March 26, 2013

Hobbies.

I like roads. I like driving on roads, I like designing roads, I like following roads to see where they go and I like seeing what signs say on roads.

I’m a road geek. I always have been and I always will be.

I have a whole website devoted to the roads of Upstate New York. Some people don’t understand why I have such an obsession with all things roadly, but I do. I have been known to drive two hours out of my way to see what the new exit signs on an interstate look like.

I haven’t been as engaged with my road hobby over the past year or so as I would like to be. Work has crept into my personal life a bit and I have been busying myself doing hobby things on tech with tech. I’ve been futzing around with Linux, tweaking config files and the like. While these little tech adventures occupy my mind and keep me busy, they don’t invoke a passion like being a road geek does. Tweaking tech feels like a job and when it doesn’t work right I start to get cranky. I don’t want to feel cranky, I want to enjoy the passion I have for a hobby.

I like it when I feel passionate.

This morning I dug out my little pocket video camera and mounted it on the dash of the Jeep. Earl had bought me a nifty camera mount specifically for this purpose and I hadn’t used it before. It’s nifty! I took some video of a stretch of road that I thought other road geeks, well, actually road scholars, might find interesting. I’m going to be adding it to my road website in the next week or so.

Taking that video made me realize my passion for this geeky little hobby of mine and it got my day started off on the right foot.

And starting the day off on the right foot is always a good thing.

Earl and I have a lot of travel planned over the next several months and much of it involves driving.

I’m going to be one happy man.