Please do. It's a skill for life and a great equalizer, quite literally, once people have installed the foils on the boards there is quite literally nothing left to invent in the sport/hobby.
It's like biking, people can trim a quarter of an ounce from the bike/board here and there but the body movements and techniques that you learn now will be absolutely the same 100 years from now.
Lately I've been trying to get away from anything involving a screen outside of work. At the moment I'm spending a lot of time cooking and working on basic repair projects around the house. Once it gets warmer, I'll transition to things like camping, gardening, and fishing. I've also wanted to get into bow hunting, but it's not popular in my area so I haven't found anyone to go with.
I love going to my local YMCA because I enjoy seeing the regulars every day and they have everything I need - dumbells, isolation machines, benches and squat racks.
Love it! Have you ever tried Modded Minecraft? Huge fan of the same types of games, and nothing except factorio hits quite as hard as expert packs in Minecraft for me.
Enigmatica 2: Expert Extended, Nomifactory (GTCEu Port), and Gregtech: New Horizons are some of the most engaging factory building games I've ever had the pleasure of playing! Highly recommend giving it a shot if you like that style of puzzle solving :)
I asked myself that question at the start of the year and the answer was: I have none! I realised that I was rapidly approaching retirement age and I had nothing to do when I stop software stuff!
So I've changed all that and tried a few things. I've settled on golf (used to play as a child - I'm 49 now) and playing piano (played that as a child too).
Anyway... I'm happy af now (only way to put it).
Not to sidetrack this but I reckon unfinished stuff is a definite cause of mid-life crisis: I realised that I start many things but don't finish them and often use the excuse, "meh, it wasn't for me!" to justify it and funnily enough, from the middle of last year to this year I was decidedly unhappy but couldn't put my finger on it. Since I picked up the piano and golf again (both things I quit at before), I've never been happier.
I don't think that's a sidetrack at all. It's unfortunate that the midlife crisis (particularly for men) has been so thoroughly ridiculed by the intellectual classes and the entertainment industry.
It's natural and, I would say, healthy to become more reflective when you come to realize that you've lived more years already than you're going to live in the future.
And having some activities that give meaning and joy to someone just in and of themselves is an important part of living well. Like you, I've found myself bothered by hobbies I put down years before out of a feeling that I wasn't good enough, didn't have the time, etc. Good on you for getting back to both golf and piano!
Anything up to 30ish miles is comfortable to me. But I’ll only do that on trails or particularly scenic roads (both of which I have available on foot from my apartment). And I limit myself to one or two outings like that per quarter. Other than that it’s mostly 3-10 miles per run depending on what I feel like doing.
I’ve been running for 15ish years and probably take a full week off a year if I’m feeling anything uncomfortable that affects my stride. Other than that I try to average 20-40 miles a week depending on the time of year and how I’m feeling overall.
The things I think I do differently from most runners are:
1. My #1 goal is to be running in 30 years. So I’ll sacrifice distance and speed today for that goal.
2. I care about speed very little. I enjoy being outside and moving so probably 1% of my mileage is at a high intensity.
I host 3 weekly book clubs with various friend groups via Discord which is very rewarding and a great way to socialize! Highly recommend for any people who enjoy reading to give a book club a shot—not only does it deepen my relationships with friends, it provides a ton of different perspectives on motifs, themes, and moments in the story that resonate with others.
We've tended towards fantasy series, but have done some sci-fi and other works as well. Currently reading through Malazan: Book of the Fallen in one group (Near the end of Memories of Ice (book 3)) and Mother of Learning in another. The third group is currently on hiatus but we'll vote on the next series soon and resume next year.
I'm also very into music (both listening and playing). Recently restrung my 7-string guitar with heavier gauge strings and have been learning some new stuff in lower tunings than I'm used to (Drop F and Drop G#).
Haven't engaged seriously with it in some time, but I used to be really into Yoyo's, specifically 1a style throwing. Super rewarding hobby that can be fun for beginners to advanced throwers.
Finally, I really enjoy video games. Lately I've been into MMO's (WoW, FFXIV, OSRS, GW2+1, etc.) but love puzzle games, factory building games, and RPGs/ARPGs.
I haven't read Malazan but I've heard it's very hard to get into. I've seen trying to read the first book being likened to being dropped in a remote Chinese village with no manual or linguistic ability in Mandarin.
