My Most-Worn Watches of 2025

First of all, Happy New Year! I hope 2026 has started smoothly for you. 

2025 seemed to have flown by. A few ups and downs throughout the year. The sudden loss of our beloved cat Bowie (previous post) and a major health-related incident (or rather, accident) occurring in mid-September, but more about that later. 

On to the topic at hand. My watch wearing tally varied a little since last year. Although, the top two spots were filled by watches that have been in the top three for the last few years. In a couple of years, I'll sit down and tally up the results of these yearly lists, in order to see if there are any pieces that haven't gotten any wear on the wrist at all. 

As it stands, I have a Seiko SARB033 model that hasn't been worn for over three years and is currently listed on eBay. It's a great watch, without a doubt. It's only flaw in my view is that it sports a 38.5mm diameter, which I find a little too large on my wrist, for the type of watch that it is. It's a dressy watch and I tend to prefer this type of watch in a smaller size. If it were two millimetres smaller, I'd keep it. Alas.

And so, let me begin. 

1 - Tudor Black Bay Fifty-Eight 

I knew this one would claim a spot near the top, but I was surprised to see it reach Number One. Worn throughout 56 days of 2025, this favourite has proven to be a reliable and accurate wristwatch (I hate the term 'timepiece'!). I bought it on Boxing Day back in 2020 and it will likely be due for servicing sometime in the next couple of years but for now, it's purring along nicely. I don't want to repeat what I've written in previous yearly watch wrap-ups, so there's not really much I can add here about this watch. 

So, I'll briefly mention the pen that's visible in the frame. And then I got the idea to include a fountain pen in every photo, so I'll quickly mention each of them, just for the hell of it. 

 

My wife and I got back from a trip to Ho Chi Minh City earlier this week. This was a much-needed break for us. We had been working flat-out (Aussie slang, meaning 'a LOT') since early 2024 and we had gotten fairly worn out. While there, I spent some time looking for something to purchase to celebrate my 60th Birthday last week. I didn't want to get another watch. As regular readers will know, I have more than a few watches in my stable. So instead, I thought about another fountain pen (got a few of those too) and decided to go for a Mont Blanc. I've avoided them over the years because of the hype that surrounds the brand, but now I figured Well, what the hell. Get something to commemorate this milestone birthday. Might as well go for a heavy-hitter.

 

I had no luck finding a 146 model with a Medium nib, so I put this purchase on hold until I got back to Melbourne. Couple of days after getting back from the trip, I headed over to the Mont Blanc boutique at a major shopping centre and, lo and behold, they didn't have a medium nib 146 in stock either. 

However, the saleslady suggested I try the fine and medium nibs on their 'tester' pens to see if I'd like the fine nib. I was a little dubious, as I find that a fine nib tends to show the defects in my handwriting a little more obviously than a medium nib.  

Anyway, I tried the fine nib and then compared it to their medium. A barely noticeable difference between the two. Surprisingly, the Mont Blanc fine nib seemed to write closer to a medium nib in some of my other pens. And so, I bought it. Done!

 

Okay, on to watch Number 2.

2 - Rolex Explorer 

Again, another watch that I suspected would land near the top. This was last year's most-worn watch and it racked up 53 days on the wrist this year. This is an understated watch, one that provides time only, but it does it very, very well. This type of watch is often referred to as a Field Watch, but I prefer to think of it as an Expedition Watch. 

A quick explanation regarding the difference between a Field watch and an Expedition watch, IMHO;

Most Field Watches tend to have all 12 numerals on the dial. They were designated Field watches due to being issued to the military. Hamilton is perhaps the most well known current producer of Field watches these days, thanks to their Khaki range. Here's an example, picture courtesy of 

hypebeast.com/2023/8/hamilton-khaki-field-full-titanium-automatic-watches-38mm-42mm-release-info;

Easy to read dial, with a 24-hour count track, clearly visible hands, and a seconds-hand to denote that the watch is running, and for those Alright, boys, synchronise your watches moments that you sometimes see in old war movies.

 

Now, this type of watch is also very similar to what you call Pilot's watches, which feature a virtually identical dial and hands layout. But that is a whole other post. Preferably by somebody else. 

 

Regarding Expedition watches, well my theory - and it is pretty much just that - is that they should only have 4 numerals on the dial, usually at the cardinal points (12, 3, 6 and 9), and this is where the Rolex Explorer comes in, representing the most famous watch with this configuration. Other notable Expedition watches include the Nivada Antarctic, which was used by members of Admiral Richard E. Byrd's crew during their Operation Deep Freeze expedition in 1955/56;

picture courtesy of https://www.hodinkee.com/Introducing The Rebirth Of Nivada Grenchen With New Versions Of The Chronomaster And Antarctic 

 

In recent years, I've come to like the sparse and no-nonsense layout of a plain Expedition watch. Sure, they often don't have a date window, but this is not a detraction in my view. It's a good memory aid to check the date in the morning and then remember it for the rest of the day. 

As this year's statistics show, this type of watch was a favourite of mine in 2025.

 

The pen - A Officine Leonardo Furore Sun Yellow, with Medium nib. This is a relatively new brand which produces some stunning pens. This one creates a smooth line on the page and makes for some effortless writing. You'll see a couple of others from this brand in this post. I thought the colours of the pens would brighten up the photos. 

Also pictured is a Matchbox 1963 Mercedes-Benz 230SL. If I ever set up a small bar in the lounge room - maybe in the next house - I'll put a few of these on display, to man the place up a little. Not so much a man-cave. Maybe more of a man-corner.

3 - Omega Seamaster Professional 300m

Perhaps the watch that I've owned for the longest time...actually, it IS the watch that I've owned for the longest time. The original skeleton hand-set began to get difficult to read in the dark, so I swapped them out for a sword hand-set. I think I already wrote about this in my 2024 Most-Worn thread, so I won't go into it all again. While nowhere near the regularity of wear that the first two watches on this list achieved, this watch spent 32 days of 2025 on the wrist. 

