Lots of riders here!
In my college years I owned a Honda 500, a straight four. Nice ride and if I was going to get another bike I'd look for one like that. Later I had a Yamaha 750, two-stroke V (I don't remember model names or numbers) and though it was a larger bike and a decent ride, it never matched the Honda.
No more bikes. I also used to do a lot of backpacking and hiking and running and cycling and stuff like that. But I have two little kids now (and a wife!), so that takes a lot of time and energy with not much left over for hobbies. But... I do keep at the photography (not just of the kids). I prefer film, have a darkroom and love old-school and simple cameras. TLRs, rangefinders, Holgas, things like that. I also do a lot of pinhole photography and have built a number of my own cameras (nothing fancy, mind you). Pinhole is about as basic and simple as you can get.
I also enjoy backyard astronomy and have recently forayed into solar astronomy with a dedicated set-up. The Sun is dynanic - every day is different and beautiful and I just love it.
Other things - I read. A lot. Physics, philosophy, cosmology, neuroscience, etc. And I do some occasional woodworking. Built a boat several years ago, a lapstrake Merrimack skiff - just a small rowboat. Now I'm busted back to bookshelves and random house repairs.
One common thread is that I like to keep things simple and low-tech. Film, not digital. Rowboat, not a power boat. Manually operated telescopes, no motor-drives, no computerized object locators (not yet, anyway, I may cave on that score). Actual books, no e-readers. (These are all just personal preferences - no judgements, and I'm no purist.)
I like to keep the experiences as direct as possible and I think pipe-smoking dovetails in with that quite nicely.
Nice to meet some folks to share the puffing with, even if "virtually".
