What are some hobbies other than reading? I always find myself receding back to playing vidya(cs:go) after reading a ton or needing to cool-down. IIRC there was some guy making some cool rock?(some type of crystals) and I know Nabokov and a few other russians were into butterfly collecting; In one of Franzen's new books I think he talks about bird watching? Not sure. I'm interested in all of these but have no idea where to start as I live in a urban city and have no means of transportation other than a bike, summer break is coming up and I'll love to have stuff to do.
Besides reading, I do crossword puzzles and ride my bike for fun. I occasionally watch movies, but I also gave up tv shows, since most of that is a timesink like vidya.
Evan Ortiz
I like guns and locks and racism
Jason Russell
ironically enough I have a 1900 USCF rating in chess I was a prodigy in Middle School I just think its a waste of time, but not in the sense that it won't do me any good(I mean its a hobby) in the sense that I would have to study/practice intensely for me to play anywhere near the level I want to. Playing chess online its pretty bland compared to IRL and IRL is exhausting and requires practice so I rather take up something else, but wow glad your into chess its a good game.
Cameron Bennett
Ive been learning french as a hobby the whole Rosetta stone, french children books, and watching french movies with subtitles its been very easy though it sounds like you want to be out in nature, something like fishing or hiking.Went bird watching with my grandpa when younger cant recommend .
Jaxon Roberts
I like to lift and read, that's pretty much it, I'm not that interesting
Oh, and eating burgers
Hudson Ortiz
>Playing chess online its pretty bland compared to IRL as someone who only plays online(I have no one to play with OTB) can you please explain what the main differences are between the two?
Ryan Young
Yea your def right, I walk around campus a-lot,do tons of /nightwalks/ and I'm pretty in shape I just don't have good foods to eat so im forever avg weight avg muscle. Tennis sounds cool, no idea where to start/who to play with im a pretty insecure/anxious guy. Yea, Its a huge time sink and I play cause I get lonely and im too exhausted to read, too exhausted to go out so I just fall in the middle. Guns are cool, im broke though also a college student and its a sensitive topic on my campus.Locks are cool no idea what you mean by this though?(lock picking?) I know Spanish and a little French from hs, I want to learn German more than anything;but your right I do want something not so...uh..passive, but rather something with alot of depth but not being inside all day, I already write so that cant be it. Don't know anything about bird watching or butterfly collecting just know its a thing
Trying to see if I can find a bird watching/butterfly collecting guide
IRL >Rating points at stake >Long time controls(i.e. 30mins to 2hrs) >Psychological factor comes into play like you can see people physically stressed/thinking >Make friends with your opponent SUPER easily after maybe go over your game if its not just blunders >Clubs >Matches are round after round pitting the winners v winners losers v losers throughout the tourny(not random online opponents that can be good or bad) >make friends(again) >Its just different the environment is so unique in a tournament hall, everyones silent and once the first move is played you can be playing for hours focused on those 64 squares without realizing(depending on time control) >pieces start flying everywhere when you need to blitz out moves low on time.
Its just so much better, online doesn't even compare. If you've seen the bobby fischer clips of him vs spassky or any chess professional chess players irl its just so much different the aesthetic is insane. Imagine being in deep thought for 30m then you drop a risky ass move on the dude across you and you can see him physically thinking the gears turning in his head.
If your in the US USCF is a memberchip that you can get online for cheap(less than 50$?) and if your outside FIDE is cheap too. Then from there is pretty simple:Google search chess tournaments in (your state). They'll have all the info there time control,time it starts,location and you just walk in earlier and wait for them to put up the matches. You'll figure it out quick
Matthew Baker
I like to swim. I like to wake up in the morning and swim. Makes me really sluggish at work (good thing). Get home, cook dinner, read (and chan) until I go to bed. Weekends I usually just watch porn. >butterfly collection Hah!
Josiah Young
I stopped playing video games half a year ago and now I have nothing. Nothing fills my soul with a shred of joy
It's okay play videogames as a hobby you retarded faggots. It's when it consumes your entire life that and you dedicate days to The Grind that it becomes unhealthy.
imo playing vidya is time better spent than reading most dribble posted on social media or threads entirely full of shitposting.
Samuel Cox
thanks a lot for this reply user. I'm in the UK but I'm sure I'll find a way to get involved in the club scene. Also if you're still here, since you're 1900 rated, would you mind giving me some advice on getting better fast? I've been playing for 3 months and have made my way from a ~900 beginner to a 1500 rated player on lichess.