As for the pen, it's another Leonardo. This one is a Momento Zero in Seaweed Green, with an Elastic Fine nib. I bought this pen off eBay for a good price but it was fitted with an Extra Fine nib, which I knew I wasn't going to like. Sure enough, once I received it and filled it with ink, it produced a fragile handwriting which showed up all of the gaps in the loops of my lower-case letter a's, g's, y's and d's. So, I visited a website called Galen Leather and got a Fine nib for it. Most of my pens are either Medium or Bold nibbed, so I figured a Fine nib wouldn't hurt too much. Fitting the nib took some trial and error* (and ink-stained fingers) and I'm not 100% certain that I've done it absolutely correctly, as the ink-flow tends to take some vigorous shaking to get the pen going. But once it starts, it writes very nicely. 

*Leonardo pens switched nib manufacturers sometime in 2021. They once used nibs made by Bock and now use nibs made by JoWo. Both companies are German and the nib quality is great on both. The main difference lies in the plastic nib feed section, as their design is slightly different. This nib change-over required some hit-and-miss on my part before the ink flow was suitable. 

4 - Baltic Hermétique Tourer

Here's one that has become a favourite since I got it in 2024. Thirty-one days clipped to my wrist and it proved to be quite reliable. Baltic make some nice bang-for-buck watches, with some nice variety. The bead-of-rice bracelet makes for a very comfortable fit and offers some breathability on warm days. And the watch's 37mm diameter works nicely on my small wrist. I've gotten very selective in recent years with regard to what kinds of watches and sizes I prefer. For this type of watch (yes, it's an Expedition piece, in my view), thirty-five to thirty-seven millimetres seem to be the sweet spot for me.

As for the pen, we have another Leonardo Momento Zero, this one in a nice marbled blue barrel and cap, with a Bold nib. This pen was part of a swap that I did with my old boss and I think he got the better end of the deal. When I got this pen, it had a 1.1 Italic nib on it. It wrote okay, but had a habit of tearing into the paper when I wrote. Either the nib was too sharp or I couldn't master the art of holding the pen correctly. In the end, I replaced this annoying nib with a Bold one, which writes a nice thick line. Now it's a great pen. 

 5 - Omega Railmaster Co-Axial (36.2mm) 

Twenty-one days on the wrist. I think this watch may be well overdue for servicing and I'll get around to it this year or next, unless it stops running beforehand. Again, another Expedition watch and an absolute fave of mine. If I had to whittle the collection down to five or six watches, this one would be a stayer, without a doubt. This 2nd Generation Railmaster has become increasingly collectible in this 36.2mm diameter, as they weren't produced in this size for the same length of time as their larger 39mm and 42.2mm siblings. As such, this model currently sells for silly pricing on the pre-owned market.

Once again, a watch with simplicity of layout, making for excellent legibility. I think this watch has appeared on every one of my yearly lists, which tells you something. 

 

The pen is a Pelikan M450 Vermeil, with a medium nib. The cap and barrel end-cap are 925 Sterling Silver with a rose gold plating. As such, it does tend to get a purple tarnish over it from time to time. I've been told that regular use of the pen is one way to prevent this tarnishing from happening.  Otherwise, I just run some Brasso over it with a cotton cloth to bring it back to its original lustre. 

The images in the photo are still from a Netflix show called Love, Death + Robots, a series of self-contained episodes set in alternate futures and universes, showcasing some stunning animation. Two episodes by Alberto Mielgo are absolutely gorgeous to look at.  One is titled Jibaro and it concerns a 17th century soldier who is deaf and is therefore immune to the siren song of a water nymph who lures entire armies of men to their deaths in a large lake in a forest. The other episode is called The Witness and it centres on an exotic dancer (stripper) who witnesses a murder and is soon on the run from the killer. The animation is fantastic across almost all episodes of this two-year series but these two were standouts for me. 

 

6 - Longines Spirit (37mm)

 

Another smaller-sized watch. And it sits nicely on my wrist. Longines pitches this range along the Pilot's watch line, as the brand uses historic aviators such as Amelia Earhart, Charles Lindbergh, and  Howard Hughes in the marketing for this Spirit line of watches, which has done nicely for the brand in recent years. 

Similar to the Railmaster above, this watch spent 21 days on my wrist and it performed flawlessly. Great Watch. 

The pen is a vintage Sheaffer Imperial (I think), possible 1960s or more likely from the 1970s. Writes nicely and has a nice heft to it.  

 

6 - Seiko Prospex Solar Diver's 200m  

I got some regular wear out of this watch throughout last year. Racked up 19 days with it, and it was the watch that I took on my holiday to Ho Chi Minh City, as I wanted something with quartz reliability (and solar powered was a bonus) and easily replaced if damaged or lost. The watch served me well. I tried to ensure that the first photo of each day was one of the watch, showing the date. That way, it would be easier to recall what we did on any given day. Although, we didn't really take too many photos this trip. As far as I was concerned, this was a holiday from everything, including worrying about whether or not I'd taken photos of any particular thing. 

Water resistant enough to handle a hotel pool or shower, legible dial, quartz accuracy, adjustable bracelet clasp, to allow for swelling of the wrist on a hot day (and they were ALL hot days!) and every blast of sunlight would charge the solar cell in the watch. 

Basically, this watch represented the best of what a set-and-forget wristwatch can do.  

There was a time in my watch collecting journey when I would have scoffed at a watch like this. 

Fool that I was.  

 

The pen is a Montegrappa Privilege with Medium Nib. When I visited relatives in Italy ten years ago, they surprised me on the last day with this pen, which I thought was far too generous of them. Cap and body are Sterling Silver and it has a nice weight to it. And it writes nicely too. 

But even if it didn't, would I get rid of it?

 

And that's 2025's watches wrapped up. 

 

Other watch-related news.

