others interests of hp calc users

[Iqbal]

I have always wondered what are some of the other interests of HP calculator collectors/users. Myself, I play cricket ( not a bug for the US guys ),table tennis (ping pong). I also love hunting, fishing and airgunning. BTW I am a licensed land surveyor and I have been an addict to HP calculators since September 1987.

[Johnny Bjoern Rasmussen]

I'm drumplayer addicted to rock and blues so I have some nice vintage Premier drums from the 70's.
Besides that I'm a gauge 1 (scale 1:32 for use in the garden) and Z (scale 1:220) modelrailroader.

Edited: 26 Mar 2009, 3:05 a.m.

[Geir Isene]

A rough overview of some of my interests:

Philosophy; Free will

Mathematics; Statistics, number theory, category theory

Physics; Astronomy (star gazing), astrophysics, cosmology, particle physics, quantum mechanics

Music; From classical and opera to hard trance and even jazz

Other art; Writing poetry and short stories, creating 3D digital art

People; Doing seminars on people relations and communication, helping individuals

Role-playing games; Playing the Amar RPG and also live RPG

Sports; Foosball, down-hill skiing, coaching a football team of 9 year olds

Programming; Raven, Ruby, MCODE, Focal, Forth

Business; Doing seminars on free software, ITIL and just about anything else

But family first.

And; See my web page for more.

Edited: 26 Mar 2009, 5:37 a.m.

[DaveJ]

I'm an electronics designer, I currently design THIS during my work hours.

In my spare time my main hobby is ELECTRONICS, and everyone knows about my uWatch.

I'm a gym junkie, and developed THIS workout program for iPods.

I'm also into CANYONING and edit the yearly CALENDAR . I'm also the most active member of the OzCanyons Group, and host that site too.

I'm also into sustainable living, and have a webpage for my HOUSE.

I've also developed a Solar Air Heater for fun.

I'm also one of the early pioneering members of GEOCACHING in Sydney, and used to edit the Australian Geocaching Newsletter.

I'm also the world's foremost expert and author on Internet Dating.

Dave.

Edited: 26 Mar 2009, 5:22 a.m.

[Valentin Albillo]

Hi, iqbal:

My main interests in no particular order:

• Mathematics, both dead serious and recreational

• Music: many genres, both modern and classic, most especially Bach and Mozart, most especially Opera

• Photography and multimedia: video and audio creation and edition

• Everything Science: physics, computing, engineering, biology, neurology, the works

• Japanese culture: history, language, cinema, art in general, literature, the works

• Sci-Fi, Comics, and serious science literature

• Movies: both vintage (even B&W and/or foreign) and modern

• Japanese martial arts, most especially anything having to do with nihonto

• Chess and some other classic games (backgammon, reversi, card games, etc)

• HP & SHARP vintage handhelds collecting

• Programming (anything and everything in any language)

• Social engineering, human relationships, pedagogy, children education, dealing with people in general

• Modern-times wars, most especially WW II

Things I'm NOT interested in:

• Money

• Politics

• Religion

• Power

• Philosophy

• UFO's, "New Age" thingies, "ghosts", mediums, paranormal "powers", and any such drivel

• Losing my time, most especially dealing with morons or moronic ramblings.

I have left *many* in both counts but there you are !

Best regards from V.

Edited: 26 Mar 2009, 9:10 a.m.

[Mike (Stgt)]

First collateral interest of HP calculators is emulating HP calculators (by simulating their CPU to make a firmware interpreter). Rest see here. I re-activated cooking in the last 3 years, hounting for old recipes from farmer's society in the last 2 or 3 centuries or so (like Aligot and such alike, have a look at Cholera), and inventing new stuff like "devilry-wheel" what is a yeast cake with chestnut, some white pepper, etc. (It was a big success at a local midsummer nite art fair, where fire was the main theme.)

