I’m from Long Island, so anything north of White Plains meant “upstate NY” to me. I was under the impression Albany and Buffalo were next to each other when they are about as far apart as Paris and London. But living in Westchester with a wife from the Hudson Valley who lives to vacation in the Adirondacks has familiarized me with upstate geography. The Finger Lakes are near Cornell and the drive there is rather scenic. It is a landscape of rolling hills and valleys studded with picturesque farms. The full self-driving feature on my Tesla was again clutch for getting me there without being overly exhausted.

Haute cuisine not necessarily being a feature of these trips, I had dinner at a Denny’s at 9:30 pm, spaghetti and meatballs while my car charged at a closed Starbucks about a block away. The breakfast at Holiday Inn had an automatic pancake maker instead of a waffle iron so that was a bit of an upgrade. The bathroom surprisingly had a very loud jacuzzi and a landline next to the toilet seat but also native USB-c chargers. 1986’s fancy bathroom upgrades, meet 2026’s charging standard.

I ended up missing the first day of the show (Friday afternoon) but I got there early on Saturday. As I was loading my watches into my display immediately two dudes from Westchester came up with a lot of conversation. I ended up moving to be closer to some friends’ tables.

One thing that strikes me about these shows is that it’s one of the last havens of affordable vintage watches. I think the higher end watches were around $3,000-$4,000, there were plenty of options under $1,000 or even $500. There were trays of watches for $10 each, project watches of course, but including many mechanical watches. There were also some American pocket watches being offered, as well as the usual assortment of clocks. I think the overall ratio has improved in terms of having more watches at these shows, which is typically associated with a “younger” crowd. Of course, I consider anyone my age or less to be “young” and it’s relative to the average membership so I’m talking about anyone under 50.

I brought the giant bag of straps I forgot to bring to the last show and I surprisingly did a brisk business in selling straps all day. Of course I was selling them insanely cheap but still, pricing out straps one at a time, taking pictures, shipping, etc. would be a massive hassle. I got about $600 out of my strap assortment, less than if I pieced them out, but I got them out the door so I was happy.

In terms of watches, I’ve reached the point where I’ve sold all the ones that I really wanted to get rid of and I’m a bit indifferent to selling what I have left. So I went through them, came up with reasonable prices, and labelled them with hanging price tags. I color-coded the tags to make it easier and made a stoplight diagram to make it simple enough for a child.

I got lots of looks and tire-kickers but not much commitment until the end when I made a big trade and sold one watch.

So I walked away five watches, a giant bag of straps, a watchbox, a winder, and a Dunhill lighter…lighter, and came home with two new-to-me watches.

Overall it was a good show. I enjoyed spending time socializing with other watch dudes. When you have a table, you’re there anyway and have a home base, so you’re chatting and contemplating buying/selling/trading the whole time. I can’t think of a better way for a watch guy to spend their “time.”

It’s an old Sony radio from the late 70’s or early 80’s. I’ve been surprised to have people comment on Instagram that they had this exact one at some point. It happens to have been made in Taiwan. My dad is a retired electrical engineer from Taiwan so this hit me perfectly in my nostalgia spot.

It turned on and sounded great. The only things that didn’t work were the volume knob which was scratching and randomly varying the volume level, and that the AM/FM switch would only do FM and when switched to the AM would not pick up any AM radio. As you can see, it has two antennae, a round one and a hanger shaped one that is on a soft wire. The backlight, which is a green color, was working when I got it.

I had it for a while but I decided to try to fix the knob. ChatGPT identified that the volume knob has a potentiometer that gets oxidized over time so that almost all old radios of this type develop the same problem. On YouTube I found some videos of people taking the radio apart, spraying it with deoxidizer, turning the knob back and forth, and fixing the problem. It didn’t look that complicated so I gave it a go. It helps that the old manual is available online as well, and it has detailed diagrams. In fact, the old manual looks like it was designed to help you repair the radio.

Sony Radio Manual Icf 9650w

10.2MB ∙ PDF file

Download

Download

So I first unscrewed the antennae attachments with a flathead screwdriver.

I then used a Phillips head screwdriver to take the back panel off. It’s actually screwed to plastic tubes that come out of the front. It was a little surprising, but the wood on the top, bottom, and sides is just a shell, the radio is basically a sandwich between the front that screws into the back panel, the electronics are attached to the front piece.

So I aggressively sprayed some Deoxit into the area around the knobs on the inside. I did the other knobs too, the bass and the tremble, and the AM/FM switch.

The volume knob

Other knobs

AM/FM switch

I twisted the knobs back and forth and flipped the AM/FM switch back and forth a few times. Surprisingly, the volume knob is now perfect and the AM radio is now picking up a signal normally.

The one thing that is pretty annoying is that I think I busted the fragile light bulb. I found the part number in the diagram in the manual, it’s called 1-518-154-00 Lamp (PL301). I located one on a vintage Sony part website for one cent with shipping for 13 bucks, but the website cancelled my order, I guess they couldn’t find it.

At first I thought the Deoxit had shorted something out because I used a lot of it but it has had a day to dry and the backlight is still not working. I’m not thrilled but the radio functions great otherwise. I guess I will gradually look for the light bulb but I’m not too hopeful.

It was a fun project and it’s a cool device that is as old as I am. The two of us were both made/born in Taiwan and probably imported/immigrated to America at around the same time!

On source was blogs. My favorites were Hodinkee, Fratello, Ablogtowatch, Worn and Wound. When Hodinkee used to sell vintage watches I went through their entire back catalogue of sold listings and read all the details and scoured the pictures to educate myself.

Another was the forums, particularly Watchuseek and Omegaforums. There were a lot of long detailed articles and a community that was willing to answer annoying newbie questions. I honestly really got started there when Fred Mandelbaum answered a question about an old Breitling and gave me the confidence to buy my first vintage watch.

A third was books. I picked up AJTT (the big black Omega book), Rolex Field Guide, the Movado History, the Alarm Wristwatch, and others.

At this point though, I tend to get a little bored by educational videos. I get an underlying feeling of suspicion that the person is trying to hype up the watch for personal gain.

Some of my favorite videos now are by people who just want to show something and not necessarily write a dissertation on it. Maybe attention spans are shorter now or maybe I’m less serious, or I have less time and patience.

I realized this today when I was watching Yasha from Rex Watches on Instagram. He’s a NYC diamond district watch dealer. My impression is that he likes Rolex and AP. Over the past few months he has diversified his offerings and listed what I would consider “value picks” by other brands. The video I was watching had him listing a bunch of Omegas. He just went through them one after another with the barest of bare bones descriptions (“green dial, solid gold”), the online price, and his price.

Why do I like this? I’m not sure. It’s kind of like, just cut to the chase, show me some watches. Let’s not pretend that we are friends here. You want to sell, I maybe want to buy, so let’s go. Leave the white gloves and orbit rig at home. No bullshit.

Or maybe the cultural moment of the Knicks win has me celebrating New York brusqueness. What do you think?

Caseback Openers

A rubber ball. It’s still the GOAT. This one looks like an 8 ball.

Rolex propeller. This is the old style, but it works great on most vintage Rolex casebacks including Submariner, GMT. You sometimes see John Buckley use it in his YouTube videos at 48 seconds here. I found one at an NAWCC show. They come in different sizes, I have the larger one.

Pahawi’s Custom Made Speedmaster Opener. If you want to open a Speedmaster caseback this thing is seriously awesome. You have to email the guy. It comes with a little tube you can insert to get more leverage, I usually don’t need it, and a little holder for your desk. Details here.

