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What are your other guilty pleasures?

HiFidelity

HiFidelity

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Often you find yourself simply spending too much and buying too many things to feed your Reefing addiction. Sometimes I end up channeling my compulsive behavior into other hobbies that way I can feel better about myself unreasonably blowing money with the false sensation that it is justifiable because I didn't throw all my money into one aspect of my life. lol I know I know, very confessional type of statement there but hey, it's more fun that way :)

Some of my other compulsions are as follows:

PC's - Oh boy, every time I have sought out to build a new system I found myself building 3
CAR - This one has dwindled down in recent years, but in the past I've kept several sets of wheels for any one of my cars that wore rubber and were ready to be swapped, sort of like an automotive shoe wardrobe.
Booze - The older I'm getting the more I'm developing a taste for $30 bottles of beer o_O
Audio - Good god, this one requires 3 subcategories, headphones, traditional Hi-Fi (tower speakers, etc) and car audio.

I'm realizing I should stop there before I trigger a serious self audit (not the Scientology type) and start adding up some cost figures ultimately ending up very mad at myself haha...

This was last weekend's project;

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Weighing in at 60lbs we have Vintage Transistor Amps pumping out 250w each :D, my 10x10 office sounds better than the finest concert hall in town.

Oh & now I have my very first quadcopter (drone) on it's way in the mail, I'm screwed, yes, yes I am...

Disclaimer: This thread is NOT wife approved, do not partake if you regularly leave your screen open and walk away from the computer ;)
 
My few are

RC flying. Mostly aerobatic aircraft though I do enjoy all kinds. Quad copter style stuff doesn't quite do it for me.

Bicycles. I've really pared it down to only 1 hard tail, 1 steel road bike n a carbon road bike. I had over 30 bikes at 1 time. Quite a few 1 offs or hard to find eq.

Photography. Another hobby I've pared down substantially. Only 1 body n 3 lens. Had 6 35mm slr, over 20 lens including a very nice Nikkor 600 f4 ED. 4 Leicas with 6 lens, Contax 645 n 5 lens plus bunch of other stuff.

PCs I just build as I need but I do geek out over the latest gear.

Booze is just red wine (esp big cabs), beer n bourbon.

These are just what I'm willing to admit to!
 
Fishing. I do a lot of fishing when I can but haven't been recently. I like fly fishing for trout, deep sea fishing for cods, salmon, etc. Hit me up if you want to go fishing!

Hunting. I haven't done this much but I own a deer rifle and a shotgun for pig, duck, quail. .

Photography. It's just been corals lately lol but I like wildlife photography.

Birding. I like going on birding trips and identifying birds. Haven't done this much lately either.

Same! I'm not gonna admit anything else in writing ;)

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So this week (mind you it's only tuesday) I've purchased

These puppies;

http://en-us.sennheiser.com/high-quality-headphones-around-ear-audio-surround-hd-650

and these ones;

http://en-us.sennheiser.com/best-audio-headphones-high-end-stereo-hifi-hd-600


Last week was this guy;

https://www.massdrop.com/buy/dark-voice-366se

and this will be the other planned purchase for the rest of this week;

http://www.headfonia.com/lafigaro-336c-the-otl-starter/


I'm going to lose my mind once all this stuff is here, hopefully I'll have time to go pick up some records because there is no sound like the sound from Vinyl :D

This is the space where all this madness is;
14898_10152571774412186_2048294439823181641_n.jpg


Obviously I too left out some things (ehem, cameras, ehem)
 
Wow you guys are really doing your part for the economic recovery!

My guilty pleasures are boring and extremely cheap compared to the above. The only real expensive hobby I have is fish/corals. Even with that I'm squeaky cheap. Most of my corals are from swaps/meets.

For me, cars are transportation. As long as it works for that, I'm good. I like to walk/hike/backpack. Other than the gas to get to the trail, it's dirt cheap! :)
 
Enderturtle - I'm a photographer so I spend a little extra on my video card, i7 cpu because more cores & bigger cache = faster photoshop, lots of ram because I shoot raw so my files can be hundreds of MB's in size, where I spend extra energy and time is how my storage is configured, I like employing solid state drives for OS & software along with an array of at least 4 other drives mirrored so I always have 2 copies of everything. A photographer's biggest nightmare is lost data, it's not a spreadsheet so it can never be recreated. That's my PC banter for the day :)

I don't have children yet, so my hobbies are justified since I have no one but myself & my fiance at the moment to invest in, we live decent lives & have a good roof over our heads so yeah, life's good so enjoying it is important while one can afford to.

The truth is I am the most frugal hobbyist you can find, I think for every 10 used pieces of hardware (for any hobby) I only buy 1 brand new therefore I'm always paying a fraction of the retail tag. $1000 tank, I won't pull the trigger till I find a deal at $300 or less, $500 headphones = if I can find it for $100 then I'm game. What helps a lot is that I can fix 90% of anything and you can always pay 25% of the value of an item if it requires love, this logic makes me feel great because someone else's land filling junk is something I'll put to good use for the next 10 years. LOL I probably am fooling myself half the time but far from being a consumer since my $$ almost never goes to the manufacturer or brand that created the product, not good for economy but good in my books since the money goes to another individual who's also earning a paycheck, paying a mortgage, buying groceries etc....

