[blinxdk]

My absolutely largest passion is motorcycles. "Live to ride, ride to live" is pretty accurate

I'm hoping to go to the track again next season and try taking a few race shots.

Not the best picture, but this is my current bike: Suzuki SV1000S K6

[borno]

Nice ride blinxdk, Mine is a wee bit more docile by todays standard.


"I don't want a pickle, I just want to ride my motor-sickle"

[blwnhr]

Cars and photography are my 2 biggest hobbies.

Cars is something I have always been interested in, I have built a car from a wreck with my father and it’s been an addiction since then. I really enjoy going for a Sunday drive in my good car, a 1960’s Holden (Australia’s Chevrolet). Unfortunately I am spending too much time photographing events to do any work on any of my cars and that is frustrating.

Sticking with the car theme, I also design car audio systems. I’m not talking the ones loud enough to destroy your hearing, but ones that sound perfect. I select the gear, engineer and design the install and also tune the system. My personal car was state sound quality champion for a few years (despite massive changes in technology). I was proud considering my total system cost was about 1/3 the competitors.

I’m also into Pocket Bikes, my mates and I go riding as much as we can. For those who don’t know, pocket bikes are a scaled down version of a road-bike and are great fun. Mine looks like a Yamaha R1. We modify them, hot them up and then go for ride. Some pictures here – AGSPhotos.com - Pocket Bikes. When you consider the wheels are like 10” round, they are pretty small.

I also ride mountain bike a bit. Not enough, because I’m busy doing other things, but I did a 15mile ride last Monday around the city I live in and felt great so will get into it more.

One thing I have to stop doing is agreeing to design things for people. I work in architecture and have people asking me all the time to design house renovations, kitchens, sheds, decks, all sorts. I normally just agree because I like the thought of doing it to help them out, but then realise there is no hope of me being able to do it in the short term. I don’t want to tell them I can’t do it because that makes me look bad so I generally pull late nights to get it all done.

Finally, to prove my addiction to hobbies I just bought a set of golf clubs. I normally only play 3-4 time/year, but got sick of using hire-clubs. I know now though that I’ll see them sitting there collecting dust and get inspired to play more often.

Basically I can’t say no to trying something new, and I have a broad taste so I get enjoyment out of a lot of different things. The sad thing is I am trying to do so many things my hobbies are kind of stressing me out because I am trying to pack too much into my days. Over winter I am winding back a bit. There won’t be so many events I need to photograph and I have to learn to bite my tongue and say ‘No’ when people ask me to do design work for them. I am not bored with any of my hobbies, there just aren’t enough hours in the day to do them all. Darn work!

[Chako]

For other hobbies (in no order)...

1. I collect FDC (First Day Covers). I have settled on Canadian FDCs of which I have 8 binders full. It stems from collecting stamps and coins when I was younger.

2. Computers.

3. Leather crafting. I found a bunch of neat weird looking tools at a pawn shop and bought them for no reason other then they seemed to call out to me. I brought them home, and did an internet search to find out what they were. I found out they were a set of leather stamps. Before I knew it, I was reading books, buying tools, and practicing. I have been doing this for the last 5 years now, and probably is my most relaxing hobby when I can't do photography.

Here are two photos of my latest belt for a friend that I made last weekend. His initials I blurred out.

Buckle


Belt featuring two train engines pulling 3 box cars, 1 gondola, and a bay window caboose.


4. Reading.

[heatherslightbox]

I've dabbled on and off in photography since I graduated from high school--I used my HS graduation money to buy a Canon Snappy p&s. From that dabbling came scrapbooking, which I still do. I've always liked to travel and it gives me an excuse to indulge my photography habit.

I like wine tasting and cooking. I like to be outside--hiking is among my favorite outdoor activities. If you're in Florida and are looking for good places to hike, Florida has an awesome state park system. I like to go to the beach--Florida's east coast beaches are my favorites.

Although I wouldn't consider it a hobby, my husband and I are currently taking the Financial Peace University classes through our church. We have a goal of eventually getting out from under all of our debt--everything except the house (2 CCs, my car, and a home equity loan). Once that goal is accomplished, it'll free up more money for us to do the things we want to do more of, like travel and I should have more money to indulge my LBA (although DH thinks $200 is expensive for a lens). I'm also hoping that I won't have to stay in my rather boring job forever; perhaps we can save enough for me to retire early at 45.

Needless to say, my plate is pretty full.
Heather

[fillerupmac]

I'd hafta say astronomy is my major hobby - I got $8k wrapped up in an 18 inch Dobsonian Reflector (Starmaster). It took me 5 telescopes to get there, including the obligatory department store telescope that I bought, used once, immediately saw my mistake, took it back, got an 8 inch Schmidt-Cassegrain, and I've been staring at the night sky for 10 years now. Deep sky objects, otherwise known as faint fuzzies (galaxies far far far away) are my favorite, with the 18inch mirror, I have seen light from galaxies that took 2 BILLION years to get here. It left that galaxy before there were single celled whatever on this planet.

Camera's have always been a passion - ever since one of my mentors talked me into an OM-1, which I still own. I also own a Leica from WWII days, my fathered captured it off a SS Trooper - it has the SS markings on it.

