have is a set of gem-quality sphene: yellowish green, good clarity, and more fire than diamond even. I had my goldsmith set them in a chain of oxidised silver, interspersed with tiny white diamonds.

I find as I get older and acquire more stones and jewellery that I'm starting to sympathise more and more with Smaug, instead of the Dwarves.

 

[Zardnaar]

Kinda rajen up exploring the great outdoors.

Got up to light hiking on old volcanic ridges and 700 metre hills working my way up to overnight and thinking about the great walks- 3 day hikes over 2000 metre mountains.

Kinda easy mode now.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

I don't have metalworking skills either, sadly. Actually, just the other week I did a silversmithing workshop and it went much better than I'd expected. Usually I'm all thumbs, but I managed to make some stuff that wasn't half bad.

My favourite stones, wow, that's a tough one. Anything, really. Fancy coloured diamonds, tanzanite, opal (and fire opal), tsavorite garnet. Some of the less common stones like sunstone, moonstone, apatite. Some of the most unusual stones I have is a set of gem-quality sphene: yellowish green, good clarity, and more fire than diamond even. I had my goldsmith set them in a chain of oxidised silver, interspersed with tiny white diamonds.

I find as I get older and acquire more stones and jewellery that I'm starting to sympathise more and more with Smaug, instead of the Dwarves.

You probably should (NOT ) check to see if the InterGem travelling gem & jewelry show passes anywhere near where you live. Ecery aspect of the business gets represented: equipment, uncut stones, cut stones, artificial stones, glass, beads, jewelry, estate sellers, local mineral clubs, and more.

If you DO wind up going, contact me, and I can give you some recommendations for people I’ve been shopping with for a decade+.

And if you get SERIOUS, the .annual show in Tuscon s supposedly beyond words. (I’ve never had the opportunity myself.)

 

[Dioltach]

Fortunately Intergem doesn't seem to be travelling to Europe any time soon. I've been to a couple of jewellery fairs and walked out a lot poorer than I walked in. But much happier too.

 

[fba827]

Just wondering what kind of hobbies people have, which are not gaming related. (snip)

Any ways, what are you guys doing besides gaming?

I understand the individual words but you put them together, I cannot comprehend these sentences… ‘hobbies’ ‘not gaming’ ?

 

[R_J_K75]

I drink beer

Awesome!! Me too. Theres never too much or enough beer. Which reminds me that I need to get a few 30 packs.

 

[Homicidal_Squirrel]

I understand the individual words but you put them together, I cannot comprehend these sentences… ‘hobbies’ ‘not gaming’ ?

Unfortunately, some of us can't seem to get a gaming group consistently together. I've had to find other things to distract myself from work. If I could get a group together which was able to have more than one consecutive session where everyone was able to show up, I'd probably be starting game related posts. Instead, I now go around taking pictures and have people looking at me weird.

 

[Mad_Jack]

I've dabbled in metalworking and jewelry a bit - the tools are incredibly useful for other hobby applications as well.

I've posted this before in the miniatures thread, but this is my current project.... Having lost my hobby jigsaw the last time my basement flooded and being on an absolute-zero budget, I'm essentially doing it all by hand - I cut the boards by hand, and cut out all the notches in the shelves and supports with an under-powered hobby-sized Dremel with a cutting bit.

 

[Sacrosanct]

I've dabbled in metalworking and jewelry a bit - the tools are incredibly useful for other hobby applications as well.

I've posted this before in the miniatures thread, but this is my current project.... Having lost my hobby jigsaw the last time my basement flooded and being on an absolute-zero budget, I'm essentially doing it all by hand - I cut the boards by hand, and cut out all the notches in the shelves and supports with an under-powered hobby-sized Dremel with a cutting bit.

View attachment 279594

As a fellow woodworker, I know just how hard that was to do with those tools lol.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

Fortunately Intergem doesn't seem to be travelling to Europe any time soon. I've been to a couple of jewellery fairs and walked out a lot poorer than I walked in. But much happier too.

