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What are your failed hobbies?
As I spent some time recently clearing out my closet, I looked longingly at my keyboard that I purchased with the intent of learning and practicing while working from home, as well to my ant farm kit where I had unsuccessfully kept a queen and small colony for a few months until they died several years ago. I'm sure we all have these tokens of failed experiments or forays into hobbies that once seemed interesting but we ended up losing interest in.
What are yours? Why were you initially interested in it and why did you stop?
Anything to do with music. I love music and I love the idea of being a musician. But I’m so bad at it. And in order to improve it’s a lot of commitment that I just do not have. I’ve tried learning instruments, learning how to sing, learning how to read music, trying to read music theory. And it just never pans out. I think I prefer just being a normal listener.
I think the harmonica is probably one the easiest instruments there is. If you blow semi randomly into a harmonica there's a great chance that you'll make some kind of pleasant sound. It is also super cheap, so you don't have much to lose.
Same goes for the jaw harp. You just need to pluck a single piece of metal and the rest you figure out quickly without any help. They’re cheap too, just don’t buy a snoopys harp.
I looked it up, are you talking about the Jew's Harp? The name sounds racist, but that's how Wikipedia calls it so I think I'm good.
Am Jewish, and a common misconception among non jews is that the word "jew" is somehow in it of itself offensive. It's not. A jew is just a person who happens to be Jewish, just like an Italian is a person that happens to be from Italy or a painter is a person who happens to paint things.
Obviously I can't speak for all jews, but "jew's harp" isn't offensive to me at all. Sure, it doesn't actually have anything to do with jews or judiasm, but that never stopped french fries, chinese checkers, or mexican standoffs.
Yeah... I was thinking more of something like a weird backstory attached to it. I never heard of a "Catholic drum set", or a "Neopentecostal tambourine", so it did sound kinda weird at first.
Ironically, Northumbrian pipes are incredibly offensive. To the listener.
(Just kidding, I haven't found a set of bagpipes I haven't liked.)
They go by both names, the Jews harp, or jaw harp. I’m not entirely sure why they have two names, it’s always been confusing to me too.
I bought one of those and I swear that I can't get it to work for the life of me, and I wonder how much of it boils down to me worrying about ruining my teeth.
Are you sure you didn’t get the snoopy harp? It’s notoriously known as one the worst harp. If the gap between the reed and forks on your harp is really large then odds are it’s a bad harp and won’t make much of a noise. Also it won’t ruin your teeth, don’t press hard or anything and you’ll be fine!
Right there with you word for word. I get the "blame" for destroying the teenage metal band dreams of my friends and I as I was the first person to sell my instrument (drums) despite everyone else also giving up/selling and none of us having anything even remotely called musical skill.
Another friend of mine has a musical degree, he's a pianist, and has attempted to teach me how to read music many times; it never clicks, but we enjoy the attempt each time so it is still reattempted every year or so.
If you want something to mindlessly and melodically bang around on you could always get a mountain dulcimer. It's an Appalachian instrument that is more or less designed to be easy to play, has three courses of strings (which can be in pairs or singles). Seagull actually makes one you hold more like a mandolin, and it's only like $130 USD for a well-built instrument.
I played the piano for a few years around high school and I like to sing. But now I live in an apartment and don't want to make noise that disturbs the neighbors, because I go bonkers when they do that to me (which is, unfortunately, often) and I want to at least retain the moral high ground.
If I could live in a detached house I'd love to be more of a musician, but the cost of moving would be immense right now, far too disproportionate.
Full weighted "digital pianos" are surprisingly cheap and full-featured these days. A while back I bought a full 88-key model with the permanant stand and a matching bench, and I think it cost me somewhere around $200. Combine with a set of headphones and you'll never bother the neighbors.
Wait, what. That surely was a used piano, right? I don't remember ever seeing a weighted 88-key digital brand new for anything under 500 USD. Anything I would have been interested in buying would start at 1000 USD, and the really nice ones I had my eye on were north of 2 grand.
