Things I'm Passionate About Part 6

Part 6 of this series! A neat one today! Enjoy!

1. Antiques

I love antiques, my parents for example, ZING! Sorry Mom and Dad, love you. Yes, they read my work. Anyway digression; I love antiques, old relics from the past that each hold their own stories of history, whether it’s personal history or from your family, to places you might have history with or just love, to our history as a species or civilization as a whole. Not all old things are antiques, but all antiques are from the past. After reading part 5, it should come as no surprise that I love antique weapons chiefly of all; everything from a 500-year-old short-sword my Dad found at auction to old pistols and rifles from the Alamo I have my eye on. They all fascinate me and add value to my collection and net worth. As I write about antiques in the future, weapons or not, I’ll be talking about individual pieces, collections, famous antique dealers, and adrenalizing auctions. Coins are another passion of mine in this regard; a timeline of the evolution of currencies over the millennia utterly fascinates me.

2. Gaming in General

I think my earliest memories of gaming are playing City on the little Timex computer that my mom would painstakingly rewrite every few months for us until we got our Commodore 64. I probably still have both of those computers kicking around somewhere. The “monitor” for the Timex was a little Casio black and white TV that had a handle on it for, I guess, some kind of portability. I must have been 3 years old or so. I’ve been hooked on digital escapism ever since. Wasting thousands upon thousands of hours of my life gaming. I used to argue that “if you enjoyed it, it wasn’t a waste” but now that I’m approaching middle age, I think my younger self was full of crap. I could have spent those hours learning myriad skills applicable to better jobs, or even just being cooler. Nobody cares that you can beat both quests of Zelda 1 in 46 minutes, but people pay attention if you’ve climbed every mountain in your province. Don’t get me wrong, I have had many non-videogame-based adventures over the past almost-four-decades, but I could have been doing so much more with my life. And I DO love the videogames, they’ve given me much escapism and inspiration over the years but like with most things I’m leaning more on the side of moderation now. Getting old sucks.

3. Watching/Listening to YouTube Videos

I walk a ridiculous amount, mostly for health/weightloss, but also for bragging rights. While I do I hate wasting my time and feeling like I’m accomplishing nothing or being bored alone with my thoughts. To remedy this, I turn to my favorite YouTube channels which bring me amusement and inspiration for the 2-4 hours a day I spend on my feet just doing my exercise. I have many favorite channels, and at one point was subscribed to over a thousand of them. I’ve since culled it down to remove everything that isn’t directly educational, apart from a couple. I did this because it was taking up too much of my time when not walking, focusing on things that weren’t important to bettering myself, my health, my goals and my life. I’m of the philosophy now that unless something is directly education or beneficial to being productive, it’s a waste of time to watch. I do know that we need some time to relax, but I’m still learning how to.

Part 6 of the list of things I’m passionate about done, onto Part 7!