 

1) 

Oh yeah, regarding the health-related incident that I mentioned in the opening paragraph. I fell off a ladder and fractured my spine back in September. No way to sugar-coat it, folks. Might as well just come out and say it. 

We have been doing some painting, in an effort to get the house looking tidier so that we can put it up for sale and move into something a little more manageable. This house has garden surrounding it on all four sides and the maintenance takes some doing. Anyway, my wife was painting the kitchen/dining area walls and I was tackling the exposed beams along the ceiling. The house dates back to 1974 and, for some ungodly reason, the original owners painted these beams with a mission brown stain. This meant that, rather than being a coat of paint that could be sanded off and re-painted in any other colour, the stain had actually soaked into the timber so that any attempt at removal of this colour would require sanding away quite a bit of timber. Screw that. That would be way too much work and mess. 

Instead, my wife consulted with the guys at the paint section of our local hardware store and they provided us with a can of white paint which has a slight grey running through it when wet and then dries to a nice subway-tile white. Two coats of this stuff should do it. 

So, I got to work. I rigged up a plank of pine between two ladders to create a short 'bridge' which would be high enough to reach the uppermost section of the beams at their apex, approximately 10-and-a-half feet high once I was on the highest point of the plank and stood to full height.

One ladder was a modern aluminium one (yes, that's how we spell aluminum in Australia. And we pronounce it as 'allooo-minny-um'). The other ladder was a vintage wooden one that I had revarnished years ago. 

Anyway, it all seemed to be working well enough. It did involve quite a bit of getting up and down this ladder bridge but I was basically done. Until I noticed a small patch that I'd missed. 

 

Right in the top corner, only about a finger's-width unpainted. I placed the two ladders up close to the spot and climbed up the wooden one. A few seconds later, I'm on all fours on the plank, about six feet off the ground and getting ready to stand up so that I can give this tiny patch of the beam a lick of paint. I noticed that this set-up suddenly felt a little rickety to me.

Last thing I recall seeing was the plank twisting quickly to the side.

Next thing I knew, I was on the kitchen floor, lying on my left side and struggling to catch a breath as I tried to yell out Oww, owww, owww! 

My back and ribs were killing me as I tried to breathe in. My wife and kids rushed in. I said my back hurt like hell, as she told the kids to clear the ladder debris while she fetched a blanket and came back to place it carefully under my head. 

Just try to get your breathing under control, Tee, she said. I took short breaths as the pain continued. She asked if I could wiggle my toes. Yes, I could. 

Where does it hurt?, she asked. 

My spine and back right-hand side were in agony.   

My breathing slowly got under control and she wiped my forehead with a cold flannel towel. 

Some time passed before I was able to gingerly get up onto all fours and they helped me up and over to the couch. 

She asked if I wanted her to call an ambulance. I don't know, I replied. 

An hour or so later, she took me to the nearby hospital. It was around 1:00pm. We went in through the Emergency door and were soon seen to by one of the staff. Very shortly afterwards, I was on a hospital bed in the Emergency Department. Over the course of the next eight or nine hours, I was given a CAT Scan, blood test, blood pressure check, blood sample taken, X-rays and told to lie still. The Doctor poked and prodded my back while I tried not to scream.

A nurse would appear every so often to ask me what day it was. Just to ensure my brain was still working as it should. Did it ever? Or maybe she was having trouble remembering what day it was?

The CAT scan and X-ray revealed a fracture of the T6 vertebra in  my upper back. I was wearing my Hamilton Khaki Field Auto when I arrived at the hospital, but soon took it off and handed it to my wife. Right now, I didn't really need to be wearing a watch;
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Turned out to be a compression fracture of the vertebra. No broken ribs, but they hurt like hell on the right-hand side of my back. Had they been bruised? Every breath seemed a struggle. They gave me some over-the-counter painkillers, which took the edge off. The CAT scan also showed some cysts on my liver, to be dealt with later on. Man, what the hell!

More about that below. 

 

Not really much more they could do. They gave me some more painkillers before giving me the all-clear and basically told me to avoid any heavy lifting, twisting at the waist, or strenuous activity for the next few weeks. 

Cool. I sent a text to my boss later that night to say that I would not be at work the following week. 

I moved carefully over the next seven days. And on the following Friday night, at about 8:00pm, I sneezed and the pain started all over again. Aww, hell! 

Back to hospital a couple of hours later, when it seemed like it wouldn't subside.  

I apologised to the Doctor who saw me this time, saying I felt like an idiot, but she reassured me with the old better-safe-than-sorry line. She prodded the back of my ribs near the spine and I flinched.

Yeah, that's it!, I said through gritted teeth. 

Okay, it looks like you may have bruised the intercostal muscles that are attached to the ribs as they join up to the spine. These muscles expand when you breath. What I want you to do is take ten deep breaths every hour and cough ten times every hour. Try it now for me.

I tried taking a deep breath. No fun. 

Okay, now try coughing.  

I coughed. Once. That was even less fun. 

She gave me a referral for further X-rays, as a precautionary measure, and I went and had them done the next morning.

Here's the remains of the broken timber ladder. The Hamilton Khaki is on a different strap;

 

From what I can tell, it looked like one of the ladder's legs split at its base and down I went. It all happened so fast. 

 

Visited my GP a few days later for the results of the latest X-rays. I was hoping to see some actual X-rays but all he had was the report. He explained a little bit about compression fractures. No further damage done to my back, which was good. He wrote me out a referral for an Ultra-sound, to have the cysts checked out. I had the ultra-sound done later the following week and they turned out to be benign. Just a part of aging, as told to me by my GP at the follow up appointment a week later. He told me to ramp up my Vitamin D intake by getting out in the sun a little more. 

 

My back still felt tight and a little achy in the first two months after the fall. 

Thankfully, this has faded since then, and I pretty much feel normal now. Although, I haven't tried any heavy lifting since. 

So that's that disaster averted. It could all have been much worse. 