You’re actually not too far off. I looked it up and it was about $400 at the time, but with the bench and stand it would have been over $500 easily. It was an extremely basic model because it was almost as basic as it could be. And now it costs about $100 more.
If you’re interested it’s an Amazon exclusive model, the Yamaha P71. I bought it for my grandmother who needed to get rid of the upright piano she owned for decades because it was too big for her apartment. She told me that it didn’t take her any time to get used to the feel of the keys on it, so they must be at least halfway decent.
Almost the same. I could apply myself more, but i'm happy just playing metal.
So i have a nice guitar and gear and i grab tabs of the songs i want to play and learn to play them. Nothing more, nothing less.
In the past, trying to learn theory, improvisations and other things just frustrated me. I couldn't find a reason to learn because it takes too much commitment for something i'll just do at home for fun.
I'm getting better by just playing.
Whittling: Because I wanted something to do with my hands that wasn't playing computer games, and like the physical experience of woodcarving. I was bored by the whole thing. My mind couldn't slow down to the level of paying attention to each cut, and that wasn't safe.
Piano: I love the sound of piano, and took a class to learn to play, but the process of learning and then maintaining the skill for its own sake wasn't enough to keep me interested after that structured education ended.
I don't know if it works for the piano, but with guitar what makes me get better and keep playing is just forgetting about practice and learning.
Just learn songs, nothing more. Grab the tablature/notation/whatever they call it for piano and play the same notes. Maybe piano is harder because it uses standard notation, but guitar has tablatures and it is really easy to read.
Piano probably has something similar.
Probably reading. I’ve got a decently sized collection of books, I’ve read about half of them and the rest I meant to get to when I bought them, but life gets in the way, I forget what was going on and feel like I need to restart, reading isn’t a natural go-to for me so even when I have time it usually doesn’t happen, et cetera. My bookmark has been sitting on the same page of The End of the Affair for weeks. Meh.
If you truly read half your books, you should consider yourself extremely successful in that department.
That's actually really encouraging, thank you.
I don't see that as failing, but maybe it's inefficient? I can be an avid reader sometimes, but it depends on my mood. Whenever I see an interesting book, I've gotten into the habit of downloading the Kindle sample to my iPad and not buying it unless I get to the end of the sample.
I took some flying lessons but didn't get to the point of flying solo, and I probably won't take it up again because I don't think I have the attention span for it. I still have a headset that I should sell one of these days.
I've also tried learning guitar, electric guitar, and ukulele. Maybe I was spoiled by already doing well at piano lessons? I find the amount of practice it takes to be comfortable with fretting each chord and switching quickly between chords to be kind of discouraging, compared to how easy it is to learn to play lots of chords on a keyboard. (And accordion is easier yet.) Then after learning a beginner song on guitar, you're just playing accompaniment, which isn't so interesting for me since I don't sing. I did learn a few rhythms on ukulele that are nice, though.
I bought a uke for my husband and while it was kind of fun to play around with for a while (for both of us), It didn't feel very rewarding to continue on our own. It's pretty easy to play but it feels like it's a 'social' instrument that you need to have others to come along and sing or play other instruments with, and that's not the type of people we are.
Id love to do this, but they are really expensive for my point in life. Been doing casual flight sims on and off for most of my life, though.
Yes, it's expensive, but if you're willing to splurge, I recommend taking a "discovery flight" with an instructor as a fun thing to do even if you're not serious about getting a pilot's license. You won't be landing the plane, but you can do quite a bit the first time.
The first time I flew out of Palo Alto, we went up San Francisco, out towards the ocean and down the coast, and it's quite a view.
Ive done 2 discovery flights in 2 different countries as a kid, actually. Definitly going to be trying to get a private pilots licence when I am more financially stable.
Sailplane gliding is ~1/3rd of the price of powered flying. At least where I live.
Outside of cost, it's better for aerobatics (most gliders are aerobatics capable to some extent) but much less practical if you want to travel between airports.
The reduced cost comes mainly from simpler machines and less regulation.
The keyboard, I played quite a bit but it fucks my wrist and I don't have a good space where I can leave it connected. I play acoustic guitar now, it's easier to grab and play.