For your group to not only successfully complete the 1st book, but to also proceed till the 3rd book must have been a challenging feat.
Thanks! I think the difficulty can be a little overhyped sometimes, but it's definitely been a challenging read! More than anything, it often presents information with little context and leaves you to wonder for a while (sometimes books) before finally explaining things. The nice thing about reading it in a group is we can all share different insights and predictions for the things that are happening.
I think we're going to make it through the whole series because everyone is still very engaged with the books but only time will tell haha. Definitely a marathon of a series!
Honestly, probably not. It's not necessarily that I don't think someone who's primarily familiar with Sanderson/Rothfuss/etc wouldn't be __capable__ of reading it—it's more that the format of the story and narrative are so vastly different than the styles of more mainstream fantasy works that it's hard to say whether or not it would resonate with you.
Some readers of the series would recommend reading 1-3 books before making a judgement on it, but I think that it's just not for most people. If you'd like a challenge and enjoy the process of solving a big crazy puzzle, than I'd say go for it! But if you are more interested in reading something that you can just pick up and enjoy, there are better series out there.
If you're looking to try some stuff outside the Sanderson/Rothfuss bubble, some of my personal favorites are Mother of Learning by Domagoj Kurmaic and Cradle by Will Wight.
The former is a fantasy time loop story about a young academy student who becomes stuck in a month long time loop and has to figure out how to get out of it.
The latter is a underdog eastern fantasy story that's kind of like an anime in book form where quite possibly the weakest person in the world learns of an apocalyptic event that he needs to get strong enough to stop in order to save his loved ones.
Both are progression fantasy, a fun sub-genre that is more focused on the acquisition of power than a more traditional epic fantasy series like the authors you mentioned have, but could be a fun way to branch out and explore some other styles of fantasy writing!
That's awesome, I want to read (part of?) Malazan in 2024, after having finally gotten around to reading Wheel of Time in 2022-23.
And I also have a collection of YoYos! Haven't learned too much relatively speaking, but I did love it when I focused on it and always want to get back into it.
The Wheel of Time is one that I'd like to read eventually too! Best of luck with Malazan! Our group has had a blast—definitely rewarding to read with a group if you can find others willing to commit because it's so dense that we're often able to theorize or point out parts that others overlooked!
Also love that you collect YoYo's too! My favorite is my OneDrop Markmont Classic. Smoothest and most balanced YoYo I've ever tried! Do you have a fave?
Yes, I've heard so much about Malazan. I basically got into fantasy more big time a couple of years ago, and decided to start going through the most popular series, and WoT was first up, being the probably most popular. (I was and am a huge Sanderson fan before this, that's one reason I decided to read more fantasy.)
YoYo's - actually my first YoYo was a OneDrop. I was collecting spinners at the time and they came out with a spinner, which is how I heard of them, then they came out with the Deep State YoYo, which sounded really cool as a "carry around everywhere" kind of thing. Of course it's not a very good YoYo for actually learning, it's thin and semi-responsive.
I haven't really played enough with any of my YoYos, but I think my favorite of the ones I have is the Boost Afterburner. It just looks amazing, and plays beautifully. But I've probably actually played the most with the Shutter and the Replay (plastic YoYo).
We read a set amount of a book on a schedule (2-3 chapters usually) then discuss as a group our thoughts on parts of the story that stood out to us. Sometimes it's predictions for the future, sometimes it's specifics about characters and their relationships to others, sometimes it's a meta-discussion about themes and motifs present in the writing and how they relate to our experiences and lives, and sometimes it's just us sharing thoughts on parts we found to be awesome!
I find it helps to discuss these things with others because oftentimes I can miss certain parts of a story or interpret events in a way that others interpreted differently. Those types of things can lead to super interesting conversations that teach us more about ourselves and the world around us so it's a fun way to get introspective and learn by deepening relationships with others!
They're usually about 1 hour long conversations that are very free-form, so there's not really a right or wrong way to do it—if you want to give it a shot, just find some people with an interest in reading something together and meet up for discussions!
Good info, thanks. A person in a WhatsApp group I am in, but not known to me, started such a club recently, so I was interested to know what it was about.
PS2 is still going? That is dangerous news lol, I spent way too much time playing it and had a blast. It was (and maybe still is) popular, but I’ve always felt it was underrated for what it was. No other game has given me the wild one-off experiences you get when you hop on when it’s just slammed.
