Steady hands. For both of my hobbies.
My hobby is (or rather was) collecting Seiko watches.
I stopped buying watches, but my holy Grail would be “The” Pogue. The original 6139-6005 yellow face automatic chronograph worn by Col. William Pogue on the Skylab mission.
Other than the NASA issued Omegas, this was his personal watch that he just took with him into space, as NASA didn’t want the Astronauts to take their Speedmasters home and so they couldn’t train as much with them.
This also was the first automatic chronograph in space, as no one had tried before if they would work without gravity (surprise, they did, as momentum is still very much a thing in space).
Here is a very nice write up by a very knowledgeable guy:
https://www.plus9time.com/blog/2017/12/24/the-true-seiko-pogue-chronograph-6139-6005
Well, my hobby is searching for historical religious artifacts, so…
Your Holy Grail is the Holy Grail
For example, in the headphone world, the Sennheiser HE-1 headphones are said to be like the pinnacle of headphones and most expensive, costing $59000 for a pair.
Edit: added image
The irony with those is that once you’re at a stage of life where you can afford those, you probably can’t hear anything over 14kHz anyway. At least there’s that sweet midrange!
Out of curiosity, what would you plug those into to get the best use of them? I couldn’t imagine the headphone jack on my motherboard would be able to take full advantage of them.
They’re super special electrostatic headphones, so they have to be run with a special type of amplifier, and the one they come with come is absolutely insane, and is a huge part of the cost. Honestly, I bet you could cost cut the whole thing down to under $20k, but you’re paying a LOT of money for stuff like the fact that the amplifier case is made of marble and has one of the coolest boot sequences imaginable, where all the tubes and knobs rise out of it and retract back in so the whole thing is seamless. It’s very much one of those things that get built when engineers are handed a blank check and told “We don’t care what it costs, have fun”
A workshop 😅
Motivation. I lost it some time around 2015 and have been kinda just killing time before death ever since.
3 other cool nerds to play board games with consistently.
As an old and broken skateboarder, I would love nothing more than a pump track within driving distance.
There are some great parks, but nothing with enough flow that I can just carve around to work up a sweat without have to push or climb a ramp to drop in all the time.
Time
What are you a speedrunner?
In the typewriter community, the “holy grail” differs from person to person, but for me it was a 1930s Royal P equipped with a rare typeface called Vogue. Very, very rarely they’ll pop up from people who don’t know how significant that is, and that’s the only way to get one at a reasonable price - because those who do know what it is will ask thousands of dollars for it.
Eventually I found one for a comparatively cheap price (sub 1k), and the only reason someone else didn’t snap it up before I saw it was because the guy refused to ship it. Local pickup only. So I took the chance to drive the 10 hours round trip to snag it, and it sits proudly as the crown jewel of my collection:
A debit card with limitless funds
I really want a used arcade machine for drum mania. It’s a party of my childhood I miss
I guess an Eleiko barbell:
Pretty much the Rolls Royce of barbells.
My dude. $1,200 is not all that much if it’s something that is going to be part of the rest of your life.
For sure. I just have a fairly decent barbell right now (came as a set with bumper plates) and I’ve got other stuff I need to spend money on. But soon!
I dream of one day finding an original Model M keyboard in a Goodwill or yard sale for like $10. Every time I’m in a thrift store I look over the electronics section JUST in case.
Also waiting for the day I find a random copy of Panzer Dragoon Saga for the Sega Saturn. Only 20,000 north American copies were made, which sounds like a lot but in video game numbers is insanely low. I’ve only ever seen it in the real world once at a gaming convention and it sold for $1,500.
If you want the model M just for it’s feel you should check out Unicomp keyboards. They make modernized versions that feel identical according to a friend who uses one. Although they are way more expensive than 10 dollars.
I actually have had a Unicomp keyboard for a few years now lol. Feels great but I would love to own the original successor one day