I'm not saying this is you, but it feels like there's a sizeable number of people who give up on piano/keyboard because they don't take lesson #0 seriously enough. And lesson #0 is ergonomics; having your seat at the right level so your wrists don't contort and keeping your back straight.
It's just a shame because there's so many better reasons to give up playing piano! :P
@Pistos I've tried adjusting my seat up and down but the issue is that I have a bad wrist from playing too much games when I was young. Just having my palm down hurts after a while (I'm using a vertical mouse now).
Guitar can be pretty demanding on the wrists too but it's not an issue for me because your hand stays aligned with the forearm.
With proper technique, your hand should stay aligned with the forearm most of the time when playing the piano, too. Only occasionally would there be times asking for a stretch or bend. Anyway, I'm not telling you to play through the pain till you get it right. It's entirely possible that the activities of your past have (mal?)formed your wrists or hands a certain way -- though I can't help but wonder if that could be rehabbed and healed.
I mean your hand should be roughly parallel to the ground when playing, not vertical :
https://i.redd.it/6oaispmor2w21.png
But yeah I should probably go see a doctor for my wrist...
Yeah, my Yamaha P35 is just hanging out in a random room, unplugged, after trying to learn to play for ~2 months last year. I did have an electric guitar for a few years with Rocksmith. I found that pretty good but didn't like making too much noise that it would disturb other people so I ended up giving it away. Really, I should go ahead and donate my keyboard to a school for someone to really learn to use.
Akir already has a fine response, but I'll just double up: Normal piano playing isn't supposed to hurt anything. At least, you shouldn't experience any pain until you're practicing hard for over 2 hours straight, and, even then, having good form should prevent almost every significant pain. At most, there would just be fatigue, but taking breaks should take care of that.
Rollerblading. Still have them but I haven't put them back on after pulling my MCL and recovering for nine months. It was bad enough I had to hobble my bike home when that knee gave out halfway through a 30 mile bike ride.
Hmm there's a lot in my graveyard but the most notable are:
But fwiw, I count them as 'wins' because they helped narrow down the scope of what I was looking for by realizing all these hobbies had things in common that I did not quite jive with.
Totally forgot about your top two.
Game development - I gave this a shot many years ago and was actually approved by Nintendo to develop and release games on the Wii U. I never got that far but when I was in college and I had the time, I certainly dreamed of making something.
Drawing - I can relate to this. I don't have an artistic bone in my body, and my 8th grade geography teacher can certainly vouch for that as she held up my picture of tributaries and told the class her five year old could do better. Always feels like a mental block whenever I tried to draw. Art Academy taught me a few things, and I believe if I spent 500 hours learning and practicing, I could maybe get to the same level as a normal person would in like 30 hours.
"Failed" is probably a harsh word as I do usually come away from a lot of the hobbies that I try with an appreciation of them that I didn't have before.
The Playdate SDK was recently released, so I have been playing around with it. I honestly find it extremely tedious; I keep wondering to myself why there isn't already a basic platformer engine built into the SDK considering so many of the games will probably need the same things; I keep wondering to myself why I have to reinvent the wheel. But then again, learning things at this level was part of the appeal and is part of why I decided to experiment altogether. But the experience of applying code to graphics just feels kind of unnatural for some reason.
If you want something that's sort of pre-built you could always do game modding. Doom, for example, is pretty easy to get into making levels for for its own sake. You've already got a fully functional engine and even game data, so it just becomes about enemy placement and level design at the most basic. You still have to learn the tools, but it's all no-code stuff.
I'm even looking at doing a total conversion, which is intimidating, but not as bad as using a tool like Godot or Unity where you have to define every intended behavior as you develop the rest of the game, because the engine is already in place.
Or you try to do it with friends who seem driven, competent, equal to the task, and end up alone because they don't care to do their part.
It's much easier to gather the required competencies from a group of different people, and this is obvious when you look at the credits of a nice little (finished, polished) indie game. But I'm always jealous of how lucky they were to have reliable co-developers who shared their vision!
Fun question! I feel like I pick-up and drop hobbies pretty frequently.
