Superman Goes on a Diet (277)

Published on Wed, 14 Feb 2024 22:29:58 -0800

Synopsis

The podcast covers new watch releases from brands like Yema, Citizen, Dior, Zenith, and Grand Seiko. The hosts discuss the features, designs, and their thoughts on these timepieces. Additionally, one of the hosts talks about his recent foray into the world of fountain pens, recommending the Pilot Custom 823 as an excellent option for those looking to own a high-quality fountain pen. They also briefly mention a cookbook from chef David Chang.

Transcript

Speaker
Andrew Hello fellow watch lovers, nerds, enthusiasts, or however you identify. You're listening to 40 in 20, the Watch Cooker podcast with your hosts, Andrew and my good friend Everett. Here, we talk about watches, food, drinks, life, and other things we like. Everett, how are you? What up?
Everett I'm doing well, Andrew. Sorry. Yeah, a little weird. You know, this is how it goes. I'm doing well. It's Wednesday night. pretty happy about recording and having some beverages with my good friend. Yeah. No, I'm doing good. I'm doing good. I've spent, uh, I spent a few weeks in a rabbit hole. I did. We talked about it last week with the fountain pen. Yeah. I've spent a few weeks in that sort of fountain pen rabbit hole. That's been fun. I've gotten, some writing instruments in and I've gotten some inks in and, you know, I'm using these things professionally on a regular basis. Right. I think that that's how you can justify it. Well, sure. And I don't feel like I need to justify it, but, but it does make more sense. You know, I write so much with a pen, you know, I think very few people write with a pen during the day professionally, you know, doctors, and lawyers and certainly other professions, but by and large, people aren't writing, you know, they're typing correspondence or whatever. So I just so happen to be in a profession where I write, you know, two dozen pages of notes every single day. And so it's been fun. I've gotten a lot of opportunity to use it. It has been some complications. You know, paper is, paper's tricky. I think I've found some resolutions. There's obviously nice paper, but that's sort of as many notes as I write. Yeah, that seems a little wasteful. You know, Rhodia pads, I think are like, they're expensive, right? I think they're like 10 bucks. And so, you know, I might go through two pads a week, realistically.
Andrew Is the paper of your your run-of-the-mill legal pad too thin?
Everett Yeah, it's too thin and it's just the composition of your run-of-the-mill yellow legal pad causes feathering. Basically the ink hits it and bleeds, yeah. But I did, I have gotten some rhodiopads and they're very nice to ride on, but not the most sort of economical option. There's another option that I picked up On Amazon actually, it came on a recommendation off the pen addict slack. It's a brand called Mintra and they make a premium pad, which is pretty economical. I can't remember how much I paid, but not very much. And the paper's really pretty thin. I think it's like a 20 gram, which in fountain pen paper terms is thin, but I gave it a little test run at home and I was like, I think this might work. it seems not to bleed. Uh, so we're going to give that a try. There's also inks that are quote unquote drier. You can play with it. Anyway, so I've just been having, I've been having fun with that, but it's not without it's dabbling, dabbling. It's not without its quirks.
Andrew Weird that you would have a quirky obsession.
Everett Who saw that coming? Yeah, that's right. I was actually on the pen addict slack earlier today. and some folks were talking about the new Yema micro, okay, so the Pen Addict. Pen Addict is a website, and it's run by this fellow named Brad Doughty, who's sort of, in my mind, like the OG pen guys, the guy who sort of clued me into like the high-tech C pens, and he's got a Slack, which has got a billion members, I think. Actually a billion. Yeah. And, um, there's a watches, there's a, uh, a watches sub Slack. I don't know what they call it. Channel channel. I think that's what, that is what they call it. There's a watches channel on there and they were talking about the new Yema release that we're going to talk about more, which is a micro rotor. And someone said, can we please stop using micro rotors? It's, it's an antiquated movement that has been abandoned for a reason.
Andrew You're on a slack talking about pens, you dickweed.
