Looking for a hobby ...

July 2, 2009 6:30 PM

A physical hobby for a desk-bound man.

I have been thinking about taking up a hobby that complements my sedentary lifestyle working as a software developer. I do exercise but that's more for health. I play some music but that is quite sedentary as well. The hobby should be something that will involve physical skills. Something that comes to mind is carpentry or woodworking but I am afraid it will take up a lot of room.

Any other ideas?

posted by raheel to grab bag (41 comments total)

Off road cycling, tons of fun and great for you!
posted by julie_of_the_jungle at 6:42 PM on July 2

How about bowling or pool? You already exercise, so you don't need something strenuous.
posted by Dr Dracator at 6:44 PM on July 2

Building model cars/planes/boats, etc.

Knitting/crocheting. (Yes, men do it too)

Drawing.
posted by amyms at 6:45 PM on July 2

Start hanging out at a bar with a dartboard!
posted by Greg Nog at 6:45 PM on July 2

Oh, I thought you wanted something you could do at your desk. That's what my suggestions above are for. Sorry if that wasn't your intention.
posted by amyms at 6:46 PM on July 2

Martial arts.
posted by hermitosis at 6:46 PM on July 2

Homebrewing.
posted by box at 6:54 PM on July 2

Vegetable gardening.
posted by Eumachia L F at 6:59 PM on July 2

Bicycles in general are a lot of fun, too. You can clean 'em, tune 'em, change the parts around, sign 'em up for bike social-networking sites, all kinds of stuff. Also, you can ride 'em.
posted by box at 7:00 PM on July 2

Seconding bowling or pool. Both have great learning curves, such that you'll never fully master them, but over years you'll become very very very good. My favorite kinds of hobbies.
posted by Precision at 7:01 PM on July 2

Lego art.
posted by Cool Papa Bell at 7:22 PM on July 2

Rock climbing. Now you can even do that indoors.
posted by caddis at 7:36 PM on July 2 [1 favorite has favorites]

Weaving, or stained glass.
posted by orange swan at 7:46 PM on July 2

Disc golf. Don't knock it.
posted by spikeleemajortomdickandharryconnickjrmints at 7:53 PM on July 2 [1 favorite has favorites]

Or the other homebrewing: bread baking.
posted by foooooogasm at 8:02 PM on July 2

Luthiery. Fine peening. Interpretative dance. LARP. Chainsaw sculpture. Prop-based standup comedy. Stonewright. Stop-motion animation.

(Kind of a vague question, isn't it? I'm also a little confused by the idea of arbitrarily selecting a "hobby", rather than just doing something you enjoy doing. That seems backwards to me.)
posted by ook at 8:10 PM on July 2

Weight lifting.
posted by holloway at 8:11 PM on July 2

My suggestions:
- In-line skating (rollerblading)
- Martial arts
- Gardening
- Renovate parts of your house (or a friend/relative's house) yourself
posted by Simon Barclay at 8:35 PM on July 2

Definitely also recommending homebrewing and bread baking. They're not overly physical though, but they make for wonderful and rewarding hobbies that will get you away from the desk for a while.
posted by swrittenb at 8:43 PM on July 2

Beer league hockey. Way easier to get into than you'd think. Tons of fun too. Contact your local ice rink.
posted by JuiceBoxHero at 8:43 PM on July 2

Learn to sail? That's what I'm doing. It's reasonably physical, gets you outside, but doesn't feel unpleasantly excercise-y.
posted by Kadin2048 at 9:38 PM on July 2 [1 favorite has favorites]

Walking, alone or with a partner.

Unless you're training for some kind of race or event, walking is the way to go to get all the health benefits of working out.

You don't need to fork out a lot of money, you can do it anywhere, you'll get outside, you can be a tourist in your home town, you can listen to music or books on tape, you can engage a different part of your brain and hopefully, if you look both ways before you cross the street, you won't get injured.
posted by holdenjordahl at 9:39 PM on July 2 [2 favorites has favorites]

I'm a sedentary desk-bound grad student who does lots of programming. My advice to you: Go find the nearest soaring club and ask to take an intro flight with an instructor. Many clubs offer a cheap 3-flight intro package and if you decide you love it, it should cost you less than $4000 to get your private pilot glider rating. Getting a powered rating isn't too much more expensive, but there's something about motorless flight that appeals to the same set of instincts as sailing, but with the added thrill of, well, flying. Additionally, being a member of a club gives you an excuse to chat with an interesting section of the world you might not normally meet in software dev world, and you'll get a lot of exercise in the form of "hey, help me rig/de-rig/move this glider."
posted by Alterscape at 9:49 PM on July 2

Facet gemstones, the machine is compact the process is clean.
posted by hortense at 10:33 PM on July 2 [1 favorite has favorites]

Surprisingly, nobody mentioned photography. dSLRs are very cheap nowadays.
posted by zaxour at 11:28 PM on July 2

Seconding disc golf. Discs are cheap, the vast majority of courses are free and open, and at many it's okay to have a beer while playing.