The ones I participate in currently:
Off-road truck building (mostly rock crawling),
Metal fabrication (welding, tube bending, etc),
Weightlifting,
Surfing,
Built a pond in the backyard with bluegill and leopard frog.
Swing dancing is the most important hobby I have because it is the foundation of my social circle and helps me to build relationships with people outside of my immediate professional and economic circles.
It's also great to be able to go to pretty much any reasonably sized city, head to a dance and immediately start building a new social circle.
Besides this, I have been making live programming videos on YT for a while, but more recently I've started experimenting with using video as a medium for storytelling and highlighting things I appreciate in the various communities I am a part of.[1]
hope its a bit of pun. if not, everyone makes mistakes. sometimes really big/grave/stupid/silly ones. its OK. its really OK. call it learning/lessons. a more positive way to see the same things.
Photography, both analog and digital. I particularly enjoy the former as no computer is involved - I stare at one all day at work, thankyouverymuch.
Ham radio, in particular tinkering and construction - I am an RF engineer by education, but work outside the field - so the hobby is a good way to at least retain some skills.
Oh, and I do traditional textile dyes for my mother and a few handfuls of her fellow weaving artisans.
No, never quite got around to that, I'm afraid - has been on my to do-list for ages, but every time I sit down to do something about it, I glance over at my cameras and go out shooting another couple of rolls instead! (Mostly landscapes and the occasional portrait - I live in the proverbial middle of nowhere, so there's an awful lot of reasonably untouched nature right outside...)
(Gostei das suas fotos e sinto muita falta de estar em uma cidade de verdade, como você e seus amigos! (Eu trabalho no Brasil alguns meses por ano, então falo um pouco de Português!)
Building motorized Bikes.
I'm well versed in bike ridding and maintanance, and in 2020 I started mounting 2-stroke engines on them. It's nice hobbie to learn about internal combustion engines, because it is very cheap and very diy. The community is nice (they still use those subject spefic old forums).I don't have to care too much about registrations and rules.
I use the bikes I build to go where I'm too lazy to pedal.
101 comments
[ 3.5 ms ] story [ 183 ms ] threadGuitars
DJ sets
Jiu Jitsu
It's like biking, people can trim a quarter of an ounce from the bike/board here and there but the body movements and techniques that you learn now will be absolutely the same 100 years from now.
I should use it.
Enigmatica 2: Expert Extended, Nomifactory (GTCEu Port), and Gregtech: New Horizons are some of the most engaging factory building games I've ever had the pleasure of playing! Highly recommend giving it a shot if you like that style of puzzle solving :)
So I've changed all that and tried a few things. I've settled on golf (used to play as a child - I'm 49 now) and playing piano (played that as a child too).
Anyway... I'm happy af now (only way to put it).
Not to sidetrack this but I reckon unfinished stuff is a definite cause of mid-life crisis: I realised that I start many things but don't finish them and often use the excuse, "meh, it wasn't for me!" to justify it and funnily enough, from the middle of last year to this year I was decidedly unhappy but couldn't put my finger on it. Since I picked up the piano and golf again (both things I quit at before), I've never been happier.
Anyway, golf and piano :-D
It's natural and, I would say, healthy to become more reflective when you come to realize that you've lived more years already than you're going to live in the future.
And having some activities that give meaning and joy to someone just in and of themselves is an important part of living well. Like you, I've found myself bothered by hobbies I put down years before out of a feeling that I wasn't good enough, didn't have the time, etc. Good on you for getting back to both golf and piano!
I’ve been running for 15ish years and probably take a full week off a year if I’m feeling anything uncomfortable that affects my stride. Other than that I try to average 20-40 miles a week depending on the time of year and how I’m feeling overall.
The things I think I do differently from most runners are:
1. My #1 goal is to be running in 30 years. So I’ll sacrifice distance and speed today for that goal.
2. I care about speed very little. I enjoy being outside and moving so probably 1% of my mileage is at a high intensity.
We've tended towards fantasy series, but have done some sci-fi and other works as well. Currently reading through Malazan: Book of the Fallen in one group (Near the end of Memories of Ice (book 3)) and Mother of Learning in another. The third group is currently on hiatus but we'll vote on the next series soon and resume next year.
I'm also very into music (both listening and playing). Recently restrung my 7-string guitar with heavier gauge strings and have been learning some new stuff in lower tunings than I'm used to (Drop F and Drop G#).