 

2)

I finally got around to getting my Rolex Submariner serviced. I bought the watch back in 2015 and I sent it off get worked on back in October 2024. I was told the repair would take around 5 to 6 weeks. 

It took 20 weeks and 3 days. 

Came back working smoothly, though.

They had it long enough. 

3)

My wife has a Sinn 556A. I bought it for her back in 2014 and she basically wore the hell out of it until sometime in 2021. 

This 556A ticked all the boxes regarding the type of watch she prefers;

1- Large-ish (38.5mm diameter case)

2 - Clearly readable numbers on the dial.

3 - Date

4 - Water-resistant (to 200 metres)

It is a well-built and reliable watch. And it had a certain cachét for her because it was German-made rather than Swiss. This gave it a little more point of difference. The only thing that began to bug her about it was the size of the date window, placed at the 4:30 position of the dial. It was small, and her eyesight (or mine, for that matter) isn't what it used to be. 

So, since I was working for the company at the time, I got her an Oris ProPilot Big Date, with blue dial; 

As indicated by its name, the Oris ProPilot is considered a Pilot's watch and it was a successful seller for the brand.

While she liked the overall aesthetic of the Sinn watch, the difficulty in reading the date became a deal-breaker for her. So, I got her the Oris and she's worn it ever since. It's a 40mm diameter, but she doesn't mind it. It sits well on her wrist.

The Sinn 556A was soon packed away in her bedside cabinet. 

Of course, me being me, every time I saw one of these 556A's online, I'd start thinking of getting my own. About a month ago, she saw me looking at one on my iPad. 

I have one of those, she said.

Yes, I'm thinking of getting one myself, I replied.

Don't spend your money. Have mine.

No, it's yours. I'll get my own.

Just take mine. I don't wear it anymore. The date's too small. Don't waste your money.   

We went back-and-forth for another minute. She was right, of course, but I didn't want to take her watch. 

Don't be silly. Take it.  

Regardless of my interest in wristwatches, she was right. It made sense. 

So, I added a few extra links to the bracelet and began wearing it. It has every scuff and scratch that she put on it. 
Which makes it look even more awesome. 

She wore it the way a wristwatch is meant to be worn. It's supposed to reflect the life and adventures - big or small - of the person wearing it. It's meant to scar like its owner. 

 

And that, folks, is that. No major shake-ups, but an interesting exercise for me nonetheless. We'll see how I go this year.

 

In the meantime, take care and thanks for reading! 

 

P.S. - And it looks like Blogger is now highlighting names and phrases and providing links to them. 

Hmmm.  

Goodbye to Another Wonderful Cat | Bowie. 2017 - 2025

Once again, our house feels different. 

We wake up in the morning, and he's not sitting outside our bedroom door. We come home from work, and he's not curled up asleep on a corner of the couch. We prepare dinner, and he doesn't walk in meowing as the plates are placed on the table.

April 30th. It was a Wednesday evening. I got home from work and my wife and daughter said they'd go get us some burgers for dinner. My son was out working, so it would just be the three of us. 

Off they went to a local burger joint (which ended up stuffing up their order) while I sat at the kitchen table taking some lenses off some cameras and swapping them around to see which lens would fit which camera. 

Ten minutes or so later the doorbell rang. It was a neighbour from a few houses down. He had a torch in his hand, as it was beginning to get dark.

"Hi, teeritz, it's ******, from number 4, Do you have a cat?"

I said that we did have a cat, and he explained that his wife had told him that a cat was lying on the nature strip outside their house. 

I headed out there with him and as I got closer to his house, I could see the familiar shape and colour of our cat, Bowie. 

"Oh, no, no, no", I thought to myself as I got closer. 

"Ahh, damn, Bo", I said as I crouched down to feel his chest and back. His eyes were slightly open, pupils fully dilated. He still felt warm, but didn't stir.

He was gone. 

"Oh, dammit", I said as I stood up, wondering what to do next. I thanked my neighbour and he asked if I needed any help. I told him I'd be okay and that I'd just go get a towel and be right back. He waited a minute or so for me to come back. He asked again if I needed any help. I thanked him and told him I'd be alright, as I crouched down and wrapped Bowie up in the towel. Burmese cats are known to be heavy, often described as 'bricks wrapped in silk'. He felt heavier right now as I bid my neighbour a goodnight and headed back to my house a few doors away. 

It was now around six-thirty pm on this chilly Autumn evening. My wife and daughter had been gone about 20 minutes. They should be back soon, I thought to myself as I sat down on the weight bench in our carport and looked down at this little cat in my lap, wondering how I would break the news to them. I stroked his cheek as my eyes welled up. 

"Oh, Bowie", I said as I continued patting him. I wondered if he had been hit by a car, but there were no marks or signs of trauma to his body. The tears kept coming. About ten minutes later, I got a message on my phone from my wife; "Sorry, an idiot took our order". 

That explained the fact that it was now around 30 minutes since they left. It was about twenty minutes later when I saw my wife's car turn into our street. It pulled into the driveway and as I sat on the bench, I looked up at my wife and daughter and shook my head. 

 

"What happened?", my daughter asked as she got out of the car. I explained what had occurred, but I had trouble getting it out. She said we have to take him to the vet, we have to take him to the vet. She was now understandably distraught.

I told her I'd been sitting with him now for over 30 minutes and I didn't think a vet would do any good. I took a slow deep breath and retold what had happened, my voice a little shaky. My wife was still trying to comprehend it. 

 

The above was written about a week after it occurred. I stopped writing because it was all still too raw.  I'll continue now (July 27th) and I'll see how long I last.

 

She had gotten home from work at around 5:45pm and my daughter had brought Bowie over to greet her. He seemed fine and his usual self, she told me. They then discussed dinner plans and I arrived home shortly afterwards.