Ciao.....Mike

[hpnut]

Mine are cooking, hiking, classical music, painting, photography, reading.

who shares Cyrille's passion for woodworking? http://cyrille.hydrix.com/eng/index.html

[Erik C]

Iqbal,

-engineering: aerospace and mechanical areas

-travel
-family

-coffee

-PBS (a television station that is essentially non-commercial)

-tinkering, building, designing (lately little time for this)

-programming (non-HP stuff, right?) Matlab, C, and recently found the opportunity to dive into some internet scripting - it's all the same when one can relinquish the affections over a single language (Perl users...?)

-recreational and professional mathematics; I'm an engineer, but not a bull-pen occupant :)

-graduate studies...it does occupy my time


Erik


ah- forgot the recent venture into cooking my own food, hahaa...quite fun indeed!

Edited: 26 Mar 2009, 10:31 a.m.

[Martin Pinckney]

I am a civil (most of the time) engineer who owns a small design firm.

I am married 31 years and have 3 grown children.

These two activities have consumed most of my energy for the last 32 years.

My other interests include (beside HP calculators):

Worshiping God, studying the Scriptures, and fellowship with other Christians.

Shooting.

Reading history and biographies.

Miniature machining.

Photography using Nikon F2 cameras.

Politics.

[Egan Ford]

• My wife and kid. We love board games (mostly German) and have about 100 of them.
  
• High Performance Computing (my job). Collecting and programming mid-80's vintage calculators always reminds me to think smarter and not harder.
  
• Math, Physics, Programming.
  
• Mountaineering, Canyoneering, Snowboarding (I live in Utah).
  
• Domestic (US) movies that do not make me think.
  
• Foreign films that do make me think.
  
• 20 years ago I would have said cycling, but now that's been replaced with travel and food. Working to get that changed to travel and cycling.
  
• Almost anything with blinking lights.
  

[Dusan Zivkovic]

1. jazz


2. guitars


3. football


4. sleep

[bill platt]

1. Cricket. yes, it is played in the States.
2. Fishing.
3. Hiking.
4. Painting.

[DK2ZA]

Amateur Radio, Callsign DK2ZA. Are there other radio amateurs here?

[bill platt]

N#LPX.

[Bruce Bergman]

N7HAW - Nice to meet you!

My other interests:

God, family and friends

Amusement parks, especially anything Disney

Geocaching - placed second cache in San Diego county in 1999

Mountain Rescue - 10 years as team EMT, now ex

Community/church theatre sound and lighting

Model railroads and trains

Embedded systems

Video games

Anything that's a gadget

thanks,
bruce

Edited: 29 Mar 2009, 11:15 a.m.

[Nigel J Dowrick]

In no particular order:

• Walking - English / Welsh / Scottish hills, or the English countryside.
  
• The music of J.S.Bach (and some other lesser composers as well)
  
• Physics (especially particle physics, cosmology, and quantum mechanics)
  
• Teaching Physics
  
• The History of Science
  
• Linux
  
• TeX (a typesetting program)
  
• Programming for fun
  
• Horror / fantasy fiction (e.g., Lovecraft)
  
• 19th Century English novels
  

Nigel

[Geoff Quickfall]

Hello all, just thinking about this post

• My 1973 Celica purchased during high school in 1974.

• Clock restorations including my last project.

• HP Calculators of course.

• Watch restorations, over 200 so far including 9 HP 01's.

• Some interesting slide rules (yes I used a Post 1461 in

  first year).

• Golfing.

• Hiking, although not recently!

• Photography.

• My job flying is also a hobby making me one lucky person!

• Still persuing studies related to my 1988 MSc, 'climate change'.

• Not interested in Woo Woo psuedosciences.

RESTORED WATCHES:

LATEST CLOCK RESTORATION (last summer)

Cheers, Geoff

Edited: 26 Mar 2009, 2:55 p.m.

[Chuck]

Nice watches! The 4th watch, second row, first picture brings back memories. My dad received one similar for graduation in 1948. It was a Lord Elgin, but I think not as square? Unfortunately it was taken in a home robbery 20 years ago. :( I'll have to keep my eye on the lookout for a replacement for him.

