How To Field Questions About Your Audiophile Lifestyle...


We Audiophiles often have a bit of "The Adams Family" about us to other people..especially to neighbors and those who come into contact with us often.Here are some of the most common questions that come up and some suggestions on how to field them.

Q."About that stereo of yours,; "what kind is it?"
 A. Looking at your watch, "It's a q
uarter to 5."

Q."How much did it cost?"
 A. "I'm not sure.I stole it."

 Q."How come my stereo doesn't' sound like that?"
 A."You need smarter friends with better advice." "I hear they really kick"is 5 words from hell, if you are really serious about your selections.

 Q."Why do you play "Aerosmith" and the "Butthole Surfers"then switch to that "Beethoven"
 crap?"
  A. "Beethoven was a musician too."He went deaf without any rock music at all.

  Q."Why is your furniture differently arranged than everybody else's, all diagonally?"
  A."It has to do with the lighting,"or "Thats the way the previous people living here liked it."

  Q."Why do you always walk backwards when there is a strong wind coming at you ?"
  A."I like to protect my nice face from aging" or "I forgot my ear muffs today."

  Q."Why do you play your CD player with the top off and why does the Xmas tree near it always have greenish blue lights."
  A.It has to do with the absorption of stray laser..Err it's too long a story."

  Q."Why do you have a Xmas tree still up by your CD player?"
  A."It's already September..Might as well just keep it up now."

I hope this helps.

supertweak

Showing 3 responses by wolf_garcia

Audiogon has lightened their post removal policy a little recently and I feel that's a good thing as I do argue with people from time to time. One newer guy simply used the removal process as a cowardly remedy to any challenging response if he felt they were "personal." Lame...but if anybody can't handle the back and forth regardless of the source or criticism, they likely should find a safe place to dwell and stay away from forums.
Does somebody actually get "introverted" from "when people would constantly tell you how foolish you are for wasting time and especially money on stereo equipment." Who are those people? That's a tough crowd ya got there. My experience over more than 5 decades of audio stuff (I was roped into running a 16 millimeter projector for a fearful teacher in the 5th grade...now I get overpaid to mix concert sound) is most people are so uninterested in audio freaks they don't care enough to be negative about it. "Your hobby is BAD Clem...hang your head!"
It's tough to get anybody into this stuff...I've advised people about systems because they trust me to do that and that's always worked out fine, but in the typical dinner party group with my rig playing unobtrusive background stuff (no vocals...a strict rule for background sound at parties), people don't notice. Or they notice that "it sounds great" which it sort of doesn't in that context as it's just there in the background. If a friend wants me to demo something for them on my rig you tend to instantly annoy other guests who are appropriately talking to each other...in spite of any of this I've adjusted over the years to the glossy eyed disinterest from by most people trying to pay attention to my description of a tube, and now I really don't try very hard to explain this hobby....I get it.