Everett You're on a fountain pen slack that talks about mechanical watches. And so that's actually what I said. I was like, well, both fountain pens and mechanical watches are antiquated technology that were abandoned for a reason. And I don't care. I want it.
Andrew Yeah.
Everett I want it. All of it. Give me that micro-rotor, Yema. We're coming back to you. So anyway, I'm doing really well, Andrew. How are you?
Andrew I am also doing really well. I'm kind of tired. I don't really know why it was like, it was just a really normal day. I worked from home. I think it's all the Chinese food.
Everett I think it may be. Yeah. I definitely had a bit of a, like a, yeah, a little power down.
Andrew Uh, so my wife and I have a tradition of Chinese food, uh, for Valentine's day. Today is Valentine's day for us. It's not anymore for you. listening, but it was. Uh, so we had Chinese food. You are without Kim tonight. So we, we brought you into our Valentine's day tradition, kids and all, and got an actual mountain of Chinese food. Um, so I'm a little bit, a little bit sluggish right now, but I'm not really good. I could go for a nap.
Everett Well, you're going to have to wait at least, an hour by our standards probably more like an hour ten. Yeah. We can, we can get through this. We, we're going to power through it, dude. So we're, with that said, we're not talking about fountain pens tonight or Chinese food. We could. Or even Valentine's day. Rather, Andrew, we're talking about watches. And with that, uh, I think we should just.
Andrew Do you want to jump into the Yema since we've already kind of broken the seal on it.
Everett Yeah. Why don't we? So, uh, Yama one, not actually the French brand I expected to talk about tonight. There's another French brand that we're not going to talk about tonight because we respect your embargo Baltic. We respect your embargo and we're law abiding. We will respect it. Yeah, we will. That's right. Oh yeah, it's really good. I appreciate that. Yeah. But we're going to talk about a different French brand called Yama.
Andrew Why don't you just push our episode release a couple hours?
Everett Right, just release it later in the day. Yeah. So FYI, Baltica's upcoming release, they've told you that that will be released. So have some other people. on Thursday at, I think it's 4 p.m. UTC, which is something like, I don't know. It's after we publish, so we're not going to talk about it. But Yema, no such restrictions. Yema's released an update to what I think is a really cool watch.
Andrew Yeah, they made something cool, cooler. So
Everett I believe today, or perhaps yesterday, Yema announced the Superman Slim CMM.20. I think that's how we say that, right? I'm accepting of that. So the Superman... Superman is one of Yema's sort of, I guess, flagship watches. I think that's fair to say, right?
Andrew I think with them putting all this technology into it, yeah, I'd call it a flagship.
Everett Yeah. Yeah. But they've made some change. They've now equipped this thing with their own in-house, or I don't know, is this in-house? I think it's in-house, right? Micro rotor movement. This is a 39 millimeter sort of classic style dive watch with a phenomenal looking bracelet. I will say phenomenal looking because I've not actually handled one of these. with a 300 meter water resistance, and it's cut down to a really, really appealing, gosh, I just had the number, Andrew.
Andrew Oh, it's 10-2. 10-2.
Everett Yeah.
Andrew Yes. It's a 3.7 millimeter movement.
Everett Yeah. What? Yeah. So this is a 10 millimeter dive watch.
Andrew Yes. Oh, sorry, it's 12 with the two millimeter dome crystal, so it's 10 millimeters, yeah.
Everett Yeah, that's right. So 10 plus a big old high hat.
Andrew 10-2, that's why 10-2 was in my head.
Everett Which is terrific, sorry. And yeah, that's right. You do have to count the crystal, but who cares? The case on this thing is fantastically thin. And it's got some cool shit going on.
Andrew Yes. Besides the micro order. So the in-house movement is really interesting to me. It's the Caliber Manufacture Morteau 20, hence the CMM 20 name. Caliber Manufacture Morteau, manufacturing the, what is it? The bridge, main plate, and some other components there, being manufactured in France, which is really cool. Others are coming out of Lalocle, which isn't shocking, kind of to be expected, because I think this is still bearing Swiss on it, isn't it?