G-Scale trains - but not so much anymore. I'd have an outdoor layout if I had the right property - if I did, I probably wouldn't have any other hobbies!!! ;-)

Digital music - use Sonar (Cakewalk) to create music on my PC (when I have time - it's mostly a winter thing)

Snow skiing of course - not boarding, skiing. Used to race in high school, coached and taught through college, now wait for the sunny days that follow the big storms and get out when I can. Hope to still ski when I'm 80!

And since I can't ski in the summer (unless I go very south), I'd rather fly fish than golf, any day. Even if I don't catch anything...

I can't call computers a hobby - because it's my business. Started a small shop in 1979, and we're still at it, the first systems we sold came from Intertec Data Systems in South Carolina. 32k (not meg or gig, k!!) or RAM, 2 floppies, 9 inch monochrome screen, Z-80 processor, sold for $3495. Oh yeah, the operating system, CP/M had just released Version 2. V2 would load in 32k of RAM, but you were done, no more memory left. Adding another 32k was $400, so the system really sold for $3895, if you wanted to do anything. (Google Intertec Superbrain)

There ya go...

[Rickster]

Amateur Radio (extra class) AE7RS - Volunteer Examiner Liaison

Music - Keyboards - Synths

Genealogy - DNA Test Project Coordinator

Computer Heraldic Art - See my avatar

[Pooky125]

Gee, besides photography?

My current main one is riding horses. I take lessons and lease a horse, while doing basic grunt labor around the stable.

Have a couple of aquariums going. Nothing spectacular yet though.

I knit on and off. It's mostly a winter hobby.

I bead, using mostly seed beads, though sometimes with precious or semi-precious stones.

[dantuyhoa]

Cooking .

Reading .

Water color painting .


Drooling at nice old camreas .


Flirting with beautiful women . Very expensive hobby but it's good for economy

[SpecialK]

Body-surfing/boogie boarding (got too old, cold and wet :-)
Flew remote-control airplanes (finally got bored and sold it all).
Put together the best website about the Wonder Years TV show. (Finished, finally).
Collected lots of DVDs (now reselling many).
Reading (less over the years).
Photography on and off for 35 years.

[dosdan]

In the mid-60s/early-70s it was electronics, particularly audio electronics.

Then it was wine.

Around 1976-77 I used to road-race motorycycles: Yamaha TA-125, Bultaco Metralla 250 (race kitted), Yamaha RD350, Kawasaki 750.

In the early 80's it was live classical musical recording. I had a Revox A77 15"/sec, half-track tape recorder. Then I had a Sony SL-F1E (Beta PAL)/PCM-F1 portable digital audio recording combo in early '82. My mics were Nakamichi CM-700s in the late '70s and Bruel & Kjaer 4003s in about '83.

At the end of '81, I built a Z-80 computer from Electronics Australia magazine kit (Dick Smith Super-80).

Later, around '85 I needed a computer for uni assignments (mature-age Humanities degree) so I bought a XT PC. Then I realised I was more interested in tech stuff then the humanities. I wrote articles on DOS, QuickBasic programming, x86 assembler programming, dissassembly of the PC/FDD/HDD boot sequence and of computer viruses, anti-virus techniques, OS/2 and ReXX programming. I rose up the 10MHz XT, 386DX/33, 486DX/50, Athlon 1800, CoreDuo 2 chain of computers.

In 1996 I got married and lost interest in the many hundreds of hours I used to spend researching and writing computer articles.

Last 6 years it's been video photography (2xPanasonic NV-GS400s, JVC GR-DV900), video editing (Sony Vegas Pro 6/7/8), and audio recording (Sharp MDs, Sony Hi-MD and now Zoom H4 SD recorder).

Since I wanted to created better DVD covers and was not being supplied with good quality event stills, I decided to get into DSLRs and that's why I bought a K100D Super mid last year. But now, with a wife & 4 young kids, I don't have much money to spend on myself, so I'm mainly interested in older, 2nd-hand Pentax lens. I'm more technically, rather than artistically orientated, but I still try to achieve satisfying photos.

[Bramela]

Other than photography, not a great deal of time for much else (I dont know where the time goes)
I do a bit of furniture building, love woodworking.

Keen gardener, specialising in Bromeliads and some orchids.

Collect WW1 and WW2 pinback badges, have now collected about 800, with some vary rare specimens. Collection was started by my Grandmother.

Anybody got any old tinny pinback badges of a very old Kind?????

Neraly forgot, am a real wine buff, particularly Red wine (Merlot & Cab Sav) Fine Aussie wine of course which is some of the best IMHO

[J.Scott]

I love flying and got my Private Pilot license a few years ago, but haven't flown in a while.

I am kind of addicted to learning and started to take some university courses last year with hopes of achieving a BA. However, it, like flying is rapidly becoming cost prohibitive.

I like woodworking but I am just not very good at it.

Photography is still #1.

[blinxdk]

Nice ride blinxdk, Mine is a wee bit more docile by todays standard.

As long as it has two wheels and an engine, it's good in my book

What bike is it?

[vievetrick]

Red Sox Baseball
Bird watching
Watching sports in general
HMMMM.... really photography is the main hobby now that I think of it. Not much time for anything else.