Single edge razor blades. I have tried tons of different snapback openers and they are generally difficult to use on watches. There’s a Seiko style one with a handle and there are caseback knives. They work better on pocketwatches where there is a bigger lip on the edges. Razor blades sound weird and I catch flak for it on Instagram but you use them because the edge breaks before bending the metal on a snap on caseback and you can wedge the edge in deeply. It works a lot better than the other ways, if you’re not as skilled as John Goldberger with the cheese knife in that Hodinkee Talking Watches episode.

Straps

It’s hard to talk about this because everyone is a strap purveyor but here’s my take.

Leather straps. My favorite was Atelier del Sur. It was based in Argentina and later Spain. They had amazing, soft, supple, matte finish calfskin and Horween straps. These were the GOAT leather straps for me (not as in chevre, but as in the greatest of all time). Unfortunately they seem to have gone out of business after the tariffs hit, the website is up but not open for purchasing, and there was no response from their Instagram account. ARE YOU GUYS THERE?? HOLLA AT ME IF YOU STILL HAVE INVENTORY TO SELL.

Rubber NATO straps. I have tried a lot of NATO straps but the rubber NATOs from Bonetto Cinturini are the best. They combine the NATO casual comfort with the stretch of rubber. They are remarkably tough considering how thin they are, and the rubber is not sticky at all. I get them online from Holben’s fine watch bands.

Fitted NATO straps. I have been pleasantly surprised by Anchor Straps. This has been a more recent one for me. I have the AnchorFlex rubber strap for my Tudor BB58 blue and I liked it well enough to get one for my Omega Seamaster Diver 300. The Tudor one was just the strap as I had the OEM bracelet, the rubber articulates with the end link and comes in with a standard spring bar. I don’t have the OEM bracelet for the Omega so I ordered end links along with it which fitted perfectly. You get the look of the Oysterflex band with the end links and the rubber comes straight down and is soft, tough, and flexible. It’s super comfortable and a great recent addition to my straps. The only thing is that the website is kind of confusing, getting the strap without end links while providing your own from your bracelet is the $80 option under “FKM straps,” and with end links is $119 under “classic straps.”

Bracelets and bracelet mods

Steel Reef is a very cool company. I have the on the fly extension link. It is similar to what I had on my modern 36 mm Rolex Explorer, basically it snaps open and lengthens and you can snap it back in to shorten. They also make aftermarket Tudor Black Bay bezels. I took my BB58 blue bezel off for fun once and I screwed up the gasket so I bought an aftermarket gasket from these guys and it fit perfectly.

Uncle “Straps” (you will always be Uncle Seiko to me) and Forstner. I have aftermarket bracelets from both companies. Good quality. I have a half link for my BB58 but I can’t remember from which one. Forstner beads of rice bracelets are great, probably the best aftermarket beads of rice bracelet for vintage watches.

Pliers. I’m serious. My BB58, if you can tell, has been sort of a science experiment for me. The OEM bracelet is good quality but the clasp length is super long. I played around with modifiers but the best thing I ever did was take two pliers and bend the tongue of the clasp at a more acute angle. It curves around my wrist now and it’s 100% more comfortable.

Bench items

Work Mat. I have the green Bergeon nonslip mat. It’s better than those strap changing trays because it’s just a large flat antistatic mat that sits on your desk. Nothing is getting scratched by it. They make one with an adhesive back too but I have mine around somewhat. I got it from Esslinger.com

Spring bar tool. I’ve had a few, as you can imagine. By and far the best is the standard Bergeon 6767-F. One end is pointed for open lug holes, the other is a small fork (F = fine) which works much better than the large fork. You can buy replacement tips, I replace the fork regularly as it gets worn down.

Lamp. I have this one. I like that it bends, dims, and has various levels of white to natural light.

Demagnetizer. I feel like this is never really the problem but it’s cool to have one I guess.

Polywatch/sandpaper/microfiber cloth. Polish the scratches off your hesalite/acrylic crystals.

Appraisal tools

Loupe. They make big ones, ones with lights built in that cost $800, branded ones that people collect. I just have the regular one. It’s fine. If you’re buying a vintage watch you absolutely do need it to tell if the dial is original or a redial, the other time is to look at what the caliber is where it is engraved under the balance wheel.

Geiger counter. I bought this one on Amazon a long time ago but it doesn’t look like they carry it currently. It’s good to have one to know if the dial is radium, and to impress people. John Buckley has one that attaches to his phone with an app, does anyone know what it is? Hit me in the comments.

UV torch. There are fancier ones but the regular ones are about the same in terms of function. It’s fun to play with it to make the lume glow at an event or at home. I originally thought that it would help to tell if the dial and hands are relumed but honestly, I go more by the appearance on a loupe but it doesn’t hurt to check it out. Radium usually glows like zero and tritium for a little bit, but there’s also things like dead tritium and glowie zinc sulfide tritium in vintage Rolex so you can’t really go by how long it glows to know whether it is correct.

Spring bars

Yes, I made this its own category. And yes, I am linking to my story about spring bars, and to Jack Forster’s story on Hodinkee. Esslinger has a large selection, I wish they would sponsor me but the love continues to be one sided on my part, check it out here.

Frodo

He’s a hobbit of the Shire who was adopted by his rich uncle Bilbo Baggins but his background is that he’s a Brandybuck on his mother’s side and grew up in Brandy Hall. Buckland is a border area, outside the Shire proper, and has more exposure to outsiders such as in Bree and along the river. So having grown up of modest means in a cosmopolitan area but having come into wealth later in life, he naturally gravitates towards practical timepieces with a nature theme and outstanding craftsmanship. He gets the Grand Seiko SBGH343. As per the GS website, “the dial’s color is meant to express the vibrancy of the fresh new leaves as sunlight penetrates their translucence in the spaces between the peach-colored cherry blossom petals.”

Aragorn

Isildur’s heir sometimes catches flak as the last remnant of an ancient house long bereft of kingship. Nevertheless, despite the reduced circumstances of his family, he was raised in Rivendell by Elrond Halfelven. As the chieftain of the Dunedain he engages in special forces missions on behalf of the Rangers of the North. He has a limited budget but with the knowledge and wisdom of an earlier Age he chooses a timepiece that can withstand his hard lifestyle.

His choice is a Rolex 1665 Double Red Sea-Dweller. The Sea reminds him of his Numenorian heritage and it was passed along, father to son, in an unbroken line.

Legolas

The son of King Thranduil of the Woodland Realm is an Elven prince. Even so, he likes slumming it with Dwarves and Men and other miscellaneous creatures such as hobbits and such. It’s a bit of a Prince and the Pauper situation, therefore he needs something low key but of high nobility to suit his rank. Patek Calatrava 96. He has a slender girlish wrist so it works great.

Gimli

Gloin’s son is perhaps the best traveled and most open minded of Durin’s folk. Even so, he hews close to his heritage, choosing a piece that reflects the design language of the Dwarves. Art Deco inspired and highly angular and architectural, the Bulgari Octo Finissimo is his choice.

Gandalf

The wizard formerly known as Gandalf the Grey needs to let Middle Earth know that he is now Gandalf the White. 300 lives of Men he has walked this earth so he needs a calendar watch that can handle leap years. Crucially, a wielder of the flame of Anor needs a big watch with a big glow. IWC Big Pilot Perpetual Calendar Ceralume.

Sam

A humble gardener of the Shire, he proves standfast and to have a surprising affinity for Elves. He needs a watch that is plain from the outside but with a special movement inside and a connection to starlight. A Speedmaster Caliber 321 Ed White.

Merry and Pippin

A Brandybuck and a Took, they have similar roles in Rohan and Gondor respectively. They are both from respected families in the Shire and play key roles at pivotal moments in the story, and both sign up for military service.

Both end up with Tudor limited edition variants made in collaboration with their host nations. Merry gets Tudor Black Bay Harrods Edition with a white horse on a green field at 6 o’clock for Rohan, and Pippin gets a Pelagos 39 with a white tree on a black background at 6 for Gondor.