Everett Yes, I do believe that's right. Ooh. You know, they actually don't say Swiss made, so I think that maybe that's not a thing. I think this is... Maybe it's bearing French made. French made, yeah. Manufacturer, Francais. Oh, that's fancy. Francais. Enamel lacquer dials. CMM 20. I mean, it's got all the bells and whistles. 2,300 bucks for in-house dive watch.
Andrew Yeah. And it's beautiful.
Everett Andrew, do you know what we call this style of bracelet? Do we just call this a Yema style? What is this?
Andrew What do you call that? It's almost like a flat... I don't know. I think it's a Yema style, right? It's a hybrid between like a beads of rice and an oyster, right? It's using beads of rice in the middle with oyster
Everett Outside links. Yeah it's sort of got like a hexagonal. It's sort of got like an alternating hexagonal Jubilee type of. Yeah I accept that.
Andrew And they're all flat links. These are good.
Everett So this was revived. This was revived in 2018 from a 1960s Yama model with you know sort of modern proportions but also Yama did a good job in sort of keeping this thing pretty conservatively sized, but for them to come out with this thing in such a slim, I think, IMO, really attractive case, this thing's pretty dang cool.
Andrew What do you call the reader, is what I'll call it, the kind of bezel guard atop the bezel on the crown side?
Everett So it's actually a lock. for the bezel. I would just call it a bezel lock. I think it's certainly an anachronistic.
Andrew I've never seen one on like a modern watch.
Everett You know, I know that Yema is not the only one that does this. Who's doing them? But I think, well, you know, obviously different than, yeah, I think this is the watch that I think primarily is doing this today. And maybe they're the only one. Shit, I don't know.
Andrew We got a full lume option in this. A blue and a black, and they're gorgeous.
Everett Yeah, just two colors.
Andrew Just two. Why am I seeing a white and a blue?
Everett I think it's just black and blue. So these are going to go on pre-order. EMS sort of still doing the pre-order thing. That's okay.
Andrew Oh, it's cause I'm looking at a link that I accidentally opened of a full loomed version.
Everett Oh, so, but that's, that's with the ETA movement, right? Yeah. Yeah. So these will go on pre-order 20 February, 2024, uh, 2,490 euro or, or us dollars. Apparently there's no difference now. Um,
Andrew Delivery in May. Pay in cash or in American dollars and get a screaming deal. I'm kind of into it, dude. These are cool. I like the micro order technology. I think it's a really underutilized way to make super svelte watches.
Everett Monochrome has called this bracelet a scale style bracelet, which tracks it. They look like scales, right?
Andrew Mm-hmm.
Everett That's what monochrome is calling this. Um, a hundred pieces will be delivered in May 2024. So I, that, that suggests that if you're not in those first 100 orders, you may be a little bit behind a little bit later than that.
Andrew Yeah. All right. I think that's a cool release. Yeah, me too. What's next? Um, Oh, next up for me. Uh, I have a, an interesting citizen that I'd like to talk about. Andrew, hold on. Uh huh.
Everett Was the Yemi your pick and then I just took it because it was also my pick? Yeah. Okay. Sorry.
Andrew It's okay.
Everett Sorry to everybody. That's just how I roll. I'm kind of a. You're just kind of bossy and pushy.
Andrew This is, you know, this is, this is my lot in life. A rolling stone. So a new release from Citizen, the new Atessa Hakuto are. Now, I really don't like these watches. These are very fashion citizen watches. What is really cool about this. So these watches are designed in conjunction and in honor of the Japanese space program. They are using the same titanium that they are providing to the space program that is being used on their unmanned lunar landers for their space flights. That's what makes this really cool. There's quite a few other moon and space inspirations into this. Uh, if this is the kind of thing you're into awesome, but I'm really excited to see another company partnering with a space agency to propel technology and to be on the tip of the spear as it were in this kind of scientific and explorative endeavor. Uh, and it's, really cool to see that kind of partnership. It'd be cooler if they could do maybe more attractive watch or even just less ugly, but super cool.
