Q&A: Ask Me Anything
Launching a newsletter, vintage watches, new releases, geezers — answering your questions
Okay, let’s try a Q&A.
This first Q&A thread is available to paid and free subscribers. In the future, these will be subscribers only, and we’ll try to do them every month.
Ask your question in the comments of this post and I’ll respond throughout the day:
Unpolished, the vintage market, auctions, releases, future plans, Watches & Wonders or watch events worth going to, media, press trips, Cartier, my collection, careers in watches, geezer watches, microbrands, those 2025 predictions, anything!
If it goes well, I’ll raise a few of the best exchanges for a mailbag issue of the newsletter.
Thanks for following along with the launch of Unpolished this week. I’ll be at the Miami Beach Antique Show on Friday and Saturday, where I’m also moderating a panel on Saturday at 2 p.m. with Fred Savage, Brynn Wallner (Dimepiece), and Max Traber (Bonham’s). Come say hey if you’re around. If you haven’t bought a ticket yet, get one free with code PARTNERFREE (not sponsored, just a tip).
I’ll be back next week with photos of some of the best vintage watches I saw and reports from the show.
See you in the comments,
Tony
Tony - I’d be grateful for your guidance on alarm clocks.
Now into my 40’s, I’ve begun a habit that has surprisingly changed the quality of my life - that is, powering off my mobile phone in the evening, keeping it in another room while I sleep, and only turning it back on after writing for 2 hours in the morning. That means I wake up at 4:30a and try not to disturb my wife.
I’ve been using an old Braun travel clock on my bedside. It’s fine enough but it’s on its last legs. I’d like to keep it analogue and don’t care to shell out major $$ (I’ll save that for my wrist). So… can you help guide me towards some smartly designed, reliable options? Any heritage options? Or is Amazon the best source. Thanks.
Do you think it's a right of passage in the watch collecting/hobby world to reach a point where you "buy watches you like, not what the community says you should like"? I say that reflecting on my own journey of watches I fell in, and then out of, love with and getting to a stage now where I'm very happy with my collection or what I want to add to it/remove from it even if it runs counter to mainstream notions.
Did you have that stage where you just said "f-- it if no one else likes this watch, I do." And if so, what watch is that?
(For me, there are two:
-IWC Timezoner Chronograph. It's big & bulky 46mm steel case and I get a lot of "what is that?!" but the matte dial and timezones on bezel just make me happy.
-Rolex Turn-o-graph Thunderbird. 36mm, rotating bezel, blue dial, red second hand and a jubilee bracelet that really make no sense being together, and yet....magic)