Not a Hobby!?

[aspiring_sage]

My apologies to all on the forum:
Twice I’ve forgotten again that “hobby” is a curse word, and insulting here. Smoking is so much more, than mere “hobby”. This is my second offense and it appears I did not learn from the first.

Pease know I mean no insult.

In my life, anything that costs this amount of money and time, but doesn’t make me money is a hobby.

A poor definition, perhaps. I wouldn’t call these hobbies because I see how they are life sustaining and basic needs: sleeping, eating, raising family, going to church, maintaining the house, etc…

Wait, isn’t nicotine delivery a sort of medication? A lifestyle? A spiritual practice?

I suppose I wouldn’t consider “taking medicine” to be a hobby.

Perhaps smoking is a performance enhancment, and so could be considered an investment or optimization to one’s activities or investment. Maybe in that case, as a business tool, I could write my tobacco and accessories off on my taxes*?
*Not good tax advice, just jokes. Please don’t audit me, I don’t do this.

Collecting, trying and discussing smoking and accessories on a forum -> hobby

On the other hand, I’d argue that eating, sleeping, or even thinking can become “hobbies” when taken to sorts of extremes. With the amount of navel

For my life, at 0-4 bowls per week it currently takes hobby status.

I understand if you’ve been putting in the hustle at 10 bowls/day for years, that you may be insulted that I’d treat the sport so casually. You’re entitled to your opinion.

What say you?

• Hobby?
• Lifestyle?
• More natural than breathing?
• Medicine?
• Spiritual practice?
• “Nobody cares!” ?
• “Just something I do” ?
• Other?

Interested in hearing your thoughts.
Thanks

 

[cosmicfolklore]

I call it a hobby, and if this is taken as an insult, I cannot control that. Some people will argue with a fence post till they pass out.
Call it whatever you want... an addiction even. It doesn't bother me one bit.

 

[scloyd]

For me, smoking a pipe is one of my many hobbies. I may smoke a bowl once a week or may not smoke for a few weeks. There is nothing wrong with this being a hobby.

 

[Briarberg]

It's certainly a hobby to me, amongst other things. I don't see anything diminishing about the term, I see it as the most useful in many contexts.

 

[timt]

• Medicine?
• Spiritual practice?

Yes, both. It keeps the demons at bay.

 

[TheIronMonkey]

I'm not sure the distinction matters. It will be different things for different people. For a pipemaker, it could be research. For some, an addiction, others, an indulgence.

For me, it's something I enjoy doing.

 

[HawkeyeLinus]

I don't think about it, but looking up one definition, it's not my occupation and is pursued for leisure and/or relaxation - so I'll go with "hobby" but it doesn't bother me how anyone else classifies it, if they feel they need to.

Maybe that's what my faithful beagle circa 1974 was looking up in my avatar!

 

[MacMarty89]

Really? Are there members who take offence because someone calls pipe smoking a hobby? Let me tell you something: it‘s a fucking hobby.

So…

 

[didimauw]

I'd have to say it's a weird mix between addiction and hobby. I lean more towards the hobby end of it, because I still smoke cigarettes too. Smoking cigarettes is not a hobby, it's an addiction. I like to smoke pipes, I enjoy everything about it. Cigarettes I smoke because I feel the need to. I don't pick up a cigarette, and look at it in different lights, take pictures of them, or buy different shapes, colors, etc.
On the other hand, I'd sooner give up cigarettes than the pipe if I had to. I've done it once before.

 

[camaguey]

There is a difference between the aspect of smoking and the hobby of collecting pipes. Of course , they are interrelated.

 

[Casual]

It isn’t an insult here to call it a hobby. You’ll always run into someone or other claiming offense. I say, one should say what one means and stick by it. The offended will carp either way.

 

[hawky454]

I call it a hobby too. I find it quite funny that it bothers some people when we call it that.

 

[Sweet Home Alabama]

When I was addicted to chewing tobacco, it was no hobby. Pipe smoking is definitely a hobby. No addiction to date. ??

 

[tklee]

hobby1
/ˈhɒbi/
Learn to pronounce
noun
1. an activity done regularly in one's leisure time for pleasure.

Mmmm...... to me, it's a hobby. Ya, maybe to some people, pipe smoking is their daily activity, their addiction like cigarette, or part of their life. But it's a hobby to me. I only smoke pipe when I feel like smoking pipe, usually at home when I have free time. I still smoke cigarette, smoking cigarette is not my hobby, it's my addiction. That's part of my life ?

 

[sablebrush52]

Referring to the practice of pipe smoking as a "hobby" has been established precedent long before the offended were a gleam in their father's good eye.

Regardless of what the very very infinitesimally few dissenters say on the subject, hobby is the accepted descriptor, accurate or not.

We had a very lively thread on the topic with a few members growing passionate over a term that they considered insufficiently formal and lacking in the necessary gravitas to properly represent the practice of pipe smoking.

Personally, I don't care. Call it a hobby, a calling, an addiction, whatever suits you. I think of it as a pastime. Regardless, it's The Hobby in greater pipespeak.

 

[mawnansmiff]

hobby, n.1​

sense 5. A favourite occupation or topic, pursued merely for the amusement or interest that it affords, and which is compared to the riding of a toy horse (sense 3); an individual pursuit to which a person is devoted (in the speaker's opinion) out of proportion to its real importance. Formerly hobby-horse n. (sense Compounds 1).

1816 W. Scott Antiquary I. xi. 248 I quarrel with no man's hobby.

1823 W. Scott Peveril I. ix. 231 The pleasure of being allowed to ride one's hobby in peace and quiet.

1857 T. Hughes Tom Brown's School Days ii. ii. 270 He's on one of his pet hobbies.

1874 A. H. Sayce Princ. Compar. Philol. viii. 312 Transgress the boundaries of scientific evidence, and incur the charge of riding a hobby too hard.

1880 L. Stephen Alexander Pope vi. 139 His [Lord Oxford's] famous library was one of his special hobbies.

So there you have it chaps.....I think

Regards,

Jay.

 

[brian64]

Some people will argue with a fence post till they pass out.

It's a hobby.

 

[Chasing Embers]

So my cigarette smoking is a hobby? Interesting!

 

[brian64]

There is a difference between the aspect of smoking and the hobby of collecting pipes. Of course , they are interrelated.

That's essentially how I see it as well. I couldn't care less what anyone else calls it, but for me, I don't see the actual act of smoking as a hobby, but everything else about pipes and pipe tobacco certainly falls into the hobby category.

If I only had one or two pipes and purchased only some OTC blend as I needed it...and most importantly didn't waste spend precious time on a pipe forum discussing this stuff...then it would be difficult to call it a hobby. But with the collection aspect of numerous pipes and a tobacco "cellar"...and related accessories...and wading into the minutiae of it all on here on a daily basis...yeah that's all hobby stuff.

 

[makhorkasmoker]

A word has connotations as well as denotations. This is one of the ways we create shades of meaning—and understanding. Those shades matter. All sorts of terrible things can happen when we ignore connotations

the word “hobby” connotes triviality, among other things. I personally don’t think it’s trivial so I don’t use that word. And when others call it a hobby, I am not offended (a word that has taken on connotation of oversensitivity and self righteousness, recently ) but I do wonder, why would they it think it trivial? And: do they REALLY think it’s trivial? And if they don’t think it’s trivial, why use that word? The possible answers make me avoid the word “hobby” all the more