Haven't engaged seriously with it in some time, but I used to be really into Yoyo's, specifically 1a style throwing. Super rewarding hobby that can be fun for beginners to advanced throwers.
Finally, I really enjoy video games. Lately I've been into MMO's (WoW, FFXIV, OSRS, GW2+1, etc.) but love puzzle games, factory building games, and RPGs/ARPGs.
For your group to not only successfully complete the 1st book, but to also proceed till the 3rd book must have been a challenging feat.
I think we're going to make it through the whole series because everyone is still very engaged with the books but only time will tell haha. Definitely a marathon of a series!
Some readers of the series would recommend reading 1-3 books before making a judgement on it, but I think that it's just not for most people. If you'd like a challenge and enjoy the process of solving a big crazy puzzle, than I'd say go for it! But if you are more interested in reading something that you can just pick up and enjoy, there are better series out there.
If you're looking to try some stuff outside the Sanderson/Rothfuss bubble, some of my personal favorites are Mother of Learning by Domagoj Kurmaic and Cradle by Will Wight.
The former is a fantasy time loop story about a young academy student who becomes stuck in a month long time loop and has to figure out how to get out of it.
The latter is a underdog eastern fantasy story that's kind of like an anime in book form where quite possibly the weakest person in the world learns of an apocalyptic event that he needs to get strong enough to stop in order to save his loved ones.
Both are progression fantasy, a fun sub-genre that is more focused on the acquisition of power than a more traditional epic fantasy series like the authors you mentioned have, but could be a fun way to branch out and explore some other styles of fantasy writing!
And I also have a collection of YoYos! Haven't learned too much relatively speaking, but I did love it when I focused on it and always want to get back into it.
Also love that you collect YoYo's too! My favorite is my OneDrop Markmont Classic. Smoothest and most balanced YoYo I've ever tried! Do you have a fave?
YoYo's - actually my first YoYo was a OneDrop. I was collecting spinners at the time and they came out with a spinner, which is how I heard of them, then they came out with the Deep State YoYo, which sounded really cool as a "carry around everywhere" kind of thing. Of course it's not a very good YoYo for actually learning, it's thin and semi-responsive.
I haven't really played enough with any of my YoYos, but I think my favorite of the ones I have is the Boost Afterburner. It just looks amazing, and plays beautifully. But I've probably actually played the most with the Shutter and the Replay (plastic YoYo).
I find it helps to discuss these things with others because oftentimes I can miss certain parts of a story or interpret events in a way that others interpreted differently. Those types of things can lead to super interesting conversations that teach us more about ourselves and the world around us so it's a fun way to get introspective and learn by deepening relationships with others!
They're usually about 1 hour long conversations that are very free-form, so there's not really a right or wrong way to do it—if you want to give it a shot, just find some people with an interest in reading something together and meet up for discussions!
- germinating native trees in my yard to replant in the wild
- trying to increase biodiversity by attracting pollinators and pests, and covering with native plants.
- trying to improve the soil health of my yard: cover crops, low-till, (vermi)composting
I did organic gardening for a few years, earlier, as a hobby.
Have you tried no-till, like Ruth Stout, etc.?
- Gamedev (same TD game project for like 10+ years, off and on)
- Building random things with PIs and a 3d printer (remote controllable FPS robot, cat laser toy, etc.)
- Photography
- Hiking
- Random home improvements (most notably a budget theatre setup)
- Reading for self improvement
I'd like to pick up an instrument (played several, decades ago) or cooking. Maybe when I retire.
It's also great to be able to go to pretty much any reasonably sized city, head to a dance and immediately start building a new social circle.
Besides this, I have been making live programming videos on YT for a while, but more recently I've started experimenting with using video as a medium for storytelling and highlighting things I appreciate in the various communities I am a part of.[1]
[1]: https://youtu.be/79ceG6RCLHA?si=YbD1XMsSb8mZWQ8Z
Exploring the uses if LLM AIs in education.
Ham radio, in particular tinkering and construction - I am an RF engineer by education, but work outside the field - so the hobby is a good way to at least retain some skills.
Oh, and I do traditional textile dyes for my mother and a few handfuls of her fellow weaving artisans.
(Gostei das suas fotos e sinto muita falta de estar em uma cidade de verdade, como você e seus amigos! (Eu trabalho no Brasil alguns meses por ano, então falo um pouco de Português!)