We didn't see him around anywhere. He must've done his usual thing of heading out for a while before we had dinner. So, nothing unusual so far. My wife and daughter headed out to a local burger joint while I messed around with camera lenses before the doorbell rang and I got the awful news from my neighbour. 

 

Bowie was still wrapped in the towel and we got him into the car and made the short drive to a nearby animal hospital.  The girl at reception listened to our outline of events and called out a vet, who took Bo into another room. We waited about 20 minutes before the vet came out to tell us that there was nothing more that could be done. She said there was some fluid on his lungs and his front claws looked a little shredded. No evidence of impact, but it could have been a car. She based this on the condition of his claws. My wife said later that his claws were already like that and she had been meaning to trim them. We took him home and laid him out on his favourite cushion and draped his little blanket over him. 

All that was left now was to tell our son about it once he got home from work. There was no point in calling him while he was working. We didn't want to upset him. That would come later. 

Needless to say, the ladies of the household were very upset. 

 

Here he is, a few days after we first got him in 2017. He was very wary of us all and spent his first week hunkered down under our daughter's bed. Over the course of a few days, she noticed her socks were going missing. This cat had slowly hoarded a bunch of them and had arranged them in a semi-circle under her bed, like sand-bags. He'd built himself a fort. Took him quite some time to warm up to us all. My son was working nights back then, so he spent the most time with this little guy throughout the day, slowly coaxing him out from under the bed and playing with him during the day. Of course, we had Dussy, our other cat, who was older and she never really got comfortable with the idea of another cat in the house. That's putting it mildly. She hated him and would hiss whenever he came near. She did mellow a little in the last few years of her time with us. Regular readers may recall that she got ill very quickly in September 2023 and we had her put to sleep before her illness got worse.

 

Our son got home from work at around 10:30 that night and we broke the news to him. He was upset, but I think he wanted to hide it. That's okay. My wife and I did remind him that it was important to grieve in his own way and not to keep it bottled up. We told him it was unfair what had happened to Bo but it was important to deal with it. 

The next evening, my wife looked up a few pet cremation services online and found one that had gotten very good reviews. They were located on the other side of town. We made the necessary arrangements and provided a photo of Bowie - the one at the top of this post - and they were great to deal with, I have to say.  

My son brought Bowie into his room on the night that he died and placed him on the chair at his desk. This was a spot that Bo liked to sleep in during the day. 

It was a thoughtful gesture. Our son said that he didn't want Bowie left alone in the lounge room overnight. 

The next evening, we had taken Bo off the couch and placed him on his cushion. The pet cremation driver would be arriving soon. As I tilted Bo's head a little, some blood ran from his nostril. Once again, a reminder that he was truly gone. I dabbed at it with a tissue. 

My wife placed some leaves from a tree next to his head on the cushion. He liked sitting under that tree in Summer, she reminded me. 

In the coming days, I'd spend a few minutes here and there Googling info about how cats can die so suddenly, since I felt that the vet's conclusions were a little vague. 

Can Burmese cats die suddenly?, I Googled.
Yes, it turns out that they can. This breed is susceptible to heart issues. It would seem that he may have had a cardiac arrest. This didn't make me feel any better, but it did provide a possible answer to why he went so young. 

 

(August 3rd)

My wife was miserable in the days after he died. She said she just felt so sad about it, stating that he died so close to home, on a cold evening, without being with his people. 

 

We did, however, remind each other that we had all given him a nice life. 

Friday nights, my wife and I would make pizzas. The kids would be at work, so it was usually just the two of us. Bowie would appear in the dining area while we ate, and he would almost always end up with a piece of pizza crust to munch on, his little nose crinkling as he chewed.

Saturday nights were an especial treat for him. Again, the kids would be working and I would cook fish for my wife and I. 

Despite my cooking a smaller piece of salmon or barramundi for my wife, at her request, she would often not finish the entire piece, and guess who would be waiting for the leftovers?

This would later be followed by his normal 8:30-ish feed of meat. So, he was getting some surf & turf action going on Saturday nights. Living like a prince, he was. 

When I broke the news to my colleagues at work, I got some sympathetic responses from those who also own cats. One of them said; "I don't know which would be worse- a pet getting sick and dying or one that dies suddenly."

I didn't have a response at the time, but I've now had time to think about it, having experienced both outcomes. Dussy went downhill pretty quickly. She had a seizure on a Wednesday night and we saw a rapid downhill change in her health. She had trouble walking after that. The vet also said that her sight had gone. Her condition would worsen quickly. We had her put to rest the following Tuesday. It was very difficult to make the decision but it gave us time to come to terms with it. Not a lot of time, mind you, but enough for us to rally 'round and support each other while we made her as comfortable as we could in the time she had left. 

We would grieve afterwards. 

Whereas with Bowie, he was here at 6:00pm on a Wednesday evening and gone half an hour later. 

So, which would be worse, Lily? 

Losing a pet suddenly is worse. 

It's now just over three months since Bowie died. Till now, we weren't ready to look at getting another cat. However, chez Teeritz is a cat household, so it's only a matter of time. 

Since Bowie's passing, I've often thought that I could see one of our cats from the corner of my eye as I sat in the lounge room or dining area. When I've turned to look, I saw that it was a cardboard box or a shopping bag. My wife has said the same thing. So have the kids. The presence of our departed felines is still felt in this house. 

 

We visited the pet crematorium a week after they came to take Bowie away. We had the option of having his ashes posted back to us, but we didn't even entertain that idea, despite the fact that the crematorium was located way over on the other side of town. 

There was something cold and detached about Bo being sent in the mail. 

My wife and I drove out there on the Saturday morning and collected our little guy.  

We stopped off at a cafe on the way home. The little canister containing his ashes sat on the table between us. 

We soon finished our coffees and headed back to the car as the sun shone and the day warmed up. 

It was time to bring our beloved cat home. 

 

Despite the pain that one can go through when losing a pet, the joy and amusement that they provide far outweigh the grief that you experience once they're gone.  

And that's what I hold on to. 