Boromir

I would have to go with Invicta because one does not simply walk into an Invicta store to buy 2 watches and get 4 more for free, it is folly.

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A game is an activity with a set of rules that proceeds towards a specified outcome. It may be a solitary activity but more often proceeds with multiple participants that compete against each other. It may produce a winner, or multiple winners, and losers.

Whereas in the past, watch collecting was a niche hobby enjoyed in the company of others, it evolved along with the rest of our society through the development of the internet. Initially led by online forums that had an exchange of information at a peer to peer level, it shifted to a online publication model. You will notice that online publication creators tended to speak disparagingly of watch forums as a home of irascible pedants. Naturally they would do so, as this was the major competing source of online information. Online publications acted as taste creators and thought leaders in this space. They offer more organized and professional educational content and opinion in exchange for attempts to monetize their audience. Later on, online publications had their influence diluted by social media which once again empowered individual collectors to exchange information and thus level the playing field. However, instead of a peer to peer exchange of information, social media tends to broadcast the participants’ own watches or watch centered lifestyle, and thus act more as a FOMO generating activity than an informational exchange. More recently, the trend of showing dealer lifestyle and business type exchanges may reflect the hunger for more educational rather than “look at me” content.

I consider myself both a consumer and critic of watch content. I think the most insidious aspect is that audience monetization is a largely unacknowledged component of the interaction. One of the forms that it takes is that watch collectors are encouraged to spend more and more and this is promoted by dictating the nature of the watch collecting game.

Their proposed model is that watch collecting is a ladder. Let me know if this sounds familiar:

Your starter watch…

“Starter watch: Seiko SKX007” “Ten watches for under $1,000” “Your guide to microbrands.” We are talking about Tissot, Seiko, Citizen, maybe up to Hamilton.

Next up, entry level luxury…

In other words, Longines, Oris, Nomos, Baume et Mercier, TAG Heuer, nowadays also Christopher Ward, Tudor.

Now, standard mass produced luxury…

Omega, Cartier, Breitling, IWC, Panerai, Grand Seiko, up to the big Daddy of regular luxury watches, Rolex.

Beginnings of haute horology…

JLC, Zenith, Bulgari

Haute horology

Patek, AP, Vacheron, Lange, Breguet

Independents

Moser, MB&F, Laurent Ferrier

Ultra high end independents

FP Journe, Kari Voutilainen, Berneron. Richard Mille?

Artisans

Philippe Dufour, Roger W. Smith

The higher we go on this list, the less accurate it is, because I’m not a customer of high end independents and I’m not well educated on them. Nevertheless, the point is that the hottest watches are on the higher end. Partly this is because of the increasing concentration of wealth in the hands of the very few. I would argue though, that an underappreciated component is the ladder game.

Watch collectors are taught that collecting means ascending a ladder. For example, some associated behaviors are trading in “lesser” watches for “better” watches. Consolidation of a larger collection to put the money towards a more expensive purchase. Spending more as income and wealth rises over the course of a successful career. In reality, these steps generate more revenue for the watch dealer ecosystem as watches are exchanged and purchased over time.

What then is my proposed antidote? Go back to the antediluvian time of swap meets and fishing vests full of watch parts? Well, yes, I try to do just that. But also, I would encourage you, as a collector, to be aware of the game. Ultimately, each individual player sets his or her own rules. Participation is not mandatory and the rules need not be followed.

Here are some proposed alternative games to “climb the ladder."

1. Chess. Pick a competitor with roughly the same current collection as yourself. Sell and buy watches but try to keep the overall size of the collection smaller or the same and keep about the same amount of money in it. See who ends up with better pieces and secretly gloat about your success or bemoan your failures as both a watch collector and a human being.

2. Go, as in the Japanese board game. Pick a focus and purchase watches to “surround” that focus. For example, some obscure weird stuff like alarm watches or soccer timers. But this involves picking multiple foci not just one. Works better if you are Asian but AI is better at it than you since 2015.

3. Checkers. Buy as many watches as you can afford. When one goes up in value, sell it and buy more. The goal is to make it as difficult as possible for your heirs to sell off your collection after you are gone. I didn’t say that the game had to have a good goal, just that it has to have a goal.

4. Solitaire. Only buy watches online. Never go to any meet ups and never speak to others about your watch collection. If someone asks about what you are wearing, suspiciously cover up your wrist and run away. Your archetype is Gollum. Occasionally fiddle with your watches on your island in an underground lake deep within the Misty Mountains. Become a pescatarian for both practical and health reasons but indulge in occasionally eating an orc that you snuck up on while wearing Rafale Nadal RM 27-04. Of course you chose it because, if it can withstand the G-forces of an elite professional tennis player, it can withstand the G-forces of pouncing on an orc from behind.

5. Monopoly. Buy and sell watches while trying to establish an online presence across multiple social media platforms in order to collect “rent.” Congratulations, you are now a watch dealer!

Then again, what do I know? Be skeptical of me also For all you know, this whole Substack and Instagram brand of mine is all a racket to sell my upcoming brand of ultra premium spring bars and spring bar tools and accessories.

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1. Wow, look at the function of this watch! Exemplified by chronographs, calendars, moonphases, and other complicated watches.

2. Wow, look at the value of this watch! Exemplified by seeking calibers from higher end brands in lower priced pieces, like an Omega Speedmaster with a caliber 321 that is the same base caliber as the old Patek chronograph, or a JLC inside an IWC, or most famously a Valjoux 72 base caliber shared between a Heuer Carrera and a Rolex Daytona.

3. Wow, look at the design of this watch! Exemplified by integrated bracelet blue dial watches, famously Nautilus and Royal Oak.

4. Wow, look at the finishing on this watch! Kind of started with Lange but now more about modern independents with their inner angles and such.

5. LUXURY LUXURY LUXURY!

We know that in today’s economy, the rich are getting richer and everyone else is treading water or sinking. So the Swiss watch industry is really all above moving to that higher price point and catering to the ultra-wealthy with luxury marketing. What is luxury anyway? It’s the perception of scarcity, elitism, privilege. It’s a social signifier. It’s a Veblen good that is more desirable the more expensive it is.

So what’s the opposite strategy from luxury? DISCOUNTS OF COURSE. But when you’re luxury, you can’t possibly discount can you? Oh yeah? Welcome to the world of a luxury outlet mall, located conveniently an hour’s drive from Manhattan. Woodbury Common Premium Outlets, or as everyone calls it, Woodbury Commons.

I had heard of it before but I haven’t actually been there as I grew up on Long Island and anything north of “the city,” as we called Manhattan and not any of the other 5 boroughs, was considered so rustic that it might as well be Canada. But I was bored and needed something to do with my wife and kids out of town so I went and here’s what I found.

I visited three watch stores. The Swatch brand outlet is the most interesting one. It’s called “Hour Passion” (you know, like OUR passion, HOUR passion???). It actually has a decent selection of Longines, Hamilton, Mido, Rado, Tissot. There’s also a brand called Balmain that I’ve never heard of. Swatches and their kids’ brand, Flik-flak, are the only non-discounted brands. The prices are clearly listed in the display, both the MSRP and the “outlet price.” Very significant discounts are available, to the extent that I heard another customer say to his wife in Mandarin in the typical I-don’t-want-the-white-people-to-understand-what-we-are-saying, “Are these new watches or preowned?” The salesperson assured him that they were new with full manufacture warranty. I surreptitiously took some photos which I won’t share because unlike Perezcope, I can’t just shrug off waves of Swiss lawyers and hitmen from an obscure address in Malaysia (they don’t go there because they are afraid of the tropical humidity ruining their 30M water resistant watches). Suffice to say, discounts on the order of 30-40% were on offer for some rather decent models, similar to gray market pricing. And no, I did not see any AP x Swatch.

