other past or present obsessions?

MP3s - on hold
"Warez" - i've somewhat kicked this one; computers are evil
Beer - alive and kick'n obsession (the best i've found - Tucher)
Cigars - bran-spank'n new obsession

My book obsession is the other main one aside from fragrances. Nothing else really comes close to thos two.

Everything related to a refinement of the senses that comes naturally with age and experience - I wouldn't call that obsessions, though:

- food: preferably my own cooking, or GOOD restaurants (mostly in France). By "good" I do not necessarily mean "expensive" (I could go on and on about this subject...)

- music (classical): the older I get, the more I love Mozart and Schubert. I also love Beethoven, Wagner, Brahms, Mahler, Richard Strauss, Puccini ... (I could go on and on about this subject...)

etc.

By "refinement of the senses" I basically mean things that are GOOD and SIMPLE, or so refined they seem SIMPLE again, like a good and well-made perfume ...

By "etc.", I meant books - my lifelong companions ...

Colognes will always be number one!! I'm also into knives, movies, music, I don't know if this counts buy my girlfriend??? ;D

Colognes are the big one though....

My object sins, past and present ( have to keep adding to the list...) (I TOTALLY forgot my latest passion: Fish Decoys and how oh how did I leave my doggies off this list? They are my LIFE!):

• Dogs. All dogs
• My four doggies. They are above average.
• Oriental rugs and textiles
• All antiques (was a dealer for 25 years before I found my current "job&quot
• Bloomsbury decorative arts
• Rare, unusual, old and new books (always and forever)
• Vintage men's clothing (no longer an interest)
• Asian and American pottery
• Old painting tools related to decorative finishes
• Apothecary chests (anything with lots of little drawers)
• Piano music (I still play, though not professionally)
• Hundreds of CD's (not so many DVDs)
• Old (not new) fish decoys
• and of course...bottles and bottles of smelly smells

Griff

Oh Griff, I knew I adored you!

~ Food
~ Beer & zymurgy
~ Wine

To a lesser extent:

~ Coffee
~ Calligraphy
~ Indie & foreign film
~ Indie & foreign music

Oh Griff, I knew I adored you!
[/quote]


Funny. I was just about to post the exact same thing to YOU!

We epicureans need to stick together.

Griff

Oh, I am in danger of falling in love with you, too, Mad Hatter I wholeheartedly concur with all your sentiments.

Mozart's requiem... Un Bel Di' (or any Puccini melody)...the finale, the trio, in Die Rosenkavalier when the married and older Marschallin relinquishes her young lover, Octavian, and tells him to follow his heart with the younger and marriageable Sophie...a whiff of a beautiful (to me) fragrance whether the product of Jean-Claude Elena or Sweet allysum in a garden border. Ah, happiness!

Jewelry and good bijoux (the latter is really a silly hobby, since I'm allergic to all metals but gold (preferably 18K, but some 14K can also be worn; forget 10K - can't wear it) and platinum).

Not necessarily very expensive stuff, I'm more into "unusual" - my favorite piece is an east-west very light peridot sortabar-sortamarquis (no, that's not a technical term; basically, it's a very narrow and long marquis). It's a cheapy, but I love how it looks.

Also one of my favorites - a 150-thread liquid gold long necklace that I can wear for exactly 90 minutes before I turn tomato-red and start itching. Have to say, sometimes it's worth the itch - looks fantastic with Manhattan Black. And, yes, even if I wear it over clothes, I still get allergic.

I am a recovered / recovering audiophile. Setamp is short for Single Ended Triode amp which uses a type of vacuum tube in place of transistors. I used to trade audio equipment like I trade cologne. Despite owning a stereo system of embarrassing value I would listen for any possible flaw in sonic reproduction and would obsess with isolating the errant component and replacing it with the one that would lead me to the holy grail. I finally decided to find a better (read cheaper) expression of my obsessive/compulsive personality - and here I am.