Bowie lived half as long as our other beloved cat Dussy (still miss her), but he made a big impact on us all, and he had more of an effect on me than I thought he would. 

He will be sorely missed and always remembered in our household and we are grateful for the time that we had with him.

 

Thanks for reading.  

 

2024 - September | Binge-Watching Mrs Maisel, and a New Wristwatch

It's been a busy year work-wise, but I've managed to keep my department under control and operating reasonably smoothly. I've enjoyed going to work and dealing with the day-to-day aspects of the job. There have been no major dramas and all of the minor ones have been easily handled. 

In terms of my leisure time, this year has seen me reading far less than last year, which comprised mainly of espionage fiction;

Books Read in 2023

 

Trinity Six by Charles Cumming 

- Journalist chasing a story about spies recruited in the 1930s. Has a le Carré vibe to it. Pretty good.

The Catch (novella) by Mick Herron 

- The completist in me begins reading as much of Herron's work as possible.

All The Old Knives by Olen Steinhauer 

- American spy author. Very well written and plotted.

The Afghan by Fredrick Forsyth 

- Forsyth's research skills are as sharp as ever. Book was okay, maybe a 6/10.

Double or Nothing by Kim Sherwood (didn't finish it) 

- About the Double-O Section's other operatives. Bond is missing. So was my interest in this book, which took too many liberties with the world of OO7.

Standing By The Wall (novella) by Mick Herron 

- The completist continues...

The List (novella) by Mick Herron 

- and on...

The Drop (novella) by Mick Herron 

- ...and on. I did like these little novellas, as they provided some insight about the characters in Herron's other novels.

Spook Street by Mick Herron 

- A Slough House* novel. Great

London Rules by Mick Herron 

- Another Slough House novel. Excellent.

Nobody Walks by Mick Herron 

- A stand-alone book, about an ex-spy now living in France, who returns to London after the death of his son. Some Slough House characters show up. Great book.

Reconstruction by Mick Herron 

- Another stand-alone story, again with some Slough House cameos. And again, a great story. Herron writes good characters.

The Spy Who Came In From The Cold by John le Carré 

- Read it back in the late '80s. Figured it was due for a re-read. A bleak anti-Bond story.

Winter Work by Dan Fesperman - Set just after The Wall came down. Interesting premise, well-written, but it doesn't seem like a great deal happens. I think I'll have to read it again before I make a definite judgement on it.

A Spy By Nature by Charles Cumming - First in a subsequent series of books about Alec Milius, freshly recruited into British Intelligence. Don't recall much about it, but I did like the writing. Another one that will require a re-read.

The Thin Man by Dashiell Hammett - Another book that I first read back in the '80s. Thought I could use a break from all the spy stuff.

Damascus Station by David McCloskey - Debut book by McCloskey and it was great. 

*Slough House

Herron's first book, Slow Horses, concerned a bunch of f*ck-ups from British Intelligence who have been relegated to a quiet division in Slough House, led by one Jackson Lamb, a burn-out who's best work may be behind him. This crew, nick-named the slow horses by the rest of MI5, spend their days doing extremely menial and nonsensical tasks, in the hope that they'll get so bored and/or disillusioned that they'll resign, thus sparing any Human Resources headaches for Head Office. 

One of the slow horses left a secret file on a train, another is a coke-fiend, another is a problem gambler. It's for reasons like these that they have been swept under the mat into Slough House. 

Jackson Lamb drinks, smokes...and farts too much. He despises his crew (hoping that they'll quit), but he despises MI5 Head Office even more, and his one major ace up his sleeve is his razor-sharp mind. Whatever he's become that has led him to Slough House, he's still a master-spy.

Mick Herron has created a credible world, filled with a variety of characters in a shady corner of the already shady intelligence universe. 

 

Since signing up for Amazon Prime and Disney + this year, I've been watching a little more TV. One show that I'd been meaning to watch was The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel.

This show centres around Miriam 'Midge' Maisel, a young housewife living on the Upper West Side. Her husband Joel works as an executive in the city and he has ambitions of becoming a stand-up comedian. 

Problem is, he's not very funny. Midge gives him a lot of encouragement, proof-reads his routines, and generally supports his dream. One night, after a dismal performance on stage at The Gaslight Café, Joel accuses her of not being supportive of his comic ambitions and tells her he is leaving, after admitting that he's been having an affair with his secretary.

Joel leaves, and in a drunken rage, Midge ends up on the stage at The Gaslight Café, and delivers an observational rant that has the audience laughing, and the club manager Susie Myerson quickly realises that she may have a major talent on her hands. 

 

Midge is soon arrested by police for some lewd remarks during her impromptu performance and hauled off to the station. Groundbreaking '60s comedian Lenny Bruce, performing a set at the Gaslight also, is arrested as well. He becomes a recurring character in the show. 

There's a lot going on in this show throughout its five seasons. Midge establishes her own set of rules and conditions in her attempt to become a stand-up comedian in an era when women weren't encouraged to pursue this kind of career. Susie Myerson attempts to set herself up as a talent manager for Midge and other acts. Midge's parents have their own struggle in trying to understand and accept their daughter's new-found chosen vocation, while her ex-husband Joel attempts to find his own path in life. 

The acting is top-notch throughout, as evidenced by the numerous Emmy awards the show's creators and cast have garnered in recent years. 

Created by Amy Sherman-Palladino, who was responsible for Gilmour Girls (2000-2007), this show is extremely well done in almost every respect. The casting is wonderful, with particular mentions to Rachel Brosnahan as Midge, and Alex Borstein as Susie Myerson. Together, these two actresses carry the bulk of the show. 

