Everyone who has any free time has hobbies. Some of us crochet or knit, some play video or tabletop games, and some of us take day-long naps when we can. There are any number of things that we humans can do to take up our free time, but all hobbies are definitely not looked upon the same by society.
Reddit user GwenButNotReally asked:
What's your weird hobby?
All hobbies are definitely not created equally.
You made our day.
I like to compliment strangers- elderly individuals with brightly colored hair, kids that obviously dressed themselves or have unique style, anyone that catches my eye really... It takes zero effort to make someone feel good about themselves for even a moment.
It's only interesting if you're interested.
Trainspotting. The kind where you watch and film trains, not the heroin kind. It may seem boring but let me tell you when an SD80MAC goes by, it's...still boring if you're not into it.
I painted graffiti for quite a while and grew to really like and appreciate trains. I have now gotten into weathering and painting model railroad cars and usually go by the tracks in my town every weekend to see what's there. But yes, unless someone has an interest in them it's pretty boring. I get excited seeing cars that have been painted by people I know or seeing especially old and weathered cars, or just stuff that's neat and different.
I'm not condoning graffiti but railside you'll see some really neat stuff. A lot of is junk but once in awhile I see one so good the railroad paint shop probably says "I ain't even mad".
It's for the birds.
Bird photography. First got into it when I was 23. Just saw some cool birds outside so I took some pictures. Then I started wanting to do it more, so I left my house for the sole purpose of finding birds to take pictures of. Started looking up nature trails with a good birding reputation. Bought a birdwatchers field guide, splurged for a better camera. Started waking up at dawn on weekends to drive to better bird trails. Started volunteering at a rehab shelter for injured birds so I could get better pictures of rare birds
Yeah it's birds.
Rules are important!
Giphy
I collect rubber ducks. I have weird rules for the weird hobby. I'm not allowed to order them online or anything. They have to all either be given to me or physically bought in shops. I recently went to Vegas and bought 3-4 new ones.
It's elementary!
I collect element samples. My goal is to have one of each element up to Americium.
If you have a smoke detector, you've got your americium sample.
Spellbindingly unique.
I make little voodoo dolls, but like, the trendy kind you can buy at the store or are sometimes in vending machines. I saw one and was like "I could do that." And now I do.
Anytime there is a franchise or character that I can't find or afford merch for I just make myself a voodoo keychain. I've even sold them.
I've done:
Darth Vader Elsa (Frozen) Sherlock Holmes (Sherlock) Nathan Drake (uncharted) Joel Miller (the last of us) Danny Phantom Chris (until dawn) Lightning Farron (FFxiii) Hope Esthiem (FFxiii) Cloud Strife (FFVII) Jack Frost (Rise of the Guardians) Mal (Firefly) complete with tiny guns! Garrus Vakarian (Mass Effect) Kaidan Alenko (Mass Effect)
Grisly work!
I'm a Ripperologist. I research crimes of the era, workhouse records, infirmary records, newspapers of the era, and other government records during the time period in an attempt to find plausible suspects that could have been the serial killer known as Jack the Ripper. The British Empire during the Victorian Era were meticulous record keepers and I could spend a lifetime combing through them ! While I don't expect to ever solve the case (that is a 1 in a million shot) I believe I can produce better suspects then those that have been put forward who until now have all been pretty poor in my opinion.
Glad I'm not the only one.
Collecting spoons. Not even the ones with fancy, decorative handles. Screw those. Just regular, run-of-the-mill spoons. Only teaspoons though.
So ends the mystery of all my missing silverware.
Username checks out.
I love collecting rocks and sticks I find. It can't be just any old rock or stick, it has to have personality and be particularly eye catching.
Also I don't think many would consider this weird but I like to find plants and take clipping or some roots and pot them at home. I've grown quite the collection over the years.
Humans are fascinating, after all.