The other stores were less interesting. The Citizen outlet had signs indicating a baseline discount of 25% but some watches had significantly higher discounts. Surprisingly to me, their store encompassed other Citizen brands including Frederique Constant, Bulova, Alpina. I didn’t see any either of the really expensive Citizen brands of Arnold and Son or Accutron. It’s worth a look if you like Frederique Constant, I didn’t inquire as to the discount available, but I’m sure it’s hefty.

The TAG Heuer store was the only one that didn’t advertise discounts. Maybe it’s an LVMH thing but it wasn’t clearly labelled as an outlet, and it had a more highfalutin vibe. A guy with gloves on opens the door and the vibe inside is kind of hushed, and there’s a fancy decor with racing helmets and things.

Anyway, I might try visiting again when I have more time. Hour time is not a bad place if you want a mid-range or entry level luxury watch from the Swatch group. There are clearly labelled big discounts without any hidden negotiation and it is straight from the manufacturer. There’s also something reassuring about a physical location where you swipe your credit card and you get handed an item without wondering if it’s going to fall off the back of a truck on its way over from God knows where.

What is the function of a watch? I think in the electronically disconnected but physically connected times of the 1990’s, a watch was a device worn on the wrist that told the time. But now, as His Majesty has repeatedly pointed out, it is a social signifier and status symbol. In that way, it approaches more the traditional function of jewelry, except that it is not female coded.

Is a watch simply a piece of jewelry that is acceptable for all genders and particularly for men? I would argue not. Here are some cases to consider:

1. A watch that is not worn but not wound, as in the case of Andy Warhol who famously didn’t bother setting his watch. In this scenario, the watch is being used for its decorative and social signaling aspects and not to tell the time. However, I would argue that since the watch was created and designed to tell the time, and in fact it has the potential to tell the time, it is still a watch. The less accuracy that is displayed (correct time and date > correct time wrong date > wrong time wrong date) the more it approaches jewelry, yet it never fully becomes jewelry due to its potential for timetelling.

2. A watch that is not able to tell time due to malfunction. I think in this case, a watch that needs a service and merely tells the wrong time is better than a watch that does not run at all in that it exhibits its watchy-ness by moving its seconds hand and making ticking sounds. However, similar to the previous case, its potential to tell the time is what makes it a watch, not its actual timekeeping accuracy. A watch that has run out of power reserve and sits in a drawer is definitely and unquestionably a watch, after all. The ability to restore the timekeeping is what makes it a watch.

3. A watch that cannot be restored to functional timekeeping. For example, a watch that sat at the bottom of a lake and the movement rusted out. Let’s make it even more destroyed, let’s say it has a ceramic case that is cracked and cannot be replaced. I think even in the case of irreparable damage, the item remaining is still a watch, even if its value is mostly in parts or it has no value because it was originally a watch. I think this is perhaps less of a watch, in the same way that a dead person is referred to as a corpse. It retains the shape of what it once was but it lacks life.

4. A Frankenstein watch. I heard a while back of a type of fraud where the criminal takes a real Rolex and a superfake that is mostly indistinguishable from the real thing. The part that can’t be faked is the movement. So they take the real movement and swap it into the fake case, and put the fake movement in the real case. Then they take the Rolex case and fake movement, add the box and papers, and sell it to a dealer. The case is real, the box and papers are good, so the dealer takes it without looking inside. Then they take the one with the fake case but Rolex movement and bring the “naked” watch to another dealer. Maybe some sixth sense alerts the dealer that something is off so they open the back and find a real movement. Authentication is thus “confirmed.” In the context of criminal math, a $10,000 Rolex plus a $500 superfake equals TWO $10,000 Rolexes. Now in this scenario, would you consider the item with the fake movement but genuine Rolex case to be a Rolex or in any way equivalent to a Rolex? I don’t think any reasonable person would consider it to be so.

5. A dummy watch. This is the closest to the original example. A while back Rolex wasn’t able to produce enough watches to even put in window displays. So they were producing dummy watches with no movement inside, just a bit of metal to add weight, in other words an item that was not functional. I have heard that sometimes watch companies, especially new ones, might show the same type of item as a demonstration piece for reviewers. I don’t think of such as item as a watch.

So while a watch does have overlap with jewelry and the traditional functions of jewelry can be part of its function, if it doesn’t tell time, can’t tell time, and never could tell time, it’s not a watch, IMHO.

My earliest childhood memory of watches actually isn’t a watch of my own, it’s when my mother went into Manhattan to the Rolex store and bought herself a very fine watch. She had founded her own business with nothing but a typewriter, a Yellow Pages, and some connections with lapel pin makers in Taiwan and done well. Success meant a Rolex back in the 1980’s, just as Rolex means success today.

I first became aware of having a watch in middle school when I had a bit more independence and multiple classes to attend. I had a quartz Tissot, first a plain one, then later a two tone. I actually didn’t really like wearing a watch because I have a bony wrist and the bracelet always felt just a bit too tight or too loose.

I don’t recall when I stopped wearing a watch either. I believe I wore one through college. In medical school at one point we had to buy a PDA with a stylus that had a pharmacology app, a medical dictionary, and a schedule. That’s probably the first personal electronic device I carried around regularly, as my cell phone often went uncharged back in the 1990’s and early 2000’s. Once I graduated, I was issued a pager and that was clipped to my waistband constantly with the time and a nonstop, earsplitting set of urgent notifications.

I think that my childhood memory of my mother’s Rolex purchase imprinted in my brain that when one has a bit of success in their career, one ought to buy a proper watch. When I was up to become a partner in my medical practice, I started researching watches. In truth, Hodinkee is largely responsible for this watch collecting of mine.

After I got interested in watches, I learned that my dad wore the same Rolex Datejust from 1979 to the late 90’s that he got as an engagement gift from my maternal grandfather. He had it serviced a few times but only was induced to buy a new one when the tritium lume stopped glowing. He actually wanted a relume as a functional thing, but the salesman at London Jewelers on Long Island convinced him to buy a new one instead as a relume would ruin the value, plus there was a cool new feature of a quickset date (wow!). He wore that one for decades too. He also had a few Seikos he wore on the weekends.

My mom’s business was lapel pins with custom logos, mostly cloissone enamel, but also soft enamel, silkscreen with epoxy, and gold-filled award jewelry. In my head I can still hear the on-hold music and voiceover from her old office, “Pins, charms, tie tacks, tie clips, award jewelry, AND MORE.” I worked for her in the summers starting as a teenager and learned the difference between the different process to explain to customers. I feel that this influenced my interest in collecting.

As a practical matter, in 2026 I am constantly surrounded by time. In fact, I can’t get away from it. I’m just a bundle of constantly tracked, geospatially located marketing data being served up for targeted ads. But I remember back when I was just an intelligent animal roaming this planet who needed a wrist mounted device to tell the time. After all, isn’t the difference between watches and jewelry that a watch tells the time? Or does it even matter anymore?

Keeping Records

I have a tendency to try to create a systematic approach to things and iterate on them by discarding the bad and enhancing the good. I have tried to analyze my own collecting behavior on many occasions. I actually keep a spreadsheet with each of my watch purchases with the date purchased, price paid, the service cost, and the sold date and sold price. If I didn’t keep such a detailed record, my watch habit would spiral out of control. This keeps some financial guardrails around this hobby.

Constant Analysis

I’ve used ChatGPT to look at the spreadsheet and I’ve made my own lists of sold watches, state of the collection, sale lists, and so on. By doing so I’ve tried to refine what components contribute to a watch being a keeper. More important than making or losing money is finding watches that stay in the collection long term. That’s what makes me a collector, not a dealer.