Woodworking: I used to enjoy building furniture/garden amenities but we just don't have the space in our current place. I think if we got a garage again I would get back at it. Right now we have a neighbor with a full shop set-up in his garage and I'm over there once or twice a week tinkering on bikes or messing with scrap wood making recycled pallet planter boxes. It's actually more fun to have a friend to tinker with.
Drums: Kind of ditto from above, they are incredibly loud so playing in high density areas (though we don't live in really high density but the stand alone houses are very close). Plus I rarely practiced anyway. My old kit still lives at my parents (though likely not for long) and whenever anyone finds out about it they immediately demand an exhibition. No thank you.
Running: This is one I mourn. I really love running and injury has stopped me from running for the past 3 years. I tore my achilles which healed perfectly, but the boot I wore during that time gave me a gait difference that causes knee pain when I run. Still doing PT and hoping to return to it in the near future.
Hockey: This goes back to my youth. I played hockey from 7-17 and ended up getting a pretty significant injury my last year and just never went back. I don't live in a place where it is easy to play and I don't have as much interest these days. I did have a neighbor move in next door with a small rink tile and goal set-up so sometimes we'll play horse with the targets in the net. I have my skates/sticks and will jump into pick-up when invited. Kind of makes me miss it but not enough to replace any of the hobbies I actively do.
Running is one that is definitely on again, off again for me. It feels like every year I go through a phase of running for 2-3 months before something throwing off my schedule, and ultimately I just stop as a result. I'm not terribly fond of it but I know if I did 30 minutes a day every day, I would be healthier.
Woodworking. Many years ago I wanted to make a rocking chair. The idea was to make these two large "wheels" (roughly two thirds of a circle). They'd be slanted together and between them would be the chair part. I managed to partially build the "wheel" parts by gluing together plywood in a large jig (not sure if that's the correct term) I'd constructed.
This was all done as part of a workshop that gathered every week for 10 weeks, but after that ended I didn't have access to the tools nor the space to work on it. I could pick it up again, but I know now that it's a big project and I don't really want to invest that much time into it. Maybe I'll just build something else instead... I'm really good at starting things at least!
Woodworking is likely to be a part of my future hobby graveyard. I like the idea of it, and have always wanted the space for it, but have never really had the opportunity and time to get into it.
To me, 3D printing is sort of like "woodworking lite" in the sense that you're building stuff, but without doing all the work yourself. It's safer than power tools and requires less space.
There are even wood-like filaments, though I haven't used them yet.
It's for doing things at a smaller scale, though.
And there's certainly a similar degree of sanding! (If you want to finish your 3D printed pieces, which you certainly don't have to)
I haven't had any luck with sanding, but then I didn't really try. Which materials work for it?
It's very much a process. Sand, spray with filler+primer, sand, repeat. Some pics here from a project I did for timasomo : https://tildes.net/~talk/zio/the_tildes_make_something_month_timasomo_2021_showcase_thread#comment-6yps
That's an impressive build! PLA then.
I've been mostly experimenting with flex materials (like Ninjaflex Cheetah and Armadillo), and recently got a spool of PETG. Sanding flexible materials doesn't really work that well, but it looks like it will for PETG.
Oh nice, I haven't done anything with the really flexy materials, but I have done some small bits with PETG, though I haven't tried to sand those since I was after the translucent color. I have wondered if I could polish those by using a thin coat of UV resin on the exterior to fill layer lines and then sand down.
Woodworking is so satisfying, too, knowing that what you make is going to be so incredibly useful to someone! In another life, I would have made custom home furnishing and fixtures to be my career. But I don't think I could ever make it into my hobby. It takes too much time and effort with the way I live right now.
Aquariums. I started with a 5 gallon tank and a few mollies and shortly after upgraded to a 30 gallon with different types of fish, shrimp and aquatic plants. It was a lot of fun creating my own little environment, caring for these little creatures and learning their needs. I was really into it and it consumed a lot of my free time for about a year.
Then my life got busier and I got more lazy with doing the regular maintenance required to keep a healthy environment. It slowly became more of a chore than anything. I continued to take care of them, but if a fish died I wouldn't buy anymore until they were all gone. Then I gave away all my equipment.
A few years ago I got into growing cannabis indoors. I found that it exercises my curiosity in many of the same ways but doesn't require the same amount of regular work. There's lots to learn but you can make it as simple or complex as you want. It also saves me a lot of money.
Yeah. I've been having aquariums on/off for most of my life and it takes more time than you realize.
Hot sauce making. I made a few batches, then stopped. I started making a big batch, and it was waaaaaaay too yeasty, and I ended up throwing out everything I had, and then I just stopped and haven't made a new batch since. I think it's because I haven't been to grocery stores in a while (doing instacart for most groceries these days) and there hasn't been a good selection of hot peppers.
Hopefully I do it again.
This reminded me of when I tried to make my own kimchi. I made a small batch successfully and then went all in and bought everything I needed to make a large batch. It did not turn out very good, it wasn't quite a fail but the smell of taking it out of the large jar was so overwhelming that by the end I didn't want to see or smell kimchi for a very long time. I still don't love it the way I used to. :(
I feel like I could get pretty good at drawing if I just put in the practice time needed. But I failed on that "if".
I also keep telling myself I could get pretty good at cooking (the kind and quality of dishes that would impress people), but never got around to taking that seriously, either.
Dunno if this counts but: I'm pretty good at piano, but had to stop taking lessons because the budget couldn't fit it any more. Weekly lessons, plus theory studies, plus books, plus exam fees really adds up (think four digits a year).
I think if you already have the basics of music and you're just having fun, you can get by without formal lessons. I took about five years of piano lessons as a kid and then stopped playing for years. When I got back into it I wanted to learn something different, and since then I'm self-taught, using method books and whatever online resources seem interesting. I've never taken a accordion lesson from a teacher, but there's plenty of free stuff online nowadays.
(I wouldn't recommend it for absolute beginners, though.)
I've done a fair amount of self study, but, having taken some advanced level classical piano lessons, I really saw the value in them when trying to do... well, advanced level stuff. I wish money were no object, because I would pursue formal classical lessons again, given the chance.
RC Helicopters. I bought a sim, really nice controller, and old helicopter. I still want to get back into it, but I need to buy a new heli (couldn’t get parts). I also really enjoyed fixing it, but my wallet did not. Now I want to pay off my car before I get too far into an expensive hobby.
What's the difference between this and a drone? Just a different form factor?
Very different. First, there are 2 different classes of drones. DJI style drones are pretty much camera controls with propellers. The entire goal is to abstract the mechanics away from the user to focus on video controls. The second style is FPV drones. They give the user raw control of the drone (pitch, roll, yaw, height, etc). Now with a drone (specifically a quadcopter) has pretty direct translation between those controls and what the mechanics have to do to execute the controls.
For example, to tilt forward, slow down the front rotors and speed up the back rotors. The drone tilts forward, the thrust points backwards, and the drone moves forward. Same for backwards, left and right. For rotating, you speed up the front right and back left roters. The difference of angular momentum causes the the drone to rotate. Basically a drone is just 4 motors with a propellor glued on the top. All you need to do is control the speed of the motors.
Now for a helicopter. These are a whole different ballgame. First, the primary rotor spins to force the helicopter up. Pretty simple so far. Now you have to counteract that rotation. Throw a horizontal propellor on the back. Easy enough so far. Now how do we tilt forward? Reduce thrust in the front and increase it in the back. Same concept as the drone, right? Well, you have only a single rotor so you have to find a way to dynamically change the angle of attack of the rotor blades depending on what part of the spin they are in. Higher angle of attack means more lift. So we have a mechanical device that can control this called a swashplate. This is a complex mechanical device that has to be smooth and consistent. So now we have a way to control the angle of attack at different places in the cycle of the blades. To tilt forward we reduce thrust in the front and increase it in the back, right? Nope! Remember we have a large spinning blade. In physics this is functionally the same as a large spinning disk, a gyroscope. Gyroscopic procession is a fascinating section of physics. In short, if you push a gyroscope with a force, the force will actually be applied 90 degree rotated from the force. Weird, right? So to tilt forward we lower the thrust on the left side of the spin and increase it on the right.