People watching in a non-creepy way. I really dislike most people because people are selfish and rude for the most part, but I love studying the way that people interact. Learning body language and reading an entire conversation or situation just by seeing reactions and body language. It has always been a fascinating part of psychology for me. If you really pay attention to people and their interactions, you see so much more.
"What is a subtle sign that someone is really intelligent?"
The minds of really smart individuals never stop working.
Resourcefulness
"They draw wisdom from multiple sources. Wait but that might be more wise than intelligent... But I guess those two tend to be seen together a lot."
– Puzzlehead-Engineer
Inquisitive Minds
"They are curious about everything."
"To be intelligent you need to be knowledgeable and you cant be knowledgeable if you are never curious."
– soup54461
The way highly intelligent people interact with others is slightly different.
Social Adaptability
"They can switch up the way they talk to match the person they're talking to without sounding condescending. They listen to how others learn and explain it in that person's language of understanding."
– Wynonna99
Talking On Level Ground
"Talking to people as if they're intelligent at their level and without being condescending or even letting on that it's lower than their level."
"I used to work with a doctor - Tom Howard - and the day I realized he was a genius was the time he guessed every single condition a patient of mine had based on minute pieces of information about him."
– Yoodei_Mon
The Humble Professor
"No joke. The smartest professor I had in engineering school was also the most humble. She was an astounding human being. By week 2, she knew everyone's names by heart in the intro engineering course. In College. With like 180 students. Later, in upper division classes, people would occasionally ask some really stupid questions."
"Like, it happens... you get so deep into some fluid mechanics derivation or something you forget something really basic. People would ask a question like this and everyone would be thinking like; 'Wow, how did you even make it this far?' but then... it's like she would spot the flaw in their understanding so perfectly, and then respond with such clarity and wisdom that the person asking the question would look less stupid and the whole class would be enlightened."
"And here's the thing... I pride myself on being really good at that exact skill. I tutored a lot of people. I was easily one of the brightest amongst my peers. But that woman was on another level. It was mind-blowing."
"And it wasn't just her intelligence, but her organizational skills, discipline, consistency.... And yet... she was so humble. She was quiet and physically quite small. But she just exuded competence and immediately commanded every room she walked into. I've never seen anything quite like it."
– EngineeringNeverEnds
A Positive Effect
"When they explain something they make you feel intelligent."
– gwoshmi
When In Doubt
"They know when their knowledge ends and say something to the extent of 'I don't know and anything else i say on this topic is ignorant speculation.'"
–blutoboy
Some with impressive IQs may deal with questions in the following ways.
Reaction To Delayed Responses
"'You really think about everything don't you?' - a doctor, to me, after he asked me a question and I took longer than 2 seconds to answer it."
"No, I just pull something out of my ass every time and those extra seconds you waited for me to answer were purely to irritate you for my own enjoyment."
– Imakegoatnoises
The Really Good Questions
"They can ask really good questions."
"Edit: to anyone not understanding what mean, I’m talking about people who ask 'really good questions,' not just any questions, really good ones. I don’t know how one would achieve this skill(I know I haven’t)."
– milkmanbran
Taking Pause
"They spend time thinking before asking a question."
– ParkMan73
"Some of the smartest people don’t comment at all."
– metric-poet
I agree with many of the comments saying a really intelligent person knows how to cater the conversation towards another person's level of understanding.
They do have the impressive skill to convey something in a way that can easily be understood. Some of the most venerated professors at my university were like this, and their classes were always the hardest to get in to.
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I'm on the fence about high school. I want to hate it, but nostalgia haunts me. I saw a lot of violence, there is that.
We were on CNN.
don lemon nodding GIF by Red Table TalkGiphy"They started charging us for ketchup in the cafeteria. Most of the school boycotted cafeteria lunch and brought all manner of condiments from home. We were on CNN. They eventually caved." ~ Ash3Monti
No one liked him.
"I was big into drama club and musical theatre when I was in high school. There was a girl in the drama club in her freshmen or sophomore year who was super nice and everyone loved her. Her older brother on the the other hand, was a complete and total douchebag. No one liked him."