Also: Geocaching. No GPS needed (though it helps). I've been led to more I-never-even-knew-this-existed spots than I can count. Quite a few I-walk-past-this-every-day-and-I-can't-believe-there's-a-cache-here, as well. The final search for the cache itself, once you've gotten to its general location, is pretty fun, too.
posted by clorox at 12:20 AM on July 3 [1 favorite has favorites]

Roller skating. I'm a coder of sorts, and I took this up on a whim about six months ago -- and it's made a huge difference. In my case there are three rinks in the area, one of which has a weekly adult skate that's worth the effort, and now I'm working on skating backwards, which is bound to impress the kids someday. I haven't found a good upper-body equivalent yet, though.
posted by davejay at 1:24 AM on July 3

Dancing. Pick something you like the music of.
posted by kjs4 at 4:29 AM on July 3

2nding luthiery. Guitars or violin making. The highest level of woodworking and you don't need much space at all...there's a whole tradition of spanish guitarmaking based on very simple tools.

You can start with a kit acoustic guitar and go from there.

If you can't play your creations, I will!
posted by sully75 at 5:52 AM on July 3

you play music - do you play drums? drumming will make you break a sweat, because you are using your entire body. and if you already play music it's pretty accessible. plus, drumming is awesome fun.

i also second bicycles. i'm a desk-bound engineer, and have started biking 40min to work and get enormous satisfication from repairing and maintaining my embarassingly shitty bike (which on the plus side, needs a lot of work). replacing spokes, patching tires, straightening weels, tuning the derailer and brakes for better operation. that sort of thing. also, bike riding is a great as a group activity or a solo adventure.
posted by molecicco at 6:13 AM on July 3

Try using a lathe. It's one piece of woodworking equipment that can turn a chunk of wood into a finished product and doesn't take up that much room though it does create a good amount of shavings. Use green wood, it is far more pleasurable to turn.

Another option might be using a scroll saw. you can do puzzles or intarsia...the more common name for this escapes me at the moment - mosaics doesn't really cover it.

Or band saw boxes.

Or, just go with hand tools. A box of good hand tools can produce everything a full shop can and it is very pleasant to work wood without the noise.
posted by mearls at 6:17 AM on July 3

How about metalworking? Lots of small hobbyist machines are now on the market and you can put together a nice home machine shop in a 10x10-foot space (or smaller). The initial cost to get started with a mini-lathe will be about $600 if you shop carefully and a nicely equipped home machine shop with a mini-mill will be about $2000. Don't worry about learning metalworking because there is a wonderful online community that will help you learn.

Davegoodfellow.com - makes small steam/air-powered engines in his apartment
Mini-lathe.com - this site got me hooked on the hobby
Machinistblog.com - some useful links, videos and other resources
Micro-Machine.shop - another good site with lots of pictures

There's nothing wrong with woodworking, but you may quickly get the point where you everything you would like to build is big and requires a lot of space and a lot of expensive wood (and a lot of sanding and finishing work). Working in metal is often a lot less expensive and metalworking skills can be used in conjunction with many other hobbies.
posted by 14580 at 6:58 AM on July 3 [1 favorite has favorites]

I'll second metalworking. Through the university I'm attending, I have access to a mini-lathe and mini-mill (plus a TIG welder and a bunch of other fun tools). I don't often have call to use them, but they're fun. Do plan on making a bit of a mess, though. The workbench for the lathe and mill is about 8'x3', and throws chips over an area at least twice that size. We have a cement floor and a shopvac; not sure how to best make that work in smaller living conditions, but I'm sure the guys in the aforementioned links have some suggestions.
posted by Alterscape at 7:13 AM on July 3

Blacksmithing.

A small dairy goat herd, if you can swing it, will be very physical, provide a product, and the goats are great companions. Really. They are. Sheep might be good; they don't have to be milked, but they're not as fun overall.

Square dancing or other folk dancing.
posted by jgirl at 7:40 AM on July 3 [1 favorite has favorites]

What happens when you combine beer and competitive skeeball? Brewskee-Ball. Also, I don't think you have to drink beer to make competitive skeeball your new hobby.
posted by hapticactionnetwork at 7:53 AM on July 3

What about Arduino? It's part coding, part electrical wiring, part creativity. It seems like it would build on your existing skillset while allowing you to take part in some building/making of stuff.
posted by GilloD at 10:43 AM on July 3

Thirding bicycle maintenance. I've whiled away a number of fun hours learning how to maintain my bikes, fitting stainless steel fenders and semi-custom racks, taking trips to the bike shop or hardware store for parts and tools, etc. If there's nothing to do with your bike, you can also start picking up discarded/garage sale/thrift store bikes and fixing them up. You don't need much space to store a workstand and a good set of tools.

My brother-in-law, who is also a software developer, makes messenger bags and randonneur bags in his spare time.
posted by brianogilvie at 11:19 AM on July 3

Seconding Rock climbing. I am stuck at a desk for most of the day too. I got addicted when my neighbor invited me out one night. It can be as easy or as hard as you want.
I would add kayaking too. A little more work involved getting ready and finding water. It's still a good way to spend an afternoon.
posted by Climber at 12:13 PM on July 3

Fishing
posted by canoehead at 12:20 PM on July 3

Rocketry: 1 2 3
posted by neuron at 3:41 PM on July 3

I'm going to self-second my luthiery suggestion from above. The cool thing about guitar making, is that you, as an amateur, can build a guitar that's very close to as good as the very best maker. I mean...after a lot of practice, reading and research. You can make a masterwork that someone may love for a lifetime. It's got a heaviness about it that's hard to beat.

Violin making is harder, and less individual, but also a great hobby. There's more and more info about how Stradavari and his buddies did what they did available, which is making it a great time to be an amateur violin maker. People are sharing information for the first time in history...it used to be very secretive. Seriously, it would be cool. Way hard and challenging but cool.
posted by sully75 at 9:42 AM on July 5