 

Rachel Brosnahan as Miriam 'Midge' Maisel (left) and Alex Borstein as Susie Myerson. Two wonderful actresses, showcasing exemplary performances of two strong female characters with a wonderful friendship, which is the back-bone of the show, IMHO. Whenever Midge is about to go on stage, Susie's catch-phrase is a short and sweet break-a-leg statement; "Tits up". Only two words, but the meaning is profound, in my view - You're a woman, working in the predominantly male world (of stand-up comedy), so rope the audience in initially with your feminine charms, be proud, and then slay them with your comedic prowess. You are woman, let them hear you roar. Then they'll roar with laughter.

Extra-special mention goes to Tony Shalhoub as Abe Weissman, Midge's father, a Mathematics Professor at Columbia University, and Kevin Pollack as Moshe Maisel, Joel's father, who runs a garment business. 

In saying that, though, I can't fault anybody in the cast. Marin Hinkle and Caroline Aaron do a great job as Rose Weissman, Midge's mother, and Shirley Maisel, Joel's mother, respectively, each imbuing their characters with recognisable traits and mannerisms. 

And then there's the camera-work and cinematography! Outstanding. Beautifully lit and staged, with a cinematic quality to it all. 

 

 

There's a scene where Midge is about to entertain some troops and it starts with a Rockettes-style opening dance number on stage. Watching it, I couldn't help feeling that the way it was staged and shot, it wouldn't look out of place in a Spielberg movie. The production values and camera work were movie-quality. 

 

If I have one beef about the show, it would be the dialogue at times. Portions of it contained phrases that didn't exist in late '50s/early '60s America. 

When Midge recounts her first arrest to a subsequent audience at the Gaslight Café, she says; "And there I was, being perp-walked into the station."

When she tells of an incident where her young son was being indolent, she says; "I could take him."

These are modern terms and phrases, that appeared to take me out of the Mid-Century world of the show.  I suppose I can understand why they might have been included. 

Modern parlance would appeal to a modern audience. 

It's just that, given the attention to detail utilised in re-creating a 1950s diner, a street filled with big fat Buicks, Plymouths and Chryslers, and Midge's wonderful Audrey Hepburn-esque wardrobe, the modern lingo seems a little out of place.

In saying that, though, it is used pretty sparingly throughout the series, so it doesn't jar too much. 

Maybe I'm just being finicky. 

 

The attention to detail and homages to Old Hollywood are evident throughout the show.

There's a scene in Season 4 where Midge is working as emcee at a seedy strip club which is soon  raided by police and everybody scrambles out of every possible exit to avoid getting arrested. If you had sat me down in front of a tv without me knowing what or where this scene was from, I'd almost have believed it was an out-take or deleted scent out of Billy Wilder's The Apartment or Irma La Douce. You'd almost expect to see a young Jack Lemmon and Shirley Maclaine in it. 

And the Steadicam work is wonderful.

 

While it presents one or two clichés here and there - Not all Italians sit around singing Funiculí, Funiculá - it avoids the worn-out trope where Susie shows any attraction to Midge. Their friendship is built on mutual respect and looking out for each other and I'm glad that the show didn't go in an obvious direction. Like Midge's yearning to be  a stand-up, Susie's ambition - to become a talent manager - is an uphill battle in a world full of male talent agents and the series charts her struggle, but she's a tough-talking, chain smoking, foul-mouthed gal who gets sharper at the job as the show progresses and she gives the boys a run for their money.

 

I can't fault this show, to be honest. Just about every character has a major arc in their individual stories, the performances are superb, the writing and plotting are on-point, and it's all very pretty to look at. 

Worth catching this show, if you haven't seen it. 

 

I picked up a new watch in August. The Baltic Hermétique Tourer. 

Baltic was started back in 2016 by Étienne Malec. He soon launched a campaign on Kickstarter, with the aim of getting enough backers to fund the production of a three-hand watch and a vintage-styled chronograph with a bi-compax dial. These watches would be vintage-inspired designs made using modern materials. 

His Kickstarter goal was to raise €65,000.oo. 

He ended up getting pledges for €514,806.oo over the 35-day period of his campaign.

 

Here are the two watches that were funded by his Kickstarter campaign;

 

Since then, he has expanded the brand to encompass 11 different models. Baltic has become one of the success stories of the wristwatch micro-brand world. Easy to see why. As I work in the watch industry, and have been collecting watches for twenty-five years, I spend a lot of time on the web looking at watches. Micro-brands pop up all the time. Some of them are good, offering a different perspective to much of what is already being produced. 

Some of them are derivative of existing or classic designs and don't really bring anything new to the table and end up looking like direct copies, with just a small tweak here and there to keep the lawyers away. 

And some of them are not very nice at all, lifting numerous aesthetic cues from other brands, to produce a watch that has already been done better by somebody else. Very often, these kinds of micro-brands cut a few corners during the production phase and this becomes evident when one takes a good close look at the final product. 

Baltic produces watches with a vintage vibe. While they don't mimic any exact watch from the past, their designs evoke the look of watches from the late 1940s through to the early 1970s. 

Anyway, you can always check out their website;

 

Baltic Watches 

Meanwhile, back to my Baltic watch. I've always liked the simplicity of a basic time-only wristwatch with a clearly laid-out dial. Often referred to as an "Expedition watch", this type of watch was perhaps first made popular by the Rolex Explorer, from back in the early/mid 1950s. Other brands made watches of a similar style. Two that immediately come to mind are the 1957 Omega Railmaster;

Pic borrowed from blommanwatchreport.com

 

This watch did okay for Omega, but never reached the same heights as their Speedmaster chronograph and Seamaster dive watch, both released that same year. The Railmaster was discontinued in 1963 and a new edition was released in 2003, in three different case sizes. A 60th anniversary model was produced in 2017, a virtual copy - based on Omega's archival blueprints - and this was followed by a new modern iteration the year after. 

For my money, though, the early Noughties edition is the stand-out. I got the 36mm model in 2012 and have never looked back. For those who may not know, my review is to be found on this blog via the 'Watch Reviews' tab up above. 

You can see the simplicity of the dial layout on a watch like this. Very easy at-a-glance readability.

