It never ceases to amaze me how specialized human knowledge and interest can get. No matter how useless or trivial something may appear to be, there’s going to be somebody or maybe even a group of somebodies who are very seriously into that very thing. It may be some obscure craft or art. It may some long outmoded skill. It may be some peculiar animal or plant or even mineral that people get way deep into.
I mean people get doctorates in stuff I didn’t even know was taken seriously.
Compared to “normal stuff” (your definition) what’s the most out-there thing you’re into?
In my past, at various times, I’ve had interest in:
archery
knife throwing
macrame’
writing haiku (and other forms of poetry)
chess
But I never got really deeply into anything but chess and even that has been off-and-on and it’s been over 10 years since I played a serious game.
Even if you’re not really a practitioner of an odd interest, but know somebody who is, what do you rate as “really strange” to spend a lot of time, effort and money on?
I’m into making anime music videos, and I’m currently trying to learn AviSynth and all that tech stuff. So far I’ve written an avs function for cropping and comparing different clips, which seems to be the video filtering equivalent of ‘Hello World’, but I don’t see myself writing dll filters for a long time.
I was in a bookstore a few days ago and I looked at the “crafts” shelves. There was nothing but books on knitting and macrame. Not a single one on pottery. So macrame can’t be that arcane.
For me, my hobby is disguises. I like to disguise myself and go to places where my friends hang around, and observe them unrecognized. I change my hair color (sometimes with wigs) and put on beards and mustaches. I also change the way I walk, which, I’ve found, is one of the first ways a person is recognized.
I even went to my high school graduation in disguise (in the audience). I was disguised as a hippie, and sitting next to my math teacher, who didn’t recognize me until I said, after a pull on a cigarette, “Yeah, I coulda been there too, but it wouldn’ta been worth three years of my life.”*
She looked at me for a moment, and then just started laughing.
*Yes, I did graduate, I just didn’t participate in the ceremonies as “myself.”
I collected cat whiskers for 14 years. Sometimes I’d get em out and look at them, line them up by size and color etc. When my cat passed on I built a nice wooden frame to display them. It’s very whiskery!
It was a nice mini-hobby, but I don’t think I’ll do it I again when I get my next kitty. After all, there’s only so much wall space one can devote to whiskers.
Well, collecting records isn’t unusual or arcane, but I like oddities.
I collect mistakes and pressings recalled or otherwise unavailable to the public. Records with no label on one side, or no printing on the label by accident. Singles that had one B-side, were recalled and reissued with a different B-side. Records with printing variations from different lithographers, such as different text or text placed in a different spot, or different label stock made with alternate print or color paper. Test pressings, made so they could hear what the music sounded like on a record (which is worlds different from how it sounds on tape). Sometimes these test pressings contain alternate mixes of one or more songs, which they went back to fix before release. Albums that had the cover graphics changed for some reason - usually what someone perceived to be an obscenity, real or imagined. Radio promo records, which usually have a white label with “Promotional - Not For Sale” on them. Many of these have different mixes of the song made specially for radio.
Albums with songs that were later removed or changed, like John Fogerty’s “Centerfield”, which originally had a song called “Zanz Kant Danz”, until Saul Zaentz, owner of Fantasy Records and Fogerty’s nemesis, sued for what he saw as thinly veiled slander. The record was recalled and reissued with the vocals on that track redone and the song retitled “Vanz Kant Danz.” Or Bob Dylan’s “Highway 61 Revisited” that has an alternate take of “From A Buick 6” on the first mono pressing, which was recalled and replaced with the proper take. I don’t have a Beatles “Yesterday And Today” butcher cover, though. Too expensive.
I also collect concerts, broadcasts, interviews and studio outtakes by artists we all know, from Aerosmith to Zappa. Hundreds of 'em.
It’s not quite arcane, but I am in the field of humor research. It’s all very serious. We have conferences and a journal, and we write books. And we’re not funny. Actually, I was unintentionally funny at the most recent conference–the newspapers got a shot of me with my head down on the desk during the president’s address (conclusion, if the professionals are asleep, this is obviously boring and therefore very serious business).
I’m also into silverware, and specialized silverware, and rare and antique silverware. I don’t own a lot, but I know a thing or two about it.
All I was trying to say in the OP is that my interests have been rather tame or middle-of-the-road, and that the listed ones are about as “weird” as I have gotten. Rather than just not giving any indication of my own interests I listed those.
Good heavens, this is the first time in over thirty years that I’ve felt mainstream. The closest thing to an arcane hobby I’ve ever had is that I did a fair amount of medieval and Rennaissance costuming when I was in the Society for Creative Anachronism, and that was over 25 years ago. I’m too lazy to have hobbies like yours. Actually, come to think of it, I’m too lazy to have hobbies.
It’s possible that you might find this interesting, then. It’s the only hardanger fiddle album that I own.
Personally, I invent notational systems. Alphabets, numerical systems, and sets of characters whose meanings I have yet to figure out. I’m not prolific, but I enjoy it.
I’m fascinated by how the ways we depict information affects our understanding of it (Pi in decimal is easily recognized, but Pi in binary mostly is not). Finding optimal ways of representing data to maximize our comprehension of it is an interesting pursuit.
I collect diaries, journals and photographs from the time period of the early 1800s-early 1900s. Any time period beyond that range does not interest me. I’d love to collect even older stuff but unfortunately, the prices go up relative to the age of the diary or journal.
That hobby not obscure or weird enough for you? Well, here’s another one–I still color in coloring books from time to time. I steal the kids’ coloring books all the time. It’s relaxing. The coloring, not the stealing.