Everett Yeah. You know, Citizen is, Citizen has a couple of different modes, right? This is their, I think, sort of modern, you know, giving the impression of kind of that skeletonized, like, almost faux haute, haute horology. And maybe that's unfair to them. I also surmise that this is a style of watch that carries more weight with a Japanese audience than it does with the traditional American watch nerd audience.
Andrew The neckbeard people like us, yeah. And these are big. They're 44.6 millimeters. Three thousand bucks, but they packed in some cool GPS technology into these. So these are automatically syncing to your current time zone. Between three and 30 seconds, it'll take to recognize that you're in a new time zone and update your time. which is very cool. Uh, we have three varieties here. Um, so the first is, and these are all in titanium. I don't know if they're PVD or, um, it doesn't matter. First has a moon phase. These are, so they're all black. They all have, dark moon colored dials, but for one, which has some bronze accents. So some, some moon feature on the dial with a moon phase. The next is kind of a green dial with like the center link of the bracelet being made to be reminiscent of the surface of the moon.
Everett And these are the most limited. That version, the green dial is the most limited. Yeah. It's got a different pusher style and it is the most expensive to at twenty five hundred dollars. Yeah.
Andrew Whatever. And the last has a bronze bronze accents to it and a gold kind of inlaid. Surface of the moon within its moon phase date wheel. in a 24-hour sub-dial. Whatever. Yeah, they're, you know, I don't.
Everett So the green version actually has like a world time bezel. Oh, yes. Yeah. You know, I will say all of these are interesting. I think they all have a moon surface dial. I have trouble loving these watches, but I think they're pretty cool.
Andrew I think the coolness is in the partnership between, um, Hakuto R and Citizen in that Citizen is providing titanium. And I mean, FISA, like, presumably if they're already providing equipment in the way of material to the space program, they'll also be providing the watches when they decide to ultimately go to manned spaceflight and hopefully a manned lunar landing if they can get that worked out. Yeah. Which would be cool to see another, another brand making their way into space history.
Everett And Citizen's the right brand for it too.
Andrew A hundred percent. Just, you know, do something better for the rest of us.
Everett Yeah. You know, there's probably some, there's probably some chapped asses over at Casio, Be better, Cassio.
Andrew Yeah.
Everett We've got MRG. I'm going to get a threefer. Are you going to do it? I'm going to do it. This isn't even on your list, is it?
Andrew It almost certainly is. You sent me one unique thing.
Everett I'm looking. I'm looking. It's not on your list. Oh, it is. It is on your list. OK, I'll take my unique thing.
Andrew No, no. Do that. You do the threefer because a threefer is dope. We can talk about it.
Everett Okay, so Xin, Xin. I said recently on the show, I never know whether to say Xin or Sin, and someone was like, hey, it's someone's name, asshole. It's pronounced Xin. Okay, I got it.
Andrew I'm with it, Xin. There are a lot of names that we mispronounce. Yeah, but you know, I feel like- Is that Gingerfella, that singer? He did a cameo in Game of Thrones. Shroop?
Everett Yep. Ed Shroop. Xin. release their novelties today on Valentine's Day. It's Valentine's Day for us. It'll be yesterday for you, but Zen released their spring novelty release. I think they do this annually. It's a handful of releases, um, and some bangers. Yes. So first up they dropped a Zen 103, which is sort of their one of two, but, but, one of Zen's flagship chronographs. Very, very, very classic chronograph watch. I'm not enough of a Zen guy to have noticed this, but for folks who are familiar with this watch, you ostensibly will notice that the dial layout is different. So the Zen 103 is traditionally a 6-9-12, try register, three register layout with a day date at three o'clock. This, however, not so. And that is because it is a hand wound 103, which has not been something that Zen has done for a very long time. That makes this an incredibly cool watch. So they're calling this, man, the 103, S-T-T-Y-H-D. I don't know. How are you? Stetahead. Um, yeah, this is a 369, three register, hand wound, Zin 103, uh, with a manually wound Salida 510. Uh, and it's fucking rad, dude. Limited to a thousand units.