Examining the watch in person

I don’t think you always need to examine a watch in person but I think you ought to do so, especially if it is a larger purchase. I try to lay hands on as many watches as I reasonably can. Even if the watch isn’t exactly the example you want to acquire, it helps to have an idea of the size and fit on your wrist. If you buy a watch that doesn’t fit, it’s going to bug you if you wear it.

Loupe the dial

Two things here. One, you need to know how to spot a redial or bad relume. I’m not going to try to create a systematic way of doing it. You just have to see a lot of them. One trick is to look at small marker lines in the subdials, it’s hard to make them totally straight if it’s a redial. This got me once when I bought a watch but didn’t know it was a nicely done redial until I took it home and louped it. The best you can hope for in that situation is a sympathetic watch buddy who says “well, it must be an old redial because it looks great, could have fooled anyone.” Yeah, right, whatever.

The second thing is to pay attention to the dial condition. Patina is really a subjective thing. I don’t mind if the dial is faded evenly, in fact I can find it more attractive to see some fading and it makes me feel better about the dial originally. Another tell for a redial is that it looks too bright, shiny, and new for something of that age and especially in cases where the water resistance is barely adequate to barely inadequate. Big scratches (some small ones I can live with) and flaked off bits are another story. Big moldy looking spots are another no no for me.

Check the case

I check the case for overpolishing, whether there are sharp lines and facets or whether it looks rounded off and smooth. The fullness counts too, whether it still has some meat to it or it’s thinned out. Chrome or gold plating often wears off at the edges, gold filled is usually marked, and precious metals are usually marked as well with a hallmark either inside the caseback or somewhere on the case. Checking whether the crown is original is important as well, especially when the crown is distinctive and contributes to the overall design. Look between the lugs if it’s a Rolex.

I would throw bracelet assessments under this area. You should hold it out and see how stretched out it is, check the spacing between links (sometimes it looks like it’s going to fall apart, and it is), check the clasp for maker’s marks and whether they match the age and type of watch, and the material.

Check the movement

Ideally you should open the caseback but this isn’t always possible. Winding the watch and seeing whether it’s crisp or crunchy helps, giving it a little shake to loosen the balance to see if it runs (also checks if it is an automatic), pressing the pushers if it’s a chronograph (check with the seller first) and trying out any special functions such as a quickset date, jumping hand GMT, or alarm.

Ponder the meaning of life

Will your life still have meaning if you don’t buy this watch?

I’m kidding.

Seriously though, think it over a little before you fork over your hard earned cash. A keeper sparkles as soon as it’s on your wrist and the sparkles wind their way into your heart. It’s love at first sight. Don’t keep kissing frogs, find the right one, because it’s a lot hard to sell than to buy. That’s it.

P.S. Take a chance one in a while though, fuck it, just see what happens, that’s how you learn.

After the fun of my last trip, I had no hesitation about reserving a table and playing at being a vendor. I brought my trusty display case and a roll with about 20 watches. This time I decided to spice up my display a little with an AI generated flyer that I put in a picture frame.

From my Instagram stories

I also brought an old typewriter that I found at an estate sale a while back. It has a fold up case but it is large and heavy. It was a gimmick, so that if someone was looking for me, another person could tell them “yeah, his table is in the back, the one with the typewriter.” Surprisingly, a lot of people were interested in the typewriter and I encouraged them to click clack the keys and push back the carriage lever.

With a good inventory and my new decorations, I was ready for the show. Unfortunately I ended up leaving way later than I intended due to work obligations, and got to Concord around 11 pm. Along the way I stopped and ate the worst gas station sandwich of my life in my car at the Tesla charging station. I had missed lunch, so it ended up being a weird food day for me.

The next morning I got up early, as you could do your load-in prior to the start time at 9. The first day is for NAWCC members only. My table was next to someone who I had interacted with before but hadn’t spent much time with, and he turned out to be great company. My tablemate on the other side was another watch guy, but he left after the first day. I did see some other familiar faces, but overall I think the wristwatch crowd was a bit smaller than the last show in PA.

I don’t know whether it was my decorations, my branding, or just that there were fewer vendors but I had brisk sales. On the first day I sold two Hamilton railroad grade American pocket watches, a Vulcain Cricket, and traded a Constellation for cash plus a Lecoultre lamp clock. Troy McHenry wrote about them for Charlie Dunne’s Strictly Vintage Watches a while back and I swear I saw them mentioned somewhere on Substack but I can’t remember where.

I bought a Longines Medicus, a rectangular watch with center seconds and French dial and case, and a Gruen Curvex. I had a slightly weird lunch. I wasn’t interested in the hot dog but I didn’t want to leave the venue. Fortunately the lady was accommodating and made me a 1 pm breakfast sandwich, but they were out of English muffins so it went on a toasted hamburger bun.

I went back to the hotel and rested up a bit before heading to the downtown for dinner. I went to Siam Orchid Thai Bistro, which is where I went last year. I was hungry after eating weirdass food for a couple of days. I had shrimp cake for the appetizer and a spicy curry noodle with “crispy chicken” which turned out to be a sliced chicken cutlet with heavy panko crust. It was heavenly although the curry was VERY spicy. I had a fried banana for dessert which was like spring rolls with banana inside, it was ok but I would try something else next time. The thai tea lemonade was interesting, the lemonade was more like lemon juice so it wasn’t overly sweet. I was stuffed afterwards so I took a walk around the state house and the surrounding area which is really pleasant and well maintained.

The next day I was a bit of a late riser and had to check out of the hotel so I didn’t get there until 8:45 when it opened at 8. The second day was only until 12 and it was open to the public. I got a lot of tire kickers in the morning but close to closing time I had two guys, one of them spent a lot of time thinking about and bargaining for a Lecoultre Powermatic which he finally bought. The second one was a Chinese guy who came right at the end driving hard bargains. I’m Chinese too (from Taiwan), I only mention it because he wanted to bargain in Mandarin, and I had to dig deep to keep up my end of the conversation. I don’t know if it was a tactic or what but he did drive some hard bargains but on the other hand he bought a lot too, he took a Memosail regatta timer, an Imperial baby chronograph, and an Omega Dynamic.

I bought two very interesting items on the second day. One was an IWC 3531, which is a 35 mm by 8 mm thick 1990’s neovintage dress watch, sometimes called the small Portugieser. The other was a quarter repeater pocket watch. There were actually two repeaters, the other was in gold and cost 8X as much but the repeater wasn’t doing the time accurately. The one I bought was repeating correctly, but the balance staff is broken and the dust cover is snapped off at the hinge. The only thing I really care about is the repeater mechanism anyway and it was so cheap that I bought it.

On the way back I stopped at a different charging station and went to an Indian restaurant where I had some Indian Chinese food, fried rice and a spicy bread with sesame seeds. The fried rice was interesting, it had slivers of nuts in it. The restaurant was vegetarian although not advertised as such, not vegan though as many items had cheese. It was very good though again VERY spicy, I got a large Dunkin’ iced coffee on the way out.

Overall it was a great trip. I enjoyed making new friends, traveling, and of course the watches. I moved along a lot of watches that would have taken forever to sell online and which most dealers won’t want due to the low prices and smaller market for affordable vintage. I found some very interesting pieces as well for good prices. If you have the chance to attend an NAWCC show I highly recommend it.

Back in the early 1990’s, Asians were almost invisible in American culture. Bruce Lee died in 1973 but almost 20 years later he was about the only Asian man that you might have seen on TV. Connie Chung was the only woman. So the Chinese moms had the Connie Chung eyeshadow, and us Chinese guys might be called upon to vouch for our expertise in the martial arts at any moment.

When my parents arrived in the US a decade before, there were hardly any Asians in Flushing, Queens. In 1882 the Chinese Exclusion Act ushered in an era in which Chinese immigration was banned and Chinese people were prohibited by law from obtaining American citizenship. One of the key Supreme Court cases of that era is the United States v. Wong Kim Ark, which established birthright citizenship. Wong Kim Ark had been born in San Francisco but had a wife and family in China. At that time, Chinese women were restricted from immigrating to the US for fear that Chinese families would become established here and increase the Chinese population, and Chinese men were not permitted to marry white women.

After visiting his family in China, Wong Kim Ark was detained for five months upon trying to reenter the United States. The Supreme Court ruled in his favor in 1898, establishing that a person born in the United States was an American citizen on the basis of the Fourteenth Amendment. Adopted as part of Reconstruction after the American Civil War, this amendment guaranteed birthright citizenship, explicitly changing the law in the aftermath of the Dred Scott decision that had denied US citizenship to people of African descent. This right is now under litigation again in the Supreme Court as the current administration tries to dismantle birthright citizenship.

In light of the US and China alliance against Japan in WWII, the 1943 Magnuson Act ostensibly repealed Chinese Exclusion policies. However, it still allowed only 105 Chinese people to immigrate to the US annually. I suppose they thought 104 too few and 106 too many?

It wasn’t until the Hart-Cellar act of 1965 that national origin ceased to be a criteria in immigration policy. Again, it was external events that intervened. The Civil Rights Movement had given impetus to removing national origin quotas from immigration law. Nonetheless, there were attempts to favor white immigration from Europe by favoring family members of those current in the US and by favoring highly educated and skilled workers. These requirements ended up favoring immigration from Asia with large numbers of highly educated skilled workers choosing to come here.

My father is a typical case, he is a Taiwanese electrical engineer who came to the US on a student visa for a Master’s degree, and then was sponsored for a green card by his company, and brought his wife and young child (me) over from Taiwan. My mother had started an independent small business in the import-export market in the heyday of “Made in Taiwan” and was successful and thrived in the promotional products industry here in the US.

When we arrived, we first rented the upstairs of a two family home in Flushing, Queens. Another demographic trend, white flight from Flushing to Long Island, had created affordable housing conditions suitable to new immigrants with limited budgets. Back then Flushing wasn’t the massively Asian area that it has now become. My parents’ first friends in America were another Taiwanese couple with a young child that they met in a McDonald’s. Seeing other Asians in public was remarkable enough that they struck up a conversation and a friendship based purely on that. After a couple of years we were more established financially and moved out to Long Island.

Even as Flushing grew and developed a bustling commercial hub of Asian businesses, we still occasionally went to the OG Manhattan Chinatown. Some things, like my mom’s favorite Buddhist temple, and white sugar sponge cake, could only be found there. However, Flushing became more and more our go-to spot for our Taiwanese shopping needs.

An old Chinese term for America from the gold rush days was “Gold Mountain” or as we called it in Mandarin, Jin Shan. The Cantonese pronunciation is more like “Kam Sen” which were the English words on the sign at our favorite grocery store. It was near the post office, I looked on Google Maps and it looks like there is still a grocery store there called Great Wall. My memories of it were of narrow aisles smelling of aromatic spices and a coin operated kiddy horse ride outside. But the store held one amazing treasure for an awkward middle schooler, the lost candy of my childhood, Tino.

I happen to belong to a micro-generation called Xennials. Gen X were the ones who were in college or were young adults when I was in high school, and Millenials were the ones who were in high school when I was in college or was a young adult. One characteristic of my generation is our relationship to technology. The first time I ever heard of the internet I was in sixth grade, and it was a BBS (Bulletin Board System) where you posted things on a dot matrix background and sometimes people would also post things. I was a little young to understand it, but AOL came along about a year or two later, first with e-mail then with AOL instant messenger and finally, slowly, websites powered by Geocities. I was part of the “Dude you’re getting a Dell” generation as I entered college in the late 90’s.

Tino happens to have existed on the fringes of American culture just at the dawn of the internet. No one was going to a Chinese grocery store in Flushing and taking pictures of candy and developing the film at a 24 hour photo store, and then waiting 10 years and uploading that photo to the internet. There’s no 90’s nostalgia reel of Kam Sen. But if there is someone please tag me in it!!

Tino candy came in fruit flavors, I remember specifically green apple, lemon, and grapefruit, although I think there were others. The candies were rectangular and small and individually wrapped in small neat foil packets. The candy itself was translucent and hard but slightly sticky on your teeth. It had a strong natural fruit fragrance and had a small sticky center that give just one or two chews once the candy had dissolved in your mouth.

The packaging was also unusual. It was a flat square paperboard slide out carton with a colorful fruit image. It was wrapped in cellophane with a red pull ribbon. The size fit perfectly in the jacket pocket of a middle schooler. To get out the candy, you would have to have an elaborate process of removing the ribbon, pulling off the cellophane, opening the paperboard carton, pulling out an individually wrapped candy, unwrapping it, and popping it in your mouth.

It must have been this process that got some attention from my schoolmates. Their intense interest in candy overcame whatever I was lacking in social graces. The candy was certainly grabbed some attention and tasted like fruit but sweeter. Eventually I got tired of handing over my hard-to-find treat and like immigrants throughout history, I leveraged my access to exotic items to make some hard cash. I started selling Tino, I think I sold a dollar’s worth for $1.25. Not much in absolute terms, but a nice profit margin! Anyhow, I had found an excuse to make my parents buy me a larger quantity of Tino boxes every time we went to Kam Sen, and I’m pretty sure I ate away my profits while “getting high on my own supply.”

My wife has never saw a Tino before but I have certainly have bored her over the years with my candy quest. I’ve searched every candy aisle in every Asian grocery store that I’ve come across for decades without finding my lost middle school treasure. Until now, I also have found no trace of it on the internet either.

In a surprising twist, our soon-to-be AI overlord ChatGPT came riding to the rescue. After a long, detailed description of the candy and many levels of prompts somehow the magic of a large language model surpassed my decades of human perseverance.

Behold, I present to you the only known image of Tino candy on the internet, found by ChatGPT on Flickr from 2008!

If you know or remember anything about Flushing in the 1990’s or Tino in particular, please share in the comments.

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Alex Pretti was an ICU nurse at the Veteran’s Affairs hospital in Minneapolis. I spent a lot of time in VA hospitals and in ICUs during my training. Let me try to explain VAs and ICUs to you.

Veterans can receive healthcare through the VA and quality for more care if they have a service connected disability, were a POW or wounded, have toxic exposures such as Agent Orange or burn pits, or are of lower income. The veterans who I served were generally very respectful and appreciative. The people who work at the VA generally have a great regard for military service and sympathy for the needs of our veterans.

The intensive care unit, or ICU, is the place for the sickest patients in the hospital. In fact, the patients are so ill and require so much work that only 1 or 2 patients can be assigned to a single nurse. The nurses working in the ICU are among the hospital’s elite, specially trained and expert in the care of the critically ill. Some examples of critical illness would be if you had a lung injury and needed a ventilator to breathe while your lungs recovered, or if you have an overwhelming infection that caused your blood pressure to plummet and needed special medications to keep your heart and circulatory system running. Patients in ICU have a host of lines and tubes snaking out of them like tangled spaghetti, and it is the job of the nurse to check the various monitoring systems, maintain, clean, and flush the tubes that are keeping the person alive, anticipate problems both routine and life-threatening, and work with the doctor to order and administer medications and treatments. The part that doctors don’t see but that I have learned to appreciate over time is how the nurse is constantly present, answering questions from the anxious family members and comforting the patient. In some ways nursing is the most human of professions and ICU is the most intense area of nursing. In my intern year, I was a foolish, know-it-all fresh medical school graduate, and it was the ICU nurses who taught me to recognize and begin to treat truly scary and life-threatening problems.

I’ve seen a lot of nurses and doctors on social media saying this and I want to emphasize and amplify the point. Alex Pretti was an ICU nurse. When he saw a woman being sprayed in the face with pepper spray, his first instinct was to help, to block the pepper spray with his body, and ask, “are you ok?” Any human being would want to do that but when your daily work involves constantly and instinctively protecting and saving lives, your body moves by itself. We all saw the tragic consequences. Six ICE agents attacking him and pinning him to the ground. One removing his legally carried firearm. And then, this unarmed man, restrained on the ground by six armed men, was shot 10 times until he was dead.

What else do we know about Alex Pretti? He was 37 years old. He loved mountain biking. He was a medical research assistant before becoming a nurse and must have been a bit of a science nerd because he named his dog Joule, presumably after the unit of energy. He was kind.

Healthcare workers deal with the illnesses of others so often that we forget our own vulnerabilities. That might be why it hits doubly hard when one of our own is hurt, much less killed. I remember in the early days of the pandemic when ER doctors on Facebook were saying they hoped they got COVID-19 early so there would still be a ventilator available. I never thought I would feel that kind of fear again.

But then again, it’s not quite that fear of death that I feel, not yet. Circling back to the beginning, what I feel right now is grief. Human life is infinitely precious because it is full of potential. Tomorrow maybe your child will smile at you and give you a hug. Maybe the sun will shine on your face and you will feel warm. Maybe you will see a friend and share a laugh. Maybe you will help someone in need and feel like a superhero.

All human lives end, whether through illness, accident, natural disaster, or simply old age. Avoidable deaths are a tragedy, and medicine strives to reduce them. But when death comes through the cruelty of other humans, it is abhorrent to all of humanity.

I am grieving the loss of Alex Pretti’s life but I am also grieving for this country. I grew up in an America, however imperfect, where ideals meant something.

“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness.”

“And that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from this earth.”

“I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character.”

When I see Alex Pretti assaulted, restrained, disarmed, and then killed by federal agents in the street of an American city, when I see top officials describe an ICU nurse at the VA as a “domestic terrorist” and “would-be assassin,” when I feel the need to get my passport out of the safe and put it in my car and tell my parents to do the same, I wonder. Am I mourning Alex Pretti’s death, or the death of my American Dream?

Admittedly the book is heavy on Freudian analysis and thus feels a bit dated (it was published in 1994). It does have some interesting case studies of individual collectors of various objects as well as trying to psychoanalyze the collecting habits of historical figures such as Honore de Balzac. There is also a grand theory of the influence of collecting on Western civilization, a practice that is probably best consigned to the dustbin of history. The author’s underlying premise is basically that collectors are driven by unconscious unmet psychological needs stemming from childhood trauma.

I don’t want to get too comfortable on the therapist’s couch. I will say that I recognized some of the descriptions of the “unruly passion” of collecting. Do any of these sounds familiar to you?

1. Questionable financial decisions

2. Strained relationships

3. Risky behavior

4. Anxiety and guilt about a purchase, increasing until relieved by the act of purchasing it

5. Temporary relief of the anxiety, followed by compulsive need to repeatedly engage in the same browsing and buying behavior

There are some other themes that I noticed around the collectors he describes, listed below.

1. A childhood marked by stress, or loss

2. Insecurity about social status

3. Using collecting as a way to connect with others and gain status (sounds like a theme to me!)

4. A relationship with a seller who acts as a surrogate father figure and treats the collector like a favorite child who has the first chance to obtain a new toy

I think some parts of the book are worth a read, if only as an antidote to the constant encouragement of watch related media for us collectors to spend more money. I’m sure that even if you don’t recognize, or won’t recognize some of these tendencies in yourself, you have seen them if you have ever spent much time with watch collectors or attended a watch collecting event.

That said, I’ve had a lot of positive experiences from watch collecting over the years. It has been a third space outside of home and work that is an outlet for creativity in crafting articles and social media posts. The process of learning to understand and appreciate vintage watches has been rewarding.

In 2026, my watch collecting resolution is to keep this hobby as a source of enrichment and fun, not as a source of stress. Good luck to my fellow collectors, and happy hunting!

The comparative lack of attention to affordable watch collecting is really unfortunate. It seems to go beyond the human desire for novelty and veer off into catering to the wealthy, like the rest of our cultural consumerism. Recently discussed an article by Ariel Adams bemoaning the disproportionate price increases in the watch industry. Back when the middle class spent the money, Rolex would sell you a Submariner for today’s equivalent of $2,500. Now the Crown’s budget pick, a Tudor Black Bay 41 mm, will set you back about twice that amount.

Is it fun to spend exorbitant amounts of money on watches? Maybe for some people. There’s this basic human desire, maybe more pronounced among men, to keep climbing that mountain. Gotta chase that grail, gotta get the top of the pack, gotta be the very best, like no one ever was, GOTTA CATCH ‘EM ALL GOTTA CATCH ‘EM ALL.

Or maybe not. Maybe it’s better to do things for the love of the game, even if you don’t win a championship or make it into the Watch Collector Hall of Fame.

Let me list three things that I find fun about collecting watches that doesn’t involve being the best.

1. The joy of discovery. Nothing makes me happier than coming across a watch I’ve never seen before. Online pictures used to be enough, and it still gives me a thrill once in a while, but fondling a previously unknown watch and slapping it on my bony wrist far exceeds the fun of scrolling Instagram.

2. The pleasure of diving down the rabbit hole. Even if I don’t want to own it, I want to learn about it. Going through old forum posts, obscure websites made by quirky weirdos, google image and instagram searches, blurry YouTube videos, maybe even busting open a dusty old book at home. Chasing down the relevant points in order to understand a vintage watch is the one thing chatGPT still sucks at. In fact, doesn’t that indicate that it’s what makes us human, after all?

3. The fun of exploration. I’ve wandered off into many weird and wonderful places in search of watches. Become friends with a watchmaker. Visited watch dealers in various degrees of fancy to dusty. Browsed innumerable antique marts and flea markets. Stopped in obscure jewelry shops. And gone off to small American towns to visit NAWCC shows. Can you believe that I’ve been to York, Pennsylvania twice in a year? It has a surprisingly good Vietnamese restaurant. Did you know that they have a gas station chain there called Sheetz that spells every item on their menu with unnecessary “Sh’s” and “Z’s”?

My advice is to have fun out there. It’s not just about being the best. Most of us will never own a Paul Newman Daytona, or a Phillipe Dufour. It’s ok, go find something weird and have fun doing it. I’ll be here, cheering you on, but only if you send a pic!

The process of becoming an NAWCC member is fairly straightforward. You can sign up on the website, but I found it easier to just find a meeting and sign up at the door. You used to get a monthly newsletter mailed to you but it is sent by e-mail now. It will announce when a meeting is coming up, with the main component being the mart, but also some lectures and workshops.

This was the mid-Eastern meeting in York, PA. Compared to some of the other meetings I have attended, it is on the larger side. I met a guy who had come all the way from Dallas. I am told that the location in central PA brings in midwesterners as well as drawing from up and down the Eastern Seaboard. It was a two day show but I was only able to attend on the first day. I paid the fee in advance online. Like all NAWCC events, there is no FAQ so it’s kind of a show up and find out sort of situation. I did buy a lockable trade show display case on Amazon. It was the 34 x 22 inch large size, which was about right for the size of the table and the amount of stuff that I had.

The registration opened at 11:30 but the long drive down meant I didn’t arrive until about 1 when the mart load-in was scheduled to begin. I first went and picked up my badge and got my assigned table number. The guys by the door had a map and directed me and my table with labeled with my name and number. The good thing about getting a table is that you have a chance to have an early look at things. As I set up about 3-4 people came up right away. Once I was fully set up I locked the case and wandered through the mart where I found a really neat Le Coultre gold triple calendar with an original yellow dial in the larger size for a reasonable price.

