Hobbies - They're Great but Shut Up About Them

A few days ago I talked about my lack of ability to pick a hobby and stick with it.  I mean, I talked about my desire to broaden my horizons by experiencing a vast amount of activities.  Yeah, that sounds better.

But I tell you this, I would rather be one of those people with no hobby to speak of than one of those people with one hobby that they never shut up about.  Everybody knows somebody who is in to something that they never stop talking about - even though it may be the most boring thing in the world to everyone else.

Just in my office alone I can think of many such cases.  I have a bowler, a motorcycle enthusiast, a softball player, and a hunter.  I can tell you more than I care too about each of these person's hobby.  I know about bowling ball spin, I know about bullet spin, I know about tire spin, and I know about pitching spin.  I know about knocking down pins, I know about knocking down bikes, I know about knocking down deer, and I know about knocking down cold one's after the game.

But none of these compare to the things that I know about ski patrol!  That's right, I have one coworker who is a ski patroller at a local ski spot.  I have never heard anyone talk more about a hobby in my life.  Now granted, being a ski patroller is a noble hobby.  He helps a lot of people who have injured themselves.  But do we need to talk about it so much?

There is a lot of medical training that goes into being a ski patroller.  And apparently this guy has learned so much that he is now one of the trainers for new patrollers.  However, contrary to what he and others in the office may believe, he is not a doctor.  Yet, he takes it upon himself to diagnose everybody in the office.  If someone one stumbles and stubs their toe, he is there with his first aid kit, snapping on the latex gloves, faster than you can say Ow!  Picture Dwight from The Office.

He also somehow manages to bring up ski patrol in every meeting with vendors, customers, anyone.  It gets to a point about 20 minutes into the ski patrol lecture that you see people's eyes gloss over and they go into a social coma.  They are thinking of anything they can besides ski patrol, just to keep from becoming a permanent vegetable.

The best (or worst) of all, is that every time he gets in a vehicle he has to take along his ski patrol vest and first aid kit.  Why? Because every time he sees an accident (or a vehicle slide off - which we get a lot of in the winter here) he has to stop.  He says this is required by "first responders", but I think he just likes to use his ski patrol powers.

But if it's me sitting in a vehicle after an accident, and I see a guy run up with a bright orange vest that says "Ski Patrol" on it, I would be so pissed.  I can see him running up.  "Have no fear, Ski Patrol here."  And the person in the car saying, "Do you see any frickin skis on my feet?  Does it look like I'm out for a little recreation here?"

If you have a hobby, I'm happy for you.  I may even be interested in knowing what it is.  But if I was interested enough to listen to you talk about it for hours and hours, then I would be interested enough to go do it myself and then you wouldn't have to tell me about it.  So SHUT UP!

With that being said, please feel free to post comments and share your hobbies, or the hobbies of others that they have told you so much about.