"He always made inappropriate comments or jokes and no one liked to be around him. One night, he was driving him and his sister back from school when he took a steep curve going around 100 mph. He lost control and hit a telephone pole. His sister died instantly and he was in a coma for a few weeks but ultimately survived."
"Myself and my friends in the drama club were devastated. She was one of the sweetest girls you'll ever met and we all loved her. A year or two later, the brother messages my sister and tries to use his sister's death as leverage to get laid. F**k you, you piece of crap." ~ FearTheKeflex
Bribes
"Guidance counselor was taking bribes to change grades (Both money and sexual favors). Invited one male student over to his house. Had the student tie him up and hang him by chains in his basement "dungeon." Student was homophobic and while the counselor was tied up, bludgeoned him to death." ~ monthos
H2O Issues...
"This is not that extreme, but it's still disgusting. We have drinking water taps instead of fountains. One parent was suspicious of whether they were cleaning the tanks or not. So they made an announcement that the tank was being cleaned every single day."
"A lot of us didn't believe it, so a group of boys decided to see for themselves if it was true or not. So they put a dead frog in the tank when there was no one around. I don't even know where they found the frog but they swear they didn't kill it. Anyway the frog was there for a few weeks. And obviously the water started tasting weird."
"After the teachers got multiple complaints, they opened the tank and found the frog. The boys were punished, but they fired back with the fact that they lied about cleaning the tanks. They were still punished, because they proved it in a disgusting way. They could've put literally anything in the tank, but they chose a dead frog." ~ R00mTemperature
The Quad
Acds2 Look Away GIF by Anime Crimes DivisionGiphy"A worker doing stuff on the roof. He fell off. Landed in the 'quad' at lunch. A large piece of machinery fell and squished his head. Like a cartoon, only funny. Like 150 Kids saw this." ~ LordInventus
Threats
"The Latin kings gang threatened my cousin and his friends and they had 10 squad cars guarding the whole school and dismissed us the same day early." ~ Terrykrinkle
“it’s gonna blow”
"I had just moved in from Egypt to the states in my senior year of high school. A teacher thought it would be funny to fold a bunch of papers and wrap them in duck tape to make it look like a bomb and threw it my direction and went under his desk saying 'it’s gonna blow.' Everybody started laughing and I was so clueless then I just laughed along. It infuriates me to this day that I didn’t call him out on it or report him." ~ ezzabousaif
Go Fish
"Someone somehow made a bomb threat on a Swedish fish candy. Like one single piece. I don’t know how it happened but he got arrested." ~ ts_13_
Masternid
"A couple weeks before graduation, this kid hacked into the school system and put a Hitler quote and a Boston bomber reference in the senior quotes for the yearbook. One of the affected parties was a trans girl, and we're still not sure if it was a targeted act because of that."
"Administration didn't find out until the entire senior class had received their books. Some people turned theirs in to get their pages replaced, but some kept it because it was a 'limited edition item' or some stupid sh*t like that. Kid got arrested and charged with cybercrime, since he hacked everyone in our school system's school passwords."
"He was so close to graduating too, but got expelled like two weeks before he could. Looked like a rat too. It was all over the news, and everyone in the state of CT basically knows about this now. Got out on bail for $5000." ~ kocorpsie
Season 3 What GIF by On My Block"Apparently one student brought drugs to school and was selling it to her friends. A completely unrelated student caught on and stole the drugs while everyone else was in class. She was caught snorting the drugs in the bathroom by the group selling the drugs and got the crap beat out of her."
"We also had a recently graduated student murder his parents for insurance money . He hid the bodies in a chicken coop and told everybody they were on vacation. It wasn't until 7 months later the bodies were found by the landlord because the rent was late." ~ randomgenericcow
Enjoy high school, at least try too. Maybe if more kids do that, it wouldn't be so insane.
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