With that being said, my car project is a 95 VW GTI, I've sunk a whole $4k into it so far :D but it costs $10k more to pay someone to do the work I've done in my own garage at home. Not faulting anyone who loves new things or don't like repairing things, just sharing what helps me justify this chronic behavior haha

Charles (650) I like your choice in toys, I should start buying firearms in a year or two.

wpeterson, also loving your choice in vehicle :)

Mike, happy to hear that news man... Today I reconnected with an old friend of mine who's also a fellow car guy. I found his explanation of what it's like to have a kid quite awesome he said "it's a different kind of happy, you buy a new car and you're happiest the next morning but it fades, with a kid you wake up happy every day"
 
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That Vdub built in mexico or germany?

If mexico, sorry to say you'll probably be in the future start encountering ECU/check engine constantly, trans issues, various electrical, name it. Wife had a 96' GTI, we were at the dealer every month. Her binder(S) for her car was so thick, it was placed on top of the cabinets of the rest of where the other customer files were kept. They ALL knew us. Also had lots of friends with previous VW's, same issues. regardless if it was Golf,jetta, toureg etc.

But if its not your DD, and just strict fun then it wouldn't matter.
 
HiFidelity said:
Enderturtle - I'm a photographer so I spend a little extra on my video card, i7 cpu because more cores & bigger cache = faster photoshop, lots of ram because I shoot raw so my files can be hundreds of MB's in size, where I spend extra energy and time is how my storage is configured, I like employing solid state drives for OS & software along with an array of at least 4 drives mirrored so I always have 2 copies of everything. A photographer's biggest nightmare is lost data, it's not a spreadsheet so it can never be recreated. That's my PC banter for the day :)
Click to expand...

That's pretty much how I have my PC setup. Data storage is a little different. I have 5 drives in Raid 6 configuration on a NAS. I also archive my original raw files on a removal hard drive that never gets edited. Only written to then pulled and stored. The Raid 6 would require 3 drives to fail for the entire drive to be useless. If up to 2 drives fail, they can be replaced and the data restored.

Files are also stored offsite and can be retrieved online.

So lots of redundancy. Sucks if I have to tell a client the photos were lost because of a disk failure. But I haven't shot commercially for a long time. Just for fun, family n my daughter's ballet company when they do performances.
 
Preface: I've been building vdubs since the the Y2K scare hehe, I've had so far MK1, MK2, MK3, MK4 mix of Jettas & Golfs, a eurovan and even a newer Audi, aircooled is just about the only vw territory I have not ventured to. I've had a german built Corrado for about 13 years now that drive 0-10 miles a year, this is due to it being a prized garage queen and because despite having new motor/transmission/electronics, etc. etc. it only fires up when it wants to, 100% built in Germany, hand assembled actually due to the lowest production figure VW had ever seen.

With that being said, the Mexican chasis cars were assembled in Mexico, they lack the fineness of german hands therefore they are not on the same par when it comes to upholstery, sound insulation, etc. no mechanical parts were made in mexico in the MK3 generation, every working piece of the vehicle was crated & shipped across the pond but the body work, rubber & cloth Mexican. So yah this GTI is made in Mexico but read further and you'll see why this is no longer relevant :)


The ugly duckling (wearing BBS shoes nevertheless) :
IMG_0655.jpg


meh nothing impressive but looks can be deceiving, follow along...

German forged feathery light pistons 2mm oversize, Brittish made copper sleeved & forged steel racing rods, Polished crank, Block blueprinted & bored from 2.8 liter to 3.0

IMG_0001.jpg



Head ported & polished by yours truly :D

IMG_0784.jpg

IMAG0012.jpg


Exhaust cut, welded & reshaped also by yours truly:

IMAG0231.jpg

IMAG0232.jpg




Front brakes from an Audi, rear brakes are the front from a jetta, eh what? :confused: (not a car person? that's ok, this just means the rotors are a few inches bigger diameter than normal and for perspective, this is more brakes than a common mustang)

IMAG00371.jpg


Reconfigured & reconditioned electrical throughout the car:

IMAG0160.jpg


Retrofitted even more parts, this time bushings from 2004 Golf R32:

IMAG0222.jpg


Not pictured: New fuel system, ignition, 100% aluminum radiator, modified ECU, reinforced engine harness, Bilstein/H&R suspension, Sway Bars, 10lb flywheel, 6 puck racing clutch, Quaife limited slip & new transmission..... frankly I can't recall everything I've done up to this point but all I can tell you is I am not the "I'm going to put on a new intake this weekend" kind of enthusiast. All this work was done in my garage at home on weekends, I still have a few old mechanic friends who call once in a while with questions whenever they get stuck on a VW. So in short I am the dealer, salesman, mechanic and the warranty after it's all said & done.

Anyway the GTI is all put together now, I've had issues with it running smoothly enough but just a few kinks away from the road, unfortunately work has not yielded much extra time and my recent STN issue w/ my acros has forced me to pay more attention to the tank until it's resolved, car will always be there but my corals, different story.

Here's an old pic of the Corrado at Fleet Week in San Diego;

CRW_0441.jpg





Vincent, your redundancy is redunculous haha, I have used raid 1 for many years now with no regrets, I've made it a habit to dump RAW imports to external periodically otherwise I throw out an old hard drive & insert new then let the PC rebuild the array... Now I'm going to read more about how you have yours configured because it's been about 6 months since I opened up my rig and I'm itching to go with a bigger/newer SSD and a few more terabits of storage. I'm curious, what type of work do you shoot?
 
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used to like the corrado's. VR6...

That's a lot of work bud. I'm just going to limit my self to certain mods on my panamera as I do plan on getting a CPO 2015 911 Turbo S in the future. Then that I'll go balls out on upgrades and mods. Just want the panny to look nice, a little go power and new shoes. 21" 3 piece wheels, lip kit, tuning and some interior upgrades.
 
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