[Geoff Quickfall]

Yes, the Lord Elgins were the higher end of the Elgin line. Nice watches but not that common.

The one you refer to in the photo is a Hamilton circa 1950, 21 jewel manual wind with engraved movement.

Cheers, Geoff

[David Hayden]

• Programming. Been doing professionally for my entire career. No interest in management.
  
• Family and kids
  
• Photography
  
• Almost anything to do with water - swimming, boating, beach etc.
  
• Indoor rowing. Wonderful exercise and the cheapest piece of olympic training equipment you can buy (less than $1,000)
  
• elementary education - I'm on the Board of Trustees at both my kids' schools.
  
• Historic preservation
  
• Scotch
  
• Travel and Food
  

[Dan Grelinger]

I see a lot of the expected, some of the unexpected, but where are the model rocketry buffs?

[Mike T.]

Family - better put them first just in case they ever read this, I have a very patient wife and two young teenage boys. I'm not exactly short but the eldest is already at least a couple of inches taller than me and the second one is catching up fast.

Calculators - HP 21, 25C, 32, 33C, 34C, 10C, and 11C. I would like to own an HP97 one day, as this was the first 'computer' I ever used.

Computers - particularly small uVAXen (VMS), Linux, and Windows NT. I've got a couple of DEC Rainbows here somewhere too.

Programming - nearly all self taught, (HP Calculator simulators elsewhere on this site). I'm trying to get to my head around how to write programs using KDE or GNOME but I'm not getting very far, you seem to need loads of 'stuff' just to do anything in C!

Food - despite the interests above I'm into more than just Pizza! I prefer a good Chinese or French restaurant but don't get out very frequently.

Swimming - but not nearly often enough to counteract the effects of eating a little too much (I think I used to be quite good but I'm far too unfit now).

Walking - I'm not into hiking as such but if I'm somewhere new and interesting I will wander about for miles just exploring.

Model Railways - mostly Z Gauge (1/220 scale), collecting this stuff is a slow process as you spend most of your time saving up..

Electronics - can't remember much of the theory at all and haven't actually made anything for ages. I learnt the hard way to keep one hand in your pocket at all times when working with thermionic valves.

Photography - still have a couple of old Minolta X-GMs and X-700s (with some rather nice lenses) but never seem to have enough time to do much anymore, and English summers don't help!

Physics - last but not least - a brilliant subject, just wish I'd been better at Maths!

Basically I like fiddling with 'stuff'.

[Matthias Wehrli]

Well, let me say I have many other hobbies:

- singing in a choir
- archery
- geocaching

Maybe I will list them on my website (some are already).

Matthias

[Paul Dale]

My hobbies and interests in no particular order after the first:

• My wife and children first and most importantly.
  
• Woodworking - too many things to build, so little time.
  
• Meccano (also Erector & Marklin Metall) - working mechanisms mostly.
  
• Role playing games - just about any kind.
  
• Board games - mostly Euro games but some others.
  
• Painting miniatures.
  
• Puzzles - designing, making and solving.
  
• Programming - calculators and others.
  
• Music - just about anything except opera.
  
• Judo - coaching now rather than competing.
  
• Dr Who.
  

Things which I used to do a lot but don't do much anymore (lack of time more than lack of interest):

• Bushwalking.
  
• Lots of other martial arts.
  
• Windsurfing and sailing.
  
• Swimming.
  
• Chess.
  
• Bridge.
  
• Mathematics.
  
• Handball.
  

My current job is embedded programming, although I've done stints in computer security, mine site design & super computing.

Edited: 26 Mar 2009, 8:14 p.m.

[Reth]

1. Guitars
2. Bushwalking
3. Drinking :)
4. Picking-up chicks :)

[JDonley]

Reading, especially financial and investing.

walking for health.

birding and binoculars.

hunting arrowheads.

football.

walking and spoiling our cocker spaniel.

cooking (specialty is bbq brisket).

geology.