Wyatt Hill
also I should mention, currently my training consists of just playing daily, doing the occasional tactics trainer, and watching games on youtube on channels like agad.
Lucas Myers
chesstempo.com/chess-tactics.html ^Practice tactics for as long as you can that pretty much determines games all the way up to 1800, but be-careful I became brute headed and only played for tactics in game which made my results inconsistent always. Don't focus on openings at all learn two for white and two for black that is one against 1.e4 and 1.d4.
And on a more Yea Forums related note pick up Nimzowitsch's My System probably my fav chess book ever, its mindblowing to me today still. Focus on your endgame too, if your endgame is solid you will hit 1500 easily if you don't blunder tactical positions away. Dvoretsky's Endgame manual has been praised by every coach I have yet to check it out but it must be good.The art of attack in chess is good too
Dylan Russell
I love birding and just because you're in the city doesn't mean you can't do it! Look for birding groups in your area and I bet there are tons of activities within parks and gardens. I've met a lot of really cool people through birding.
On that note, through birding I got into amateur entomology. This is something you can definitely do as a hobby in the city. discoverlife.org/moth/party.html
Elijah Ortiz
Just noticed that you mentioned butterfly collecting, definitely check out that link!
Anyways, aside from birding I enjoy crossword puzzles, cooking, sewing, and playing piano. The quiet life is best.
Nathaniel Bennett
thanks again
Joshua Walker
i'm getting into astronomical spectroscopy. it's astronomy + a way to actually contribute to science.
I've always loved space, as does everyone, but wanted to know if there was any way I could do something worthwhile with that interest as an amateur. lo and behold.
astronomical spectroscopy. it's moderately expensive to get started ~$1500
and much more expensive to get into it at a level where you can actually obtain and process useful spectra (telescope, slit-spectrograph, guidinging cameras, equatorial mount, aka a good bit more money).
but professional astronomers need help from the amateur community and will put your name on any paper which was aided by your spectra.
Henry Jackson
I draw, it's fun and relaxing after you get through the initial hardships. I also play video games but I don't really consider it a hobby, it's just something nice to do occasionally. Just find something that you're interested in and which has some room for self-development, completely passive hobbies/interests tend to get old fast.
Remember that you don't have to be productive 24/7, that's good way to get a burnout and suck out the joy from things you were supposed to be doing for fun.
Adam Martinez
Art is also a hobby of mine. Personally I like to paint naked people.
Oliver Stewart
Gardening. A lot of fun experimentation goes into it, zero stress, and it's healthy. Trouble is I live in a northern climate so I only get to indulge for a quarter of the year. Pic related - 1 day's yield last summer
Like others said lifting/exercise is more of a necessity than a hobby if you have a sedentary job but you can get more specialized in it into more of a hobby - powerlifting, mountain biking, kayaking, rock climbing, ect.
Personally I train bjj to compete, lift, read, and am shitty at playing guitar and play some vanilla wow when my buddies all want to get on.
Cocaine and drinkings also a good hobby and has a low barrier to entry + its really easy to meet friends ive made a few just being generous with key bumps
Mason Cox
the carrots impressed me. those only yield the second year, correct?
Brayden Murphy
I joined a life drawing class this spring and it was great. Good way to meet other people into drawing and draw things you otherwise wouldn't probably draw. Worth it for social element alone, since art hobbies tend to be solitary.
Evan James
that's some good-looking dirt
Josiah Moore
Most successful in this new york climate are jalapeños, habañeros, and bell peppers. That pic has them and also includes banana peps (spiciest ones in pic) and the long green ones I think are chiles (not worth it - filled with seeds and tasteless meat) This year I put down the staples and some experimental peppers like apocalypse scorpion and black hungarian. Each year I continue whatever was successful and I constantly build new garden beds. We don't have a large yard but you'd be amazed with the volume of yield from a little space.
No, carrots yield year of. Easiest veggie to grow without a doubt and can soldier on well into the cold months before harvest. Like most root vegetables a loose, sandy soil is ideal so they have room to bloatmax.
Thank you, the worms love it. Free compost from the town mixed with my own table scraps and home depot dirt at the end of the summer when it's "dirt cheap"
Cooking, gardening, origami, woodworking, nothing wrong with some vidya either. Challenge yourself, that's the important part of hobbies.
Lucas Barnes
Cool. The garden looks super cozy. Where are the blackberries? I don't see them in the pic.