It's a collecting thing

- Electrical insulators (since a child)
- Vacuum tubes (since a child)
- Hammond B3 organ to consume the tubes
- Tools of all kinds
- UHF antenna arrays & low-noise preamps (HDTV, still haven't found my "signature" antenna)
- Fragrances (latest kick)

Fro-Fro, I have the same challenge. But it's not all metals that most people are sensitive to, it's many common alloys. Â*Nickel is a main offender and it is often used to alloy the much softer sterling silver and gold that otherwise would not stand up to wear -- they would bend out of shape too easily. But not all jewelers or metalsmiths alloy with nickel or similarly offending metals hence your hit or miss sensitivities to golds of different purity.

I have a trick I use with gold earrings and watches. Â*(Even 18 kt gold causes me to react ferrociously.)

Brush the backs of earrings and any part of a piece of jewlry that might touch your skin with several coats of clear, good-quality nail polish. Drying completely in between coats.

This forms a barrier and voila! Â*you might be able to wear your much-treasured liquid gold necklace. The clear polish wears off, so rememebr to reapply a few coats often. (every 2-3 wearings)

Nooooo! What did you do with the rest of it? (Tone wheels, case, etc)
Used it have an old Hammond BC. I can still smell that mix of hot vacuum tubes, machine oil, ozone and polished walnut.

Griff

Obsession is my hobby .

Let's see:

Baseball
Sports in general
Cars
Food
Wine
Antiques
Art
Men's Clothes - high end, hand made suits and shoes
Denim

Of the "collecting" hobbies, fragrance is the most developed as it's easiest on the wallet.

hmmmm,

Motorbike modifying
Guitars
CD's
Live music DVD's

Definately something OCD going on with me ;D

Oh, yes. The bedsheets. Guilty as charged. ;D

photography
books
classical music
shoes
investments

Nooooo! What did you do with the rest of it? (Tone wheels, case, etc)
Used it have an old Hammond BC. I can still smell that mix of hot vacuum tubes, machine oil, ozone and polished walnut.

Griff[/quote]
Perish the thought! The tubes are to insure I can keep it going indefinitely, although I began my fascination with them as a child - there always was a magic to them with their glowing filaments and gassy purple high-voltage glow. They just begged to be understood.

It's a 1964 B3 with 122 Leslie, all stock except the reverb (springs sagged), not a scratch on the cherry. An elderly couple had it in Florida and it came from their estate. And yes, that lovely smell - dust baking on hot tubes and light machine oil dripping onto the pedal brace. Neat that you're a wheelhead too, Griff!

CARS.

I haven't owned the same car for over two years since I was 18.

My obsession is for sports cars with gobs of power. My current ride is a lowered, extremely yellow 2005 Pontiac GTO with several perfomance upgrades, bling wheels and blacked out windows. My other car is a 1965 Mustang that my Mom bought brand new in '65 and recently turned over to me.

My next car will probably be a turbocharged Pontiac Solstice....unless I get the upcoming Shelby Cobra Mustang instead....or maybe the Dodge Charger SRT....

talk about an expensive hobby...

Shoes? Um... Shoes, you say?

*sidesteps to her shoe closet and makes everyone look the other way*

What shoes? I don't know anything about shoes!!! Oh, look, what a strange bird!!! Is it a bird? No, I don't think it's a bird...

:

When I was a youngin, I was much into two things: Â*Dr. Who and Dungeons and Dragons. Â*Those were my obsessions. Â*I had every bit of assorted crap of each of those hobbies I could afford with my allowance! Â*I still have a sock full of multi-sided dice somewhere in a closet. Â*And a few modules -- pretty sure I kept Ravenloft. Â*Anyone else have the Count Strahd von Zarovich love? Â*
But as an adult... Â*nothing really. Â*Except the frags. Â*And books. Â*But I'm not obsessive about the books. Â*I'll hit the library more often than a bookstore -- don't have to own 'em, just like to read 'em. Â*
I've got an apartment full of these Starbucks teddy bears, though. Â*That's the gf's obsession. Â*I swear if Starbucks keeps selling these damn things, we're going to have to move to a bigger apartment! Â* :P

Pedal head too. Was darn good at pumping those pedals. This was in the early seventies when I was a musical schizophrenic vainly trying to emulate my heros Jimmy Smith, Keith Emerson and Virgil Fox, sometimes all at once.