Another watch that was touted as suitable for expeditions was the Nivada Grenchen Antarctic. As seen in this magazine advertisement, lifted from...

 Hodinkee.com | Hands-On: Vintage Or Modern? The New Nivada Grenchen Antarctic 35mm Helps Us Take On The Age-Old Debate

...this watch was marketed as being worn and used during Operation DeepFreeze, a US-led expedition to the Antarctic by Admiral Richard Byrd in the 1950s. 

As you can see, these watches looked like most other day-to-day men's watches of the era, but they were quite hardy and, if much of the advertising is to be believed, these watches stood up to quite a bit of punishment. 

A lot of basic men's watches were put through the ringer during these expeditions. There's the well-known (among Tudor watch nerds, anyway) letter that was written in 1956 to Rolex - Tudor's parent company  - about how well an Oyster-Prince model fared throughout the British North Greenland Expedition;

Dig that letterhead! 

As is pretty much well-known among us watch nerds, Edmund Hilary wore a British-made Smiths De Luxe mechanical watch  during his ascent up Mount Everest in 1953. 

These simple watches, worn during these endeavours, could take a beating. Their dials were clear and easy to read, their water-resistance was sufficient for the job at hand, and they were powered by a self-winding automatic movement. As the examples I've mentioned all took place in sub-zero climates, it might be fair to say that the watches would have been covered by jacket sleeves to protect them a little. Then again, if needing to check the time quickly was a necessity, a jacket sleeve may have been pulled back a little to expose the watch for easy viewing. 

All conjecture on my part. 

So, with all of this rugged history attached to this type of wristwatch, I spent a few months looking at this Baltic watch, read a few reviews, etc, before I visited the only seller in Australia who carries this brand. I had contemplated purchasing direct from Baltic's website, but when I got serious about the watch and did the sums, it pretty much worked out to be a difference of about $80.oo less if I bought from the website. The benefit, in my view, of purchasing from a bricks-and-mortar store is that, should anything go wrong with the watch, dealing with any warranty-related issues is more straightforward when doing so face-to-face rather than via back-and-forth emails and shipping. 

And so I bought the watch. I opted for the chocolate brown dial with matching Tropic rubber strap. My collection contains enough black, blue, and silver dials, so I thought I'd change things up a bit and go totally left field. Other colour options were blue, green, or a nice shade of beige.

 

Yeah, brown was the right one to go for. It looks edible. Case diameter is a wonderful 37mm, which sits so Goldilocksy on my 6.5 inch wrist. The dial. Ahh, the dial. Chocolate brown, with the hour markers and numerals made from C3 SuperLuminova and applied onto the dial like whipped cream piped onto its surface. And it has a slightly 'stepped' area on its outer edge, which sits lower than the rest of the dial. Hard to see in the photos. 

The movement inside it is a Miyota 9039, self-winding automatic with a 42 hour power reserve. Miyota is a subsidiary of Citizen watches, of Japan. Many micro-brands use Miyota movements. This is one major way to keep production costs and selling prices down, as this brand's movements are quite robust, with a decent daily accuracy for the price.

Perhaps the one drawback with the watch is the crown. Hermetic watches are so called because the crown sits pretty much flush with the case when its pushed in. Hermetically sealed and all that. This makes for a nice symmetry of the case. This also makes winding the watch by hand a tad difficult. It's not a huge issue, really. I give it five to ten winds by hand to get it going, by running my index finger along the crown's edge, then a few flicks of the wrist to top it up a little. As long as I'm wearing it, it'll continue to wind itself. I figure it's a very small price to pay when the rest of the watch more than makes up for this minor hassle. 

The case sits quite flat on the wrist and the watch has a 100m water-resistance, making it a fairly everyday go-anywhere, do-anything (GADA, is what collectors call it) wristwatch. While it looks good on its rubber strap, I knew I'd want the bracelet optional also, so I placed an order a couple of weeks later and it arrived not long after. 

The beads-of-rice bracelet design gained popularity in the 1960s and appeared on a number of watches across various brands. A pleasant change from the usual three-link bracelet style found on watches of that era, a major plus with this type of bracelet is the fit. As the links are so small, it makes for a very comfortable fit on the wrist, and it also allows the bracelet to breathe a little, due to the numerous gaps between the links. 

The sapphire crystal on this watch is domed, which allows for some interesting play of light, reflection, and distortion from certain angles, and it very perfectly suits the vintage vibe of the watch. Baltic spent a lot of time and effort on this Hermétique Tourer range (as with their other product families), to produce a distinctive watch with old-school charm coupled with modern technology. 

There was a time when there were quite a few watch manufacturers in France, given that the country borders Switzerland. Many of these brands went under during The Quartz Crisis of the 1970s. A few of them, such as Lip, survived that storm. Other brands, like Yema and Airain, were resurrected in recent years, to be re-introduced to a new generation of watch fans.

Baltic is part of the new wave of micro brands to come out of France in recent years. Serica and Meraud are two other French brands that immediately come to mind. Some of them use Japanese movements, some of them use Swiss. Either way, the attention to detail is commendable and the build quality rivals that of well established Swiss brands of similar pricing. 

As stated up above, the minor drawback with the crown is way off-set by the many positives found throughout the rest of the watch. 

It's a beautifully-made wristwatch, in an age where there are a myriad number of well-established brands with long histories, and a vast number of newly-created micro-brands all vying for your hard-earned dollars. You could do nicely with a Baltic watch. Not a sales pitch. I'm not affiliated with the brand in any way. 

I just think it's a watch that punches well above its weight. 

 

Anyway, another post down. At the time of writing, I'm slightly laid out with a cold. Been a while since I was last sick with anything. Work is busy these days and I worked from home today. No doubt, there'll be a few spot-fires to put out tomorrow, such is the nature of customer service. 

Still, when you have to rely on numerous external partners to help you do your job, you can only do what you can only do.

 

Thanks for reading, and take care.