After that I mostly hung out at or near by my table until the closing at 5:30. I found having a table was a lot more social than wandering around the place by myself. When you’re going around hunting, you are more concentrating on the watches and maybe making a mental checklist to come back, or thinking about whether this or that watch is a good purchase. Sitting at a table, I was more interested in making small talk, saying hello to people who I’ve met before, and talking about my own watches in my case and showing them to people. So in other words the experience, maybe ironically, feels less like work and more like socializing.

I did make a good trade with someone who I’ve traded with before where we were both happy, I ended up with a Movado M95 with a Borgel case that is wound up tighter than a drum and is probably going to give my watchmaker fits. I sold a few small pieces but I was equally happy to clear out a lot of horological junk, like a big bag of old straps that I don’t have any use for, or my old MoonSwatch from the hype days that I never wear anymore.

Overall, I was pretty happy with my experience with a table. You get in at 1 when the early bird starts at 1:30, and the regular mart tickets don’t get you in until 2:30. The early bird plus regular admission costs more than the table ($40), so it’s definitely more bang for your buck. I did need to invest in a display case but it’s something I’ll be able to use every time. When I was a teenager I used to work promotional products trade shows for my mother’s lapel pin business, manning and setting up a booth by myself in different cities, so maybe this kind of experience is nostalgic for me.

If you’re feeling like a bit of an accumulator or hoarder at this point or if you just want to socialize and show people your watches, I highly recommend it. If I find the time and energy I may even put up some signage with this silly brand I’ve created and hand out free spring bars. What do you think?

Moonwatch, Moonwatch, lume so bright,

In the darkness of the night;

What collector’s hand could try,

To frame thy case’s asymmetry?

In what distant orbit in space,

Burnt the fuel at a 14 second pace.

On what rocket dare we use fire

To reach into the heavens ever higher?

And what chronograph, made with such art,

Could wind itself deep into our hearts?

And when the escapement began to beat,

Moving the seconds hand around so neat.

What a column wheel, horizontal clutch,

Push the pushers with a gentle touch.

What a tachymeter, above 90 dot,

So fortunate on Apollo 13 to have a Speedmaster brought.

When the stars sparkled in heaven’s sphere,

With water resistance good enough for 50 meters:

Did the watchmaker smile, his work to see?

As his chronograph saved the lives of so many?

Moonwatch, Moonwatch lume so bright,

In the darkness of the night;

What collector’s hand could try,

To frame thy case’s asymmetry?

The watch was consigned by a friend of the family of the original owner

Described as—“Two ancient and rusted spring bars

Are embedded in the lugs. . . . Near them, engulfed in wrist cheese,

Half frayed, a cracked old Bund strap, whose dusty smell,

And peeling glue, and smear of coppery green goo,

Tell that its original owner wore it well

Leaving his DNA like an insect preserved in amber

The wrist that sweat, as the hairs upon it grew grey

As the trousers that he wore, and upon the caseback these words appear:

DRIVE CAREFULLY, ME

And on the inside, perhaps some watchmaker’s marks?

Nothing else to see, other than lug holes

Barely holding together those fragile spring bars

Maybe they will put in a new set.

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“Watches are an investment” (very popular before 2022)

“It’s to pass down to my kid” (Patek advertising that has wound itself into our collective watch collector hive mind)

“I’m curating a museum” (for all the PhDs of horology)

“The price is justified by the large number of artisanal hours spent producing it” (yes, this is why that watch costs as much as a roof)

etc. etc.

One of the big ones that we tell ourselves, rightly or wrongly, is that a collector must have a focus, an area of expertise. The answer to “What do you collect?” CANNOT BE “Oh, all sorts of things, whatever strikes my fancy.” A SERIOUS collector who is ADMIRED by his legions of Instagram followers MUST have such interests such as:

“Limited edition Speedmasters!”

“Vintage Breitlings! and…also vintage Universal Geneve”

“Everything Heuer!”

“Cartier with Paris dials!”

“Pre-Vendome Panerai!”

“1940’s Pre-Daytonas and 1970’s Patek!”

“5 digit Rolex sports models!”

In fact, I have a mental image of a collector or dealer that is associated with each of these niches, can you guess which ones?

I got into this hobby like a normal average civilian, I was in my mid-30’s and getting made partner at my work, and wanted something to celebrate the gravitas of having “made it.” So I read a bunch of Hodinkee articles and went around a bunch of different watch stores and decided I would buy a vintage looking chronograph. Thus I became a “chronograph guy.” Then I decided the watch was too bulky and sold it and got a vintage chronograph so I became a “vintage chronograph guy.”

Three vintage chronographs later I discovered a small gold dress watch and became a “small gold dress watch guy.” Then I got into alarm watches, even buying a book on them, and summarized them in a massive pandemic fever dream of an article which gave birth to me as “an alarm guy” and also “a wannabe influencer guy.”

Then I went on a trip to Chicago and bought a couple of art deco watches and became “rectangular guy.” On an estate sale I bought some pocket watches and became…well you get the point. At another point I dabbled in Seikos, not entirely successfully.

At another point I fancied myself an “Omega guy” and at another “1970’s colorful chronograph” guy. At other points “microbrand guy,” “accutron guy,” “travel clock guy” (but not THAT travel clock).

Fortunately I’ve managed to sell along the way, otherwise my house would have no space. If I ever bring home a grandfather clock, my wife will kill me because the whole house will end up full of ticking sounds in no time.

What have I learned from this? Maybe a few lessons which I’ll list below:

1. Don’t keep chasing watches of a certain category just to complete the collection. Completion is accumulation.

2. Try as many watches on the wrist as possible. The feeling on the wrist when you put it on for the first time is the most important part.

3. Except in exceptional cases, try not to buy watches online that you haven’t tried on before. See rule 2.

4. Let watches go. It’s always a good feeling and I never miss them. Take a loss if need be, I’m not a dealer, I haven’t put in the work so I can’t expect to make money except accidentally.

5. Collect watches for personal enjoyment and no other reason and always remember to have fun!

When a watch is not attractive

Balance cock

When two guys at a meet up have an ego clash and try to “measure” who has the better watch

COSC

Chronograph Obsessed Speedmaster Collectors

Dial

The act of using your phone to call a watch dealer to verify they are a real person before sending a wire transfer

ETA

Exceptional timepiece acquired

Frequency

The number of watches bought per month

GMT

Get My Timepiece

Horology

When you engage in the world’s oldest profession in order to buy watches

Incabloc

When you are the underbidder on a Peruvian Air Force watch

Jewel

Your watch when you catch a wristshot on a slightly overcast day and it sparkles like a gem

Keeper

A guy who asks an exorbitant price for his watch and won’t negotiate

Lugs

The act of bringing of bunch of watches to a meet up

Minute repeater

A collector who buys back a watch he just sold “a minute ago”

Nipple dial

When you accidentally call your watch dealer with your phone in your shirt pocket

Overpolished

When your Substack post sounds like it was written by AI instead of a real person

Patina

A reason to increase the price if you are selling and to decrease the price if you are buying

Quartz Crisis

When you realize that you bought a Beta 21 and can’t sell it

Rubies

When your watch nestles up against the back of your wrist

Skeletonized

When you spend too much on watches and can’t afford to buy food

Time Only

The act of trying to steer the conversation back to watches when it veers off into other topics

Undervalued

When you get a lowball offer for your watch

Vertical clutch

When you manage to catch the watch in mid-air as it falls off the table

Winder

A collector who only buys from Eric Wind

Xbox

When a box is sold separately from the watch

YOLO

Your one love, Omega

Zombie brand

When a brand has endless hordes of mindless followers