No wonder I am such a mess.

Demeter or someone should create a fragrance based on old vacuum tubes.

Griff

I am dying here! Good one FroFro.

Aaw, I admire people who become obsessive over sound.

I have always had "things": an almost obsessive (in a good way!!) interest in a number of areas:

the last few years it has been:

Progressive house/trance music (I MUST own every album and dj set by certain artists)
Shoes. The last year or so Patrick Cox has been the "in" thing, for me
Fragrances (always keen, now due to more available free-time and the internet, even more pronounced)
Books
History ( I MUST visit sites and places I have been reading about eg. recently Waterloo and the city of Valencia (The Holy Grail etc.)

This "obsessive" nature is a familty trait. It is not all my fault!!

Btw, my star-sign is Aquarius.I have always wondered if this plays any part.

One obsession I had was the old computer game Doom (and the sequels up until, Final Doom). That was the only game I played for 6-7 years, every day, several hours a day. OMG how I still hold it dear to my heart but I never play it anymore. Actually, I don't play anything.

I have almost 1000 records, which I guess is something I've collected. Especially focusing on specific labels instead of artists and getting their complete back catalogues.

Never that good, but liked to imitate the likes of Procol Harum, Blood Sweat & Tears and Santana. I can bring back the 70's with a flick of the start switch, including the scent. Carlos missed his chance. I can't imagine Black Magic Woman without the accompanying ozone-dust-oil smell. Perhaps a few other notes in there too.

What, already? And we haven't even touched on the subject of lingerie chests yet... :

Oh, I had that same thing with Sims. I used to build houses, furnish them, then build others, then furnish them. It was much easier once I found the cheats to the money problem.

I played around with the Sims a bit, too. It's amazing how many hours of fun sending someone to pee and then make them wash their hands can bring. I heard normal people have children to do that, but I find Sims are much more convenient - once they get on your nerves you can just turn the computer off.

first of all my addictions fragrances,then books i read almost everything since i was a child, dvd movies i love classic hollywood pictures,travelling and italian fashion, my prefered diesel ,d&g and gucci,music i love classic ,new age ,pop,brasilian and spanish artists

the only theing that ever came close was:


Watches. i could spend hours online "researching"!

I'm still a college student so no real time to obsess with things (well, maybe a little with perfume but I keep in control). However, I do love to collect books on spirituality and history. Plus I'm really really obsessed about getting into medical school somewhere in the Bay Area in California so I can be close to my parents (hopefully Stanford or UCSF). But that's it for now.

Oh yeah, I'm pretty obsessed with sheesha/hookah also. For those of you who don't know, it's a Middle Eastern vase-looking smoking apparatus. The tobacco used is about 70% molasses and 30% tobacco, and it comes in flavors liek mint, jasemine, apple, and cantaloupe(spelled right?).

When i was younger i had an obsession with videogames and videogame magazines...which may sound silly, but i had a subscription to 3 or 4 magazines at one point. I grew up WANTING to read every month so it really helped me with my vocabulary and grammar.

Other than that:

-Weightlifting/powerlifting/bodybuilding (and the nutrition involved)
-Rifles, specifically highly accurate long distance rifles, and optics (though i never had the income to afford either of these, a good rifle costs more than my first car did, haha, and good optics are insanely expensive too)
-Car wax/polishes...Don't laugh, there is a deep world of car waxes...Man i remember i used to wash and wax my car twice a week back in the day when i had time (and still had a car)
-Mitsubishi 3000GT/Dodge Stealths. Those cars are great, were way ahead of their time. To a lesser extent 300ZX TT. PS, none of the 3000GT/Stealths or 300ZXs riced out, omg i hate ricers.
-Baseball. Playing when i was younger, watching now mostly (wish they had baseball leagues after HS because i HATE softball).
-The Lord of the Rings. The books mostly. I had planned on reading the series once a year, but that isn't going to be possible anymore i don't think (no time). It's ok though, they'll be all the better when i finally do get around to reading them again.
-Beers and liquors. My overall experience with finer beers and liquors has been somewhat limited since i will turn 21 in 2 months, but it'll definitely pick up from there. Lol i don't know how many times i've asked someone to get me Guinness or a local microbrew and having the person come back and tell me i'm crazy because i paid the same amount for 6 beers that they do for 30...haha oh well.
-Lots of beautiful girls that i was/am too shy to talk to...Haha, just kidding...maybe, not.

At one point about six years ago, I went banzai on the guitar stuff!! Top numbers: 14 electric guitars (I know, I know.....that's NOTHING compared to folks like Rick Nielsen of Cheap Trick or Rev. Billy F. Gibbons of ZZ Top! But I almost ran outta room!!).....and to go with those electric guitars, (while glancing towards Ed, Griff, and Setamp)......I at one point owned seven different tube guitar amps, two of which were custom-built from scratch by a good friend and one was a 1969 Fender Dual Showman head. That Dual Showman was used in conjunction with a Marshall 4X12 cabinet and it sounded like GOD!!!


Oh......how could I forget!! Guitar effects pedals!! At one point I owned 63 units in total!! That's a LOT of footswitching....or tap-dancing!!! LOL!!


Oh, and Griff......to add to the list of smokin' B-3 players, I'll add the awesome Joey DeFrancesco!! Just fantastic playin' from such a young man!!! Although I can't play such a wonderful instrument as a Hammond B-3 Organ, I love and respect it and admire anyone who can master such a sweet-sounding instrument!!


And another note: Everyday I drive in to work or when I head home, I drive right past the original Hammond Organ factory and office building on West Diversey Avenue here in Chicago!! As you drive westbound and look at the east side of the building, you can see the faded paint on the brick wall stating those wonderful words........!! HAMMOND ORGAN COMPANY!!

*Closes eyes and plays intro to Black Crowes' "Thorn in my pride" in his head. Giggles and grins when the B-3 whistles it's way into the song!!*

;D ;D ;D ;D ;D ;D ;D

Good question, d4.

1 . . . NF6

Cheers,

Mario

Nice to be able to divert attention--I would if I could. Â*Mine are size 14 and I favor cowboy boots. No hiding 'em.

Running and running shoes
Quality knitwear
Beers and malt whisky

I am also a cigar connoisseur, although full-bodied cigars can give me a headache! Macanudos are my faves.

And Tucher beer is simply amazing! You have great taste, Mad.

I'm also passionate about my little beagle dog. She's a year old now, and i love spoiling her.

Hehe i forgot to mention watches, too. For my birthday i want a mechanical skeleton watch with sapphire crystal!

Mine are a bit simpler:

- Tea
- Car-audio

Soccer, playing and watching
Reading all kind of books, for example novels and philosophy
Music, though I haven't explored anything new for a while, just listening my old favourites nowadays :-[
Playing all kind of competitive games, like poker, chess and MtG

good luck on med school, dude. i cen think of lots of reasons to want to be in the bay area or down the peninsula (Stanford's in palo alto , correct?).

not an obsession or a hobby but i have experienced the shesa/hookah thing with some firends from time to time and its cool.

i'm a little older, time enough for grad school and a job so i can afford some passions, as the lady CeccaSF called them (hmmm, Cecca SF, sf like san fransisco? cecca like the italian nickname for francesca or the pasta, you know pronounced checka. just wondering,not prying. cool)

frags not yet an obsession but definitey a passion along with anythingelse that smells good (like the gf)

my passions?

great food/restaurants.
california, french wines. just learning italian & spanish and a little chile and australia (like deadarm --gotto love the name)
ww ii history
old and indie film
antique tools and intsruments (i'm an engineer, what can i say?)
books, books, books
deep ocean fishing when i get somewhere far south of here where the water breaks 18 or 19*C (65*F) like the exumas , abacos, bimini chain (its better in the bahamas, baby) or florida keys
golf, golf, golf

yeah, those vaccum tubes are something for real sound, too. sometimes analog is better!

* My girlfriend. I am really obsessed with her, something highly compatible with her need for attention
* Coffee
* American cars
* Literature
* Tea
* Ice cream (have to try all different varieties at least once)
* Bodybuilding (as a way of keeping in shape)
* Music
* Audio (I have been an audiophile for 15 years)

My hobbies that I get very immersed into (not sure if I'd call them obsessions) keep changing over time. Currently they include,

Science Fiction - movies, TV and books.
Music - particularly the British space rock band Hawkwind
Astronomy - I have 7 telescopes and 19 pairs of binoculars.
Computers
Stocks, shares and margin lending - life is never dull when you borrow to the max.
Renato

-car shows
-antiques: books, watches, jewelry, crystal and porcelain only.
-the latest technology gadgets.
-vampires.
-chocolate (i have to have one every single day i can identify almost every type of chocolate by tasting it and smelling it)
-pizza and chips.
-jogging
-christie's and sotheby's auctions.
-investment tips.

- Music/Record Collecting
- Prince ;D
- AFL (Australian Rules Football) Go Freo!!!
- Indian Food
- Trivia
- Comedy

- tea
- SF and fantasy novels
- music
- beers
- movies
- role-playing games
...that's enough I guess :P

Porn.

Past:
-Video games
-Roller coasters
-High school football

Currently:
-Photography
-TV news music (don't laugh)
-Commercial aviation
-Computing
-And, of course, smells

smells
coffee
pharmacology [i collect pills ]

You know... in many ways, this has been the most revealing of all possible threads. As diverse as our interests may be, one thing I am certain of; I certainly would not be bored with visiting ANY of you! This is definitely an extremely interesting group. If this were a club, I just might in fact, consider joining! (In spite of my hard and fast rule about joining any club that would have me as a member.)

I see a Basenotes Convention in our future.

How much fun would THAT be!

Griff

In chronological order, not necessarily order of obsession depth:

1) Records, early R&B vocal groups
2) High end audio (SETAMP, What is your system?)
3) Watches, especially Omega
4) Fragrance

Lets see now,

creeks, streams, springs--this is ongoing, left over from childhood

perfect dirt--I kid you not, and of course organic

heirloom tomatoes--started from seed, once grew, oh, 12-13 varieties to rate and compare. All organically.

composting--seems reasonable with the gardening doesn't it? Heh, heh...I collected coffee grounds at the hospital for months, visited a nurse's father to help him clean his rabbit cages, went to my partner's house to cut down and save his cornstalks, the list goes on and on. It's a cheap hobby, anyway.

soup--again born of the gardening hobby, I think. I make soups all the time. My fav right now is potato with butternut squash

bread--SEE, I"M LOGICAL!! Don't bake so much now, but once had dough rising all the time. I mean, I'd grow these veges, make these soups.. I had to make good bread! Now, that smells good!

birds--I have feeders, and books, and a CD with their songs and calls.

flowers--bulbs and roses especially.

skin care--collect and use products faithfully. I won't go out to the mailbox without sunscreen. Its soothing, pure self-nurturing.

fragrances--the natural resultant obsession after all of the above!!!


Oh, and the Robert Jordan "Wheel of Time" fantasy adventure books. Have them all, the last several in hardback, the moment they hit the shelves.

Shycat,

I am so wanting to move in with you.

Griff

ah, the purist