In the suburbs where I live, blackberries and wineberries grow in the woods in the summer. I like to take walks to pick them :) Wild food foraging is definitely not a city-friendly hobby, but suburbians can look for dandelion, burdock, garlic mustard, sassafrass, black locust flower, and shepherd's purse (eastern seaboard of the United States). Last week I found two morel mushrooms and it was the highlight of my month!
Nolan Evans
I've been replacing video games with books, I feel like video games just aren't very respectful of my time. I still play them a bit here and there, but not nearly as much as I used to.
Nicholas Watson
Unfortunately no decent pics of the brambles. Big thorny mess with what appear to be twenty different plants but I'm sure they're shoots of the same blackberry bush. Foraging seems pretty neat. I've eaten wild raspberries but I wouldn't mess with mushrooms. Pic is the vine of those odd gourds from my first pic. Wound up being nice halloween decorations I put all over the yard.
Nothing wrong with playing videogames once in a while. I played DBZ FighterZ yesterday for half a hour, that's my first half hour of videogames in maybe weeks. It's not the act of playing videogames per se: it's doing it everyday for hours and hours and hours. That is what you should avoid.
Anyway I still like music a lot.
Jonathan Green
Yeah, I just identified them on sight and left them alone because a) there were only two, so not really sustainable and b) there are a couple morel lookalikes that might be dangerous. But blackberries/wineberries/raspberries are basically the safest thing to forage since anything that's a lookalike is probably also edible.
Forgot to mention mulberries! Those are great.
Levi Russell
this life sounds comfy. what do you do at work? imean where do you work?
Brody Cruz
same. been reading book of the new sun and want to check out a pynchon novel from my local library tomorrow.
Jace Adams
Smart animals need play. video games can (but not always) scratch this itch. I'd say that a good 70% of the people saying not to play games in this thread have minor addiction issues. they chose to forgo games because it "swallows" them. I see it as a bit weak willed, everything in moderation. the all or nothing approach ain't healthy. That said, some of the posters might just be done with current gaming and that's fine. but this /fit/ level of desperately trying grab control of your life to the point of self harm is just retarded.
Anyway, OP I've gotten into tech more recently. not as a consumer but as someone who wants to knows how it all works and to be able to build and repair it. it's been a useful hobby so far. Rock collecting and amateur geology is fun too.
Kevin Young
>after reading a ton or needing to cool-down. Causal. When I need to cool down I just put down the tomes and read some light genre fiction
Lucas Wright
collected guns and shot them for a while but i cant afford to much anymore. looking to get into hiking, camping /out/ stuff so i can appreciate nature and maybe get inspiration from that. im saving so i can start traveling as well and experience other countries. hopefully ill be able to explore off the beaten path and meet people and find interesting places besides tourist traps. and of course lots of reading and writing.
I like to play board games with my friends every weekend. I also paint, which is a great hobby since memories and love are implanted in every single one I do. Also going to start going into math and double major, I'm 20.
Adrian Butler
Software. Major city. I live with my grandma. I want to retire to subsistence farming in a couple years. Retard. Let's hear your weekend plans
Tyler Martinez
Which boardgames do you play? More importantly, where to get friends to play them with?
Nathaniel Miller
I've got so many to be honest. My favorites are definitely Twilight Imperium, Food Chain Magnate, Terra Mystica, Dead of Winter, and Monopoly. I play with my friends from high school to be honest; I haven't made any good friends in college who keep connections, for I attend a commuter school and neither do I use any social media applications.
Oliver Cox
Hiking, Origami, rowing, Badminton, jogging, fancy cooking and boardgame rounds with friends and reading.
Jayden Young
My hobby is coming here to shitpost.
Dylan Gonzalez
learning and music
Connor Thompson
>reading >a hobby boy oh boy have i got the place for you >>>reddit.com/r/books
Josiah Brooks
Go to the rock-climbing/boldering gym m8. You can rent shoes at the gym or buy some cheap used ones off ebay/craigslist. Only drawback is that the gym can be a bit expensive. But at least go try it a couple times. Really fun and also good exercise. You can be introverted and just listen to headphones too, and its not all akward like a normal gym. Plus the gyms in cities are always full of crazy-beautiful girls and they are actually fairly nice usually.
Nathaniel Rodriguez
Growing plants and fruit is fun. Making wine and cider too, it's easy af and you can use the fruit you grow yourself. Takes a long time though.
