Non-design activities/obsessions

how about picking up a musical instrument?

I say follow your interests with the bread thing! Maybe there’s a reason your mind is being drawn to the subject. Exploring that will open new doors, or at the very least, provide you with some high-quality grub and a great smelling kitchen :slight_smile:

For me, it’s mushrooms. What started as a general curiosity has slowly grown into obsession. Photographing, growing, foraging, eating. I’m also pretty committed to rock climbing. The mental and physical focus it requires is a great workout and spiritually recharging. Either way, I think it’s great to learn something new!

Here’s a pic from the garden… nothing like fresh morels for breakfast!

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Haha. I live in the Adelaide Hills in Australia and there are about 15 large radiata pines on our property so we get literally hundreds of pine mushrooms (saffron milk caps) every winter. We have a very limited amount of porcini in the Adelaide Hills too and I went looking for them in winter without any luck. Mushrooms are great.

The sourdough starter is kicking along nicely but I need a free weekend to do some baking. My combo cooker arrives in a few weeks… Exciting.

Run.

Not necessarily, creative, but challenging, requires good time management and strategy, gives you time to think and problem solve, great for goal oriented and stats driven OCD designers, and helps counter balance the hours wasted in the office sitting at a screen or in meetings.

I took up running 3 years ago to make a positive lifestyle change and improve my health (and I was designing running shoes without actually running in them).

This year I’ve racked up about 3,500km, only missed 1 day without running since January, did 5 marathons, 15 races in 5 countries and have no complaints about any weather. Plus I can eat almost anything and drink all the beer I want.

I know lots of runners who are creatives. A good balance between the physical and mental and i think very complimentary to design life. Plus, you can do it anywhere and any time, so fits studio life, business trips, odd consultant hours, and the midnight oil we designers tend to burn.



R

Sweet!

The large crowd is something I never would have expected. I always assume other people’s silly hobbies are like mine where it draws a few dozen people only.

Please note, the vintage bike thing is small in the US. Italy has an event with 6-7K people riding old bikes. France and Belgium would be the next in line for enthusiasts, but it drops off pretty quickly at that point.

I subscribe to the tenet that good bread is hard/crunchy on the outside and soft on the inside. It is quite difficult to find such an animal in the US. And I do love a good piece of bread, probably more so than Oprah. Unfortunately I do not have the patience or wherewithal to bake.

Do you plan on expanding into pizza dough?

I have a few hobbies and passions I follow outside work. I do find this helps a lot with keeping a fresh mind at work. I enjoy fishing a great deal. It has some great aspects for the designer. Fly fishing holds a special place for me and it allows me to use my design skills to create different products for the sport. I tie flies and also make some different line configurations for fishing. It is practical and artistic so fits my thinking quite well. I have also gotten in to videography which has been great as a story telling media and for work. Also enjoy ridding bicycles it is a great way to free the mind and open your creativity.

Have a kid. If you need more to do, have a second kid. Only halfway kidding. You know how therapeutic and enjoyable it can be to spend an hour drawing or building Lego or even Play-Doh with a kid?

Its kind of like a hobby, but it costs more, and you won’t/can’t get sick of it and change your mind.

I also like polishing individual bicycle cassette cogs to a shine, and repacking hub bearings.

Kids are great, but if you want zero time for your hobbies then have twins.
Once you have kids your hobby becomes developing your kids hobbies and truly learning about life to answer all the “why” questions.

I agree. I have been reading a lot on a site called the perfect loaf which the author has adapted material from tartine bread which is on iBooks for $2.99 so its been great to have guides to follow. I’ll definitely use the sourdough to make pizzas. I’m finding it hard to schedule in a bake session as I’ve got so much going on this time of year and you need a whole saturday at home and sunday morning to bake. I’ll try to get a bake done on the second weekend of december.

Here’s a pic of my starter… The rubber band was in line with the top of the starter when I fed it last night and this is what it looked like this morning. Lots of activity going on in there.

Looking good! I bet that would make some great english muffins :slight_smile:

My favorite bread recipe comes from the NY Times, because it’s super simple and easy to make over the course of a couple days. And, no kneading!

That’s great! Here’s an L deliciosus find from earlier this year. Excuse the dirty hands, I wasn’t actually foraging, but found this guy after a long day of rock climbing. I’m sure your specimens are probably larger, but I was still excited to find this little guy :slight_smile:

I love their bright color! And also their flavor :laughing:

Since people brought up kids I also have one of those to. Pretty crazy how kids change your view on life. He is 3 and it is so much fun doing activities with the family. We got a two person kayak recently and it has been great fun piling into the kayak and going out for cruise around the bay.

Ooh. That’s a nice one. Perfect size.

We get all sizes from tiny pins to the size of a side plate. They obviously start small and grow to the plate size.

My favorite recipe with these is a carbonara linguine. Get some of these, sautee with onions, fresh sage and garlic, add bacon, then cream and serve on the linguine with some grated parmesan or pecorino on top.

This sourdough hobby is paying off.

I might even quit design and become a baker. Working with dough is much more enjoyable than designing sheet metal patterns for workstation screen mounting brackets. Maybe even more lucrative. :laughing:

:sunglasses: Vote for my Core77 artisan home baker gift guide: :sunglasses:

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Ooooo… I like this thread.

How’s the bread thing coming along? Anyone do the NYC marathon? Any good fungi?

This February I’m going to Milan for a long weekend. There is a vintage bike swap and I will be doing a cycling city tour of Milan to see the shops of the 5 masters - Colnago, Poliaghi, De Rosa, Cinelli and Masi. The Masi shop is at the Vigorello velodrome, another must see. I’ll also probably stop at the Detto Pietro shop and get some new kicks. And finally a short ride from Como, along the lake to Bellagio, a climb up to the Madonna Del Ghisallo and back to Como via Erba.

I’ve been thinking about this alot lately and most recently its resulted in playing more music and right now I am working on building a guitar pedal. Last night I began populating the PCB, its been very fun and relaxing! Also made me realize I need to brush up on my soldering skills.

So mine is till the wood working and interior redesign. Over the winter i am going to design a deck for the house with a built in cooking area (grill sink, fridge, work surface) - the goal is to build it come spring thaw. (if i can afford my own design)