Now we have a way ton control the tilt of the helicopter. With the tail rotor, we have full control of the helicopter. But it’s not that simple. With a drone, the controls are pretty much independent. If you want to tilt forward, you just tilt forward. With a helicopter, all the controls depend on the other controls. When you tilt forward (cyclic control), you change the rotational inertia, so you have to change the tail control to compensate. You also lose upwards thrust since some of the thrust is pushing you forward. So you have to increase the angle of the rotors throughout the entire spin (collective control). All of this means the pilot has to make constant corrections to keep the helicopter doing the same thing. Even hovering is incredibly complex and very difficult. RC helicopters are a small version of the real thing, but they are just as complex. Also, the controls on an RC helicopter are based on the nose of the helicopter, not which direction you are facing. While this seems obvious, it means that all those constant corrections have to be mentally translated to the direction of the helicopter, even if it is a small speck in the sky.
There is a really good Smarter Every Day series that details the physics of helicopters. https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PL6CECC2E56B68A2C3
Fun fact: did you know that if a helicopter looses engine power, it doesn’t just fall out of the sky? It can actually do a thing called autorotation, which is conceptually similar to a gliding plane, and land safely. In one of those videos, an RC helicopter enthusiast flies a helicopter upside down, cuts power, flies it down while upside down, flips it and lands it, all without engine power.
Flying model aircrafts are usually about simulating or having a likeness to actual full sized aircraft, in appearance, mechanics, and aerodynamics. They can even feature internal combustion engines. Drones are usually about being the most efficient for specific tasks given the form factor.
Model aircraft predate widely available drones by many decades.
I will throw another one out there that I realized I forgot about:
I purchased a Raspberry Pi after years of wanting one only to find when I finally got it that I didn't really care about too many of the projects. Sure I could build an e-ink display of something, but I don't really need to. Same with a magic mirror. Or a service that I build to run automatically for me. Or I could use it to get into robotics. But in the end, I just never felt like any of the projects had much pay off except making something that is eventually going to sit somewhere and collect dust, or take up one of the few outlets that I have in my room.
I pretty much did the same. I wound up putting Rasbian OS on it and a little program to randomly play mp4s, so I could sleep easier in hotels. It's been sitting in a box since the pandemnic started.
I did the same twice over the years. I still have them. Now that I moved my parents and my HomeAssistant instances to better servers, I don’t know what to do with them.
As a kid I played a lot of videogames, but advanced very little. I like RPGs, but inevitably fail to register essential information which leads me to getting irreversibly stuck at some point between the 20h to 40h mark.
I quit playing the recent God of War because I forgot what I was supposed to do and must have spent 10 hours running around the map and clearly missing something "real gamers" would find in the first try. No videos or Gamefaqs could save me either.
I'm just a bad gamer who finishes about one game every 5 years.
Honestly, I've come to the conclusion that most RPGs are not terribly well designed.
The biggest problem with them tends to be the battle systems. Final Fantasy games in particular have battle systems that are overly complex, so players can be completely screwed over because they don't have 100% understanding of how the battle system works. Status effects are a pretty obvious example; there are some that will only ever be used maybe once or twice in the game so you wouldn't really know how to deal with them. In theory, levels help alleviate the problem since a determined player can just level up until they can brute-force their way to victory, but it's a bit of a dual-edged sword because it means that the player may never realize they aren't playing the game "right" and be forced to grind through the entire game.
This whole train of thought might be considered sacrilegious to some, but I think history agrees with me. If you take a look at various "Best RPGs of all time" lists, the ones near the top tend to be the ones that minimize painful battle systems, or at least ones that keep the focus on the story rather than the gameplay.
Anyways, you shouldn't feel bad about not finishing games. According to real-world statistics, very few people will actually finish any given video game. If you finish a game, it means you found the one that meets all of your personal expectations, and that's always going to be rare.