Andrew Which means you're not going to get one because you can't get Zin's like main catalog stuff.
Everett I mean, I think that I think there's enough of these that they'll be available. Three, maybe not.
Andrew Well, there's no five, five, sixes on the planet.
Everett Twenty eight, two thousand eight hundred seventy, which is, I think, a super fair price for this watch right there. Yeah. And it's just cool. It's got a great dial, a beautiful dial. It's got this sort of black champagne and red motif with really poppy and tasteful red accents. Fantastic black zin die or bezel that yeah, they're finishing on their watches is so great.
Andrew The only thing I would like to see on this is a bracelet. And I think that's something that Zen does really interestingly is it's like bracelet or not. There's, You get what we're giving you. Does the 103 ever come with a bracelet? I don't know. Cause I'm also not enough of a, of a Zen connoisseur to, to be able to give you their catalog off memory. But, um, I like their bracelets a lot.
Everett And I, the answer is yes, it does. It does. The answer is yes. Well, excellent. With an H link. And it's attractive too. Um, next up three U 50s. But not just any U50, a quartz U50 HYDRO, all caps, HYDRO, HYDRO-S, and HYDRO-SDR with 5,000, I feel like Dr. Evil, I've got my picture. Yeah, I know. 5,000 meters of water resistance, which That's not enough. I think they're making fun of the objectively best scale. They're like, you know, this is like a middle finger. Uh, 5,000.
Andrew And that's, they could probably achieve more. So they're achieving this by oil filling the case, which prevents pressure in a way that air does not.
Everett So yeah, that's right. Yeah. It, I mean, it eliminates the vacuum. It equalizes the pressure and it's just nothing's getting in.
Andrew Nothing's getting in Andrew. Until you get to 5,001 meters and then just the weight will crush the watch. Um, these are super cool. They're, they're you fifties that, that are like, we know these watches.
Everett These are tegmented steel. Um, I actually, so the, the hydro, Let's see. Tejumented steel bezel. The SDR has a black hard coated tejumented bezel and the Hydro S has a full black coating and tejumented treatment. So the whole thing. So we've got the Hydro which is silver tejumented whole thing. The SDR which is a silver case and a black tegmented bezel, and then the SDR is all tegmented. These start at $2,500 and they go up from there. Steep for a quartz watch, but I think considering what you're getting, yeah.
Andrew And you can't achieve this with a mechanical movement, I don't think.
Everett You can't do... Oil-filled. You can't do oil-filled mechanical. Maybe that's not true. We shouldn't say can't, but I think generally speaking, oil-filled is reserved for quartz, yes.
Andrew Uh, great size on this. 41 millimeter case, 11.8 thick. 11.8 thick for this.
Everett Yeah. No, it's a terrific size. I mean, the U50 is really just a terrific watch. Yeah. Uh, finally up for our threefer, the Zen U50 SL. This is the same case. but this time with a mechanical movement, specifically an SW 300, an automatic movement, not hydro. And so we're limited to a measly, a pittance, 500 meters of water resistance. The nerve. This is really terrific. It's a full black PVD case. Uh, I do believe it is tegemented. Shit. I'm looking. I think it's got to be. It is a, I believe a full black PVD tegmented case and bezel with a full loomed dial.
Andrew I think they, I think all of them are tegmented. Isn't that the whole Zen line is they're all at a tegmented German submarine steel.
Everett It's not. So some components are, some components are. Yeah. Yeah. So with that, with the U 50, you get a fully luminous style. Okay. It's, it is loom and it's a blue loom. So it, it renders really white in the light and a nice, that nice, cool minty blue at night.
Andrew Only 500 of these leather silicone black Tejumented bracelet available with it, uh, on the bracelet, 3,500. 250 pounds. So for euros, not pounds. Thanks, Beyonce. Yeah. But you know, at a limited of 500 pieces and this is in quality, this is, that's, that's the zone.
Everett Yeah. It's, it's a specialty watch, specialty price for a specialty watch.
Andrew And, