Hi everyone,

I love hearing people talk about things they are passionate about. There's always something new to learn you may have never thought of otherwise. So I would like to open a thread asking you to talk about hobbies that have nothing to do with slings and slinging; things you collect, activities you enjoy, interests that inspire you into effort. I want to hear about your weird and niche interests and collections, the more unusual the better.

I'll start.

My main hobby is games, in general. It started with videogames when I was a kid, but expanded in my late twenties into an interest in all games. I love videogames, board games, card games, dice games, gambling games, pen and paper games, tabletop role playing games, live action role playing games, wargames, game theory, etc. I could talk about any one of those for hours.
I have a modest collection of modern board games, and other games and gaming paraphernalia, and my desk always has dice or cards or tokens of some kind to fiddle around with.
My interests within the hobby seem to shift throughout the year, and I'm currently more closely interested in tabletop role playing games (Quinns Quest on Youtube is a goldmine), but I'm getting back into dice games (James Ernest has fun games, and Knizia's book "Dice Games Properly Explained" is incredible), and card games (Cribbage and Regicide look great).
I personally think that tabletop role playing games are a celebration of human creativity. Game mechanics, combined with theme and storytelling into a vessel for human interaction with endless possibility for creativeness.

My second biggest hobby are fountain pens and inks. I have been writing with a fountain pen since i was 10, and except for a hiatus of about 2 years have never stopped. Fountain pens do not have to be expensive to write well (My most expensive one cost about 40 eur), but you can get into really extreme ones if you're interested.
The inks are the best part for me. The variety has exploded in the past decade and we now have inks with shimmering sparkles, inks that sheen in different colors, inks with special effects, and every color you can imagine.

Another one of my interests is Tolkien. I have been in love with his work since my early teens and love everything Tolkienesque. My favorite character is Turin Turambar, and my favorite quote is the Lament for the Rohirrim. The tabletop role playing game The One Ring is an amazing product I would recommend to anyone interested in Tolkien who might want a new way of thinking about Middle Earth.

So that's me. I would love to hear about your hobbies and interests.

Interestingly enough, Rhonan, I had a stint of fountain pen use.  I got a few nice inks that have some of the shimmery changey qualities you mentioned, but once I graduated, I did less writing.  And then COVID hit, and now I hardly write anything. 

Rat man, I've been doing karate for three or four years now, I'm curious what style you do?  I'm practicing Ryuei Ryu, and I really enjoy it.  Earning shodan in Iaido helped a lot, since a lot of the basics translate.

My interest in games has also developed over the years from video games when I was a kid, to pretty much anything.  Though lately slinging has taken any time I'd have for games, either because I'm making a new one, or out using one.

I am into gymnastics/parkour, skateboarding and makro-photography. But I am not getting younger, so parkour and skateboarding is on a low level now. With macro-photography  I specialized in taking pictures of insects and other little animals. I also explored the field of taking pictures of water drops. Therefore I developed an electronic control (first with analog electronics, later with an arduino microcontroller), so I could control the timing of water drops falling into the water and the camera shutter.

@SteAls, do you perhaps remember which inks you used during that period. I'd love to share experiences and thoughts.
I'm currently using Diamine Solstice (Jet black with green sparkles) and Diamine Golden Sands (Warm yellow with gold sparkles). I have a bottle of Pelikan Golden Lapis (Rich sky blue with gold) I'm dying to try out next.

If you want I could maybe recommend hobbies which might justify getting those fountain pens flowing again.

@FloatingFlint That is a stunning image! How do you get the droplets to drop at the exact time to hit the upwards moving jet?