In my younger days:

fishing.

tie flies.

stock building.

calf roping.

leather work.

Nothing very cerebral here.

[Chuck]

I could copy almost everyone's hobbies. However, here's a short list off the top of my own head:

*music (I play trombone in several groups: the symphony, opera, community band, local playhouse, and other various small time gigs.)

*photography (nature, and fine arts)

*gardening

*sports (although age is making participating a little more difficult)

*math stuff...collecting math "junk", analytical excursions, and career (math puts food on the table.)

*you might say checking in on hpmuseum several times a day is also an enjoyable hobby.

CHUCK

Edited: 27 Mar 2009, 10:22 a.m. after one or more responses were posted

[Nigel Bamber]

¤ Family
¤ Watching the children playing any sport in School teams and wishing I still could
¤ Watching, playing Cricket ( yes I live in England )
¤ Progressive rock music
¤ Electronic Gadgets and hacking them
¤ Walking our dog in the countryside

Nigel

[Geoff Quickfall]

What kind of dog is yours Nigel?

Yes she does have eyes!

Edited: 27 Mar 2009, 1:09 p.m.

[Nigel Bamber]

Geoff

She is a Golden Retriever , happens to be Pedegree, but we don't show her, and she is just a member of the family !

With reference to the Landrover comments below I have a short wheelbase Defender, and she loves sitting next to me on the passenger seat in the front.

Nigel

[Patrick Rendulic]

profession: physics teacher

interests (in a light order of preference):

- photography (film based, slides, black and white, darkroom, ...)

- hiking

- 4x4 landrover

- boating

- ham radio

- bass guitar

- target shooting (with fire arms)

[John Mosand]

Norwegian retired architect and musician. Also studied art history.

Books: Wide range, favorites in shelf: Oxford English Dictionary (full edition), encyclopedias, lots of reference works. Otherwise, many fiction classics, humor (Runyon, Keillor, etc.).
Music: Professional oboist for 12 years. Brahms, Mahler, Schoenberg, impressionists, etc. +swing and be-bop...
Math: Read a lot, esp. interested in prime probs and complex numbers.
Old cars: Have two Saabs, a 1959 and a 1965 Monte Carlo both in perfect cond.
Slide rules: Have a large collection of Aristos and related literature.
Photography: Leicas, 1935 Standard, 1957 M3 with f:1,4 Summilux, 1985 M6 with five lenses, Digilux.
HP: 10C and 48SX (from introduction), both wonderful things!
Otherwise: Philosophy, history, art, languages, biogs, natural history, geography, well, anything!

[Joerg Woerner]

Patrick,

I had this one for 6 years in Germany:

Yours?

Regards,

Joerg

[Patrick Rendulic]

Hello Joerg

Here is mine:

6 years old ;)

This year it will see the North Cape. And I see that we both like camping.

Edited: 27 Mar 2009, 12:50 p.m.

[Peter Klein]

Me:

- Classical music (playing it, listening to it, composing it)

- Photography

- Writing (mostly about the arts)

- Musical theatre

- Hiking

- Reading, especially biography these days

[bill platt]

I'm reading an interesting book on Sir Francis Walsingham.
Also reading "Hell in a Very Small Place" about the French at Dien Bien Phu.
Finally, reading a book about Chinese exploration in the 14th ct'y and possible profound influence on the course of European exploration.

[Tony Duell]

Might as well post mine :

HP desktop calculators and computers (or is that 'hp calcs'?)

Old Computers in general. No, not 486 PCs, but things like PDP8s, PDP11s, PERQs, Philips P800s, anything I can understand at gate level.

Electronics. All electronics. Valves, transistors, ICs, etc. Building, repairing, tweaking, etc. I do have an amateur radio license, but I'm not active, and I'd rather not post the callsign.

Clocks/timekeeping. Everything from sundials to atomic clocks. One of my aims is to make a mechanical clock from scratch (and not just follow a published design, but design the thing too).

