What are your “unusual” hobbies, something you like to do/collect that would seem unusual to an impartial observer?
okay, let me get this joke out of the way first…
[Egon Spengler]I collect spores, molds, and fungus[/Egon]
for me, I collect flashlights, and that collection takes on two distinct forms, first, collecting and using small, high performance lights like Inova and SureFire, I also take inexpensive cheapies and “hot-rod” them into “sleepers”
for example, I have a couple of Fulton Anglehead millitary lights, these are well-worn lights, with lots of character marks, but they still work well, they look stock from the outside, however, one of them has a MJLED PR based LED bulb, it’s an LED stuck in a standard flange-based bulb socket, this is one of my long-runtime lights, with runtime measured in weeks not hours
the other Fulton has a small section of pipe insulation jammed into it to act as a spacer/cushion for the 3 CR123a 3v Lithium batteries inside it, inside the reflector I have a Mag Instrument MagNumStar 6 cell bulb, this one has the power of a 6D cell Maglite crammed into a 2D body, it produces a quite blindingly bright light, something you’d never expect from a Fulton Anglehead
the SureFires are my daily use/carry lights, my two favorites are also modified lights…
one is a SureFire E1L Outdoorsman the Luxeon III LED has been replaced by a Seoul Semiconductor P4, the TIR optic has been replaced with a 20mm reflector, and the stock twisty tailcap has been replaced with an aftermarket shrouded clicky tailcap that also allows the light to be stood on it’s tail to be used as a “candle”
SureFire’s Luxeon TIR lights are very throwy lights, throwing a tightly focused beam a long way, however there’s very little sidespill, replacing the TIR with a reflector creates a more normal “hotspot/spill” arrangement, and the Seoul P4 LED is light years brighter and more efficient than a LuxIII, the stock LuxIII based E1L puts out about 25 lumens, my hotrodded E1L puts out at least 90-100 lumens, and I’m also running it on a rechargable CR123a for even more brightness, and “Guilt-Free-Lumens”
it’s a great little light, just a hair over 3" long, but it’s brighter than a 6D MagLite, and is regulated, so there’s no dimming as the battery drains, the only thing the Mag 6D is better at than this light is being used as a club
my other EDC (Every Day Carry) light is a SureFire A2 Aviator, this one is also modded, in this case, it sports a replacement LED ring created by one of the enterprising modders on Candlepowerforums.com, the stock A2 LED ring is available in a series of colors, however, SureFire does not sell the LED rings as a replacement part, you want a different color A2 than the one you have, you have to buy a whole new light…
the “Aviatrix” mod by CPF’er Atomic Chicken is a replacement LED ring, he has the same colors available as SureFire, AND a few that SF doesn’t offer, like Orange, and Ultraviolet, and unlike the stock SF ring, the Aviatrix is more than a simple LED ring…
first off, the Aviatrix has a few additional modes, it has a Low Beam mode, where one of the LEDs runs, and the other two LEDs are turned off, normal mode has all three lit, and it also has Strobe, Locator Beacon, and SOS modes, the “special” modes require 6 distinct on/off cycles to access them, so it’s hard to access them accidentally, normal operation is a quick 1-second press to switch between high and low beam LED, and the unit remembers the last mode it was in
you can mix-and-match LED colors on the multifunction ring, I have a red LED for the lowbeam mode to preserve night vision, and two white LEDs for normal LED operation
now, here’s where I modded the mod…
the Aviatrix is a very cool mod, much better than the stock A2 ring, however, the “low beam” red LED was too bright and throwy for my tastes, it threw an image of the square LED die surrounded by a dim red ring when in Low only, and when in normal mode, the white LED’s took on a distinct and noticeable pinkish tint with a darker pinkish spot in the middle, somewhat distracting…
so, I pulled the Aviatrix out of the light, and grabbed a green scrubbie pad and scuffed up the surface of the red LED dome, diffusing the light, and put the unit back together…
Voila!, now it’s perfect, on low red, there’s no more “Die-In-A-Ring” , just a nice, smooth red hotspot that falls off to a nice usable spill, and when the white LED’s are lit, the red is almost completely unnoticeable, there’s just enough red to offset the “cool blue” look of the white LED’s
my Aviator is now perfect 
of course, neither my family or cow-orkers understand why i like flashlights, and indeed, often poke good-natured fun at me and my collection…
…until we have a power outage, and they suddenly “need” a light, who’s laughing then…
BWAHAHAHA!
…yes, that would be me…
so, what unusual hobbies do you have?
