As a neurodiverse person myself, I usually try to phrase the question as “what hobbies are you currently working on” to keep the conversation more about the present rather than fleeting hobbies/interests. Open ended questions lead to taking a long time to compile all of the information, targeted questions lead to an easier time coming up with an answer. Same with favorite music or movies or whatever. I’ve been alive for decades, how can I list off every artist/song/movie I’ve liked in that time. Something like “what music have you discovered lately” is easier to answer.
I usually play it safe and list reading, playing woodwinds, and currently also carving seal chops.
Sometimes I’ll let slip tabletop RPGs as well. Or my collection of weird traditional playing cards.
I rarely talk about the rest.
I have all the hobbies (thanks ADHD), so it depends on how much I want to avoid the conversation. Usually “computers” is enough to signal “danger, she’s a nerd”.
Otherwise it depends on what the other person might find interesting. Gardening, clay pigeon shooting, piano, mathematics, baking, and amateur radio are all fun topics I can infodump on.
I really am a nerd.
Same, my hobbies change depending on how many spoons I have after working and what I need to solve to fix something that breaks or support an event or dress up for like Halloween/Samhain/Dia de los Muertos parties.
Well, I don’t want to say “I really like watching twitch and mucking round on lemmy” so I say I like boxsets.
Declaring “I’m a strident feminist and get really boring about domestic abuse” is often badly received. So I say “vulnerability and inclusivity”.
I generally don’t tell people things about myself so I only tell people more when I know they’ll get it.
I’m with you here. I don’t like to share much with people who are not in my life, and those who are in my life already know what a complete freakshow my hobbies are.
Yep!
I like knitting, its something to do with your hands and can be done while watching things that would otherwise not be hobbies. Good strategy! Can’t tell people how much time I spend on internet video.
That’s really clever! Nice work
I hate when people ask me this because I don’t feel like I have any hobbies. I work long hours and am often too exhausted to do much when I’m off. I also have imposter syndrome about any hobby I start since I don’t keep them long due to getting bored or distracted. So I usually tell people I like to play with my dogs and take them for walks at the park.
Leatherworking! Always gets a positive response.
Depends, if my guard is up or it feels like more of a casual or throwaway question, I usually default to reading and hiking.
If I sense I’m engaging with a fellow neurospicy human, I’ll get into the long list of historical fashion, tea and tisanes, tarot and runes, sewing and crafting, history and reading, British quiz shows and period dramas, house renovations and land conservation, birds and bugs and snakes etc. etc. Lol
People don’t ask that of me; in fact, my own friends ask me, “Tanis, why are you trying so hard to avoid being perceived, and why is it working?”
So your hobby is The Importance of Not Being Seen?
It’s all a complicated intersection of being intensely asexual and sex-repulsed, being incredibly afraid of ever being called a creep or a pervert or a molester, or worse, and navigating spaces where a lot of people think that trans women are sex-crazed perverts.
I have mastered the art of not drawing attention to myself in public.
I always tell people about my love for music first, then the drawing and the reading.
In very few ocassions I say that I like gaming, because it might paint me in a way I don’t want to in a specific setting.
I never say stuff like watching videos, discussing (fighting) online or similar.
I tell them about riding motorbikes and roller skating, either of which can lead to a conversation.
I don’t tell them about shooting or reading risqué lesbian genre fiction, because many / most people are weird about those things.
Tell me more about the risqué lesbian fiction 🤤
Well, it’s on a bit of a sliding scale. At one end you have excellent books like The Long Way To A Small Angry Planet, which has sexy orgy aliens but leaves the details entirely to your imagination … at the other end you have the Past Imperfect book series (available free from the author’s website) which is Star Trek Voyager fan fiction with 10-page-long sex scenes, and lots of them.
My absolute favourite, however, is the Alsea Chronicles, which is somewhere in the middle.
I don’t care for anything that doesn’t have a good story/characters/plot/worldbuilding, though.
I’m the same i need good writing and plot. I’ll start with the Alsea chronicles thanks 😊
I’m quite jealous that you get to read them for the first time :-)
They look like perfect holiday reading mate I’ve been looking for books to take with me. How spicy are they?
Mild by slash-fic standards, medium spicy by normie standards - IIRC there’s one proper fully-described sex scene in each book. But the emphasis is on emotional connection … to the point where, for me, the most sexy part of the whole 10.5 books is a specific first kiss because of how it was set up.
Oh that I like, a strong emotional connection makes any spice 1000 hotter
If you like spooky, I just finished My Darling Dreadful thing and it was a great Sapphic slow burn!
Ooooh I’ll take a look thanks
Gaming mostly, but I also deeply love music, cars, and flags, more than most people I’ve met at least.
Depends on who’s asking. Sometimes I give generic blah answers, “reading and walks on the beach” and sometimes I give them the full force of my niche interests. I hate gatekeeping bros who will quiz me when I say I like a hobby that is even vaguely “masculine”.
Mountain / off road biking, any weather, any time of the day or night. I love the feeling of freedom and being in nature.