Film photography.

And related to that : Repairing cameras. Everything from sub-miniature to large format.

Home shop machining. There's not really a UK term for this, the closest is 'model engineering', but I don't really want to make models. I mean using machine tools at home to make stuff.

I hesistate to mention this one, but I love my cat :-)

Things I am NOT interested in :

Anything athletic/sporting. Neither taking part nor watching.

Pseudoscience/occult/related mumbo-jumbo.

Science fiction. Science fact is quite entertaining enough :-)

Making money. Sure I want to be able to enjoy my interests, but my aim is not to have a large bank balance

Religion. I don't want to get in a flame war, suffice it to say that your beliefs are your business, and I'll happily respect that. Just don't expect me to share them.

[Geoff Quickfall]

Hello Tony,

Yes, I agree about the home shop:

*  small shop lathe

*  CNC for metal as well as plastics

*  gear cutting wheel

*  good HP41c program for determining tooth count given the other

   main gear counts.

*  design a clock from scratch and then build.

I have a set of plans for a wooden clock based on the design of an 1820 American 30 hour clock. Most of the base plates are done and the only brass will be the anchor escapement.

Your correct, real science is exciting enough, no room for WOO WOO (aka mumbo jumbo)!

By the way, 486's are not old, even 8086 or 8088 based machine are not old to me, but then I think I am dating myself. I would rather step even further back, like you!

Speaking of which the 9825A project here is comming along nicely. Machine is almost finished and just looking for a QIC tape for testing the drives read/write capability. This one came with EXTENDED IO, SYSTEMS PROGRAMMING and STRING-ADV PROGRAMMING.

I know how you feel about film and agree, just not in my buget considering how many shots I take. I tend to throw out 50 negatives for every 1 I keep. I do use slide film for special occasions and the digital for backup.

Just finished restoring a Zenith transoceanic. Nice design on the transistor, they are plug in and easily swapped out without the mess of soldering.

Hope to see you at some of the meetings in the future, miss my second Saturdays and I have a couple of projects that I need your help with, so I will let you know when you need to bring some fine tools and the logic tester.

Cheers, Geoff

[Trent Moseley]

Hi Geoff,

Nice to see your Transoceanic. I got mine in 1969 and everything works just fine except the chart light. Is it fixable?

tm

[Geoff Quickfall]

Hi Tony,

Google "Zenith, your model number and repairs.

ex "zenith d700y repairs"

and you will get a number of responses such as these:

Trans-Oceanic

resources

DY 3000 repair

Good luck with it but I know it is 100% replaceable!

Cheers, Geoff

[Allen]

I like collecting (and solving) Puzzles made by Binary Arts / Think Fun. There are some really challenging ones.. My favorite is the Cherry Wood Hexadecimal Puzzle.
Also camping and outdoors activities.

Edited: 28 Mar 2009, 2:29 p.m.

[Stuart Sprott]

Hi,

My interests other than programming calculators are.

Maths, Physics, Surveying, Astromomy, Cosmology, running half Marathons, reading fiction and non fiction books, collecting old scientific books and during the last couple of years learning to play the Violin.

I must say that learning to play the Violin at my age (65) has been one of the most difficult tasks I have undertaken and also one of the most rewarding.

[Keith Midson]

Hi from Australia,

I consider myself to be weird, not just for collecting HP's. My interests are:

- Windsurfing
- Underwater hockey (5 time Australian representative, won 2 world titles)
- Traffic engineering/ transport planning (University was my first encounter with HP's), run my own small consultancy. I did my first engineering degree with a 28S, then two Masters degrees with a 48G, now I have over 44 HP's (and growing every day it seems ...)
- Photography
- Swimming

Most of the above (apart from HP collecting and work of course) has taken a back seat now that i'm married with three children. Interesting that my two eldest boys love playing with my 95LX and 200LX!! I'm thinking of getting a couple of cheap 95LX's for them to keep them happy!

Cheers,
Keith