I know that experience intimately.

First show I went to, I set a $500 budget. Spent $1000.

The next show I set a $1000 budget. Spent $1800.

Yada yada yada…

I’m much better at keeping to my budget these days, but it took going to a show a decade or so ago and spending WAAAAAY too much to knock some sense back into me. Essentially, I had a commitment out of town, and could only attend the first day of the (3 day) show, and was having problems deciding what to buy. So I didn’t decide- I bought everything I liked.

Well, almost everything. On my way out of the show, I passed on one newly discovered stone that was exceedingly rare. The cutter, Bill Vance, had 20+ carats of faceted material for sale, approximately 75% of the world’s supply. He offered to sell me one of the largest for $3000. I could have bought it, but the reality of what I had already spent was starting to sink in. I passed on it.

He sold it about 6 months later for $20k.

If I had bought it, selling it it would have put me back in the black with plenty of room to spare. Thing is, I’m not sure I would/could have sold it then.

To this day, I’ve never sold a piece of my jewelry and only 2 stones I’ve purchased. What little has left my Draconic hoard were gifts to friends and family.

I‘ve only a couple weeks ago cherry-picked some of my best stuff to sell in order to raise funds. I photographed them all (badly) and catalogued them for appraisal & sale with the purpose of replacing the decrepit wooden fence & motorized gate of my parents’ house with a metal one so they don’t have to take out a loan to do the work.m Depending on the job bids and what I can get for my stones, we might even add a solar power & storage setup.

But I can already feel myself second-guessing my own plan because of how cool some are.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

@Dioltach

A website to whet your appetite:

PRODUCTS | reactivemetals

www.reactivemetals.com

 

[Dioltach]

Thanks for the link! There's some amazing stuff there. My wife has instructed me to design new wedding rings for our 20th anniversary in a few months, so I think I'll be taking notes.

My downfall was during the first year of the pandemic. Stuck inside for months on end, I just started buying gemstones and diamonds on auction websites, sometimes pieces of jewellery too. And then I thought about things to do with them, so as soon as the country opened up again I wandered down to the goldsmith with a set of designs. You have to support your local economy, after all.

Lately I've been selecting some things to sell. There's not much market over here, though, and people in the Netherlands can be tightfisted. I put a ring up for sale: 1.30 ct natural orange diamond set in white gold with baguette diamonds around it. The first reaction I got was: "Can I see the receipt? I want to know how much you paid for it so I can make an offer." No, here's the valuation. I'm asking less than its value, that's all you really need to know.

That's the problem selling collectibles too here. I have a boxed set of Maps of Middle Earth, on heavy parchment-like paper. You can't find it anywhere anymore. "But you're asking more than the original selling price!" Well yes, it's collectible and no-one else is selling it. "I'll offer you half what you paid for it." Sigh.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

Re: RMS & ring ideas

Take a close look at the mokume gane* offerings- some of it is sold in sheets for inlay for rings, etc.

That’s WAY easier than doing fabrication with mokume gane billets.

This is a ring I designed with lapis, a red-gold based mokume gane, and trimmed in 14k yellow gold. It’s made with a billet, not inlay, and that jeweler hated me for a while after making it…

* mokume gane is “wood-grain metal”. Essentially, artisans use the same drawing & folding techniques with precious metals as used in the steel for Damascus or katana blades.

 

[Dioltach]

Gorgeous!

And yes, the wrath of goldsmiths is a hazard I've encountered before. Mine hated me when I asked her to make a heavy silver cuff bracelet with gold leaves soldered onto it. It took her forever, she said, because by the time the silver was hot enough to take the solder the gold was melting. And she'd quoted me a price beforehand. It turned out absolutely lovely, though, so I'm happy.

She also hated me when I asked her to set tiny yellow diamonds individually in a necklace made of three strands of gold. They're so small you don't even see them, but when they catch the sunlight they shine like laser beams.