Hobbies

A comment I just wrote in response to JadedLotus‘s comment here made me think about hobbies, and how mine have changed a bit over the years.

Funny things, hobbies. Wikipedia defines a hobby as a pastime:

practised for interest and enjoyment, rather than financial reward. Examples include collecting, making, tinkering, sports and adult education. Engaging in a hobby can lead to acquiring substantial skill, knowledge, and experience. However, personal fulfillment is the aim.

…

An important determinant of what is considered a hobby, as distinct from a profession (beyond the lack of remuneration), is probably how easy it is to make a living at the activity. Almost no one can make a living at cigarette card or stamp collecting, but many people find it enjoyable; so it is commonly regarded as a hobby.

My hobbies definitely fall into the category of activities-one-can’t-make-a-living-from, but thinking about it, some of them have definitely helped me at work.

Reading would have to be my Number One hobby. (If you’ve been reading this blog for a while you would probably have guessed.) My library shows the range of things I read: science fiction, crime fiction, Malaysian, Indonesian, Chinese language fiction, linguistics. Blogs feature here too, as I read a lot of blogs these days… How does reading help with my job? Besides filling my head with all sorts of useful facts and fancies, I’d say it also helps my memory – I seem to have a knack of remembering strange facts, and better still, am often able to dredge such facts up in response to obscure questions, or at parties. It all goes towards The Mystique of The Librarian. Such as it is 😉

I’d have to say that blogging is my next most rewarding hobby, even if it is my newest one. Besides giving me writing practice, I’m loving the fact that I’m getting to know so many people from all over the world. Workwise blogging helps because I learn so much from other bloggers – whether it’s technology related, or to do with my profession as a whole, or just the whole gamut of issues people are talking about these days.

Games – computer games – also take up a bit of my time. At the moment? World of Warcraft. I’m making friends and enjoying it whenever I catch up with Morgan in that world. Workwise: problem solving, lateral thinking, learning interfaces, typing. (Yes, typing – in-game chat has given me hours of practice with the keyboard. I have never learned how to type, formally, but years of chatting – IRC, email, in-game, IM – all great practice. I don’t need to look at the keyboard.)

Finally, my (not so) secret hobby: fountain pen collecting. I haven’t actually bought a single pen this year, not since my self-imposed ban on lurking on eBay. This hobby is an expensive one and after a while I decided that I needed to stop “needing” that Pelikan M400 (or whatever). My credit card can’t take the strain, even if it is such fun getting parcels from all over the world… These days I limit myself to penspotting. Meetings can be interesting (why do so many senior academics own Montblanc ballpens??). Workwise? Well, writing with fountain pens is good for my handwriting. And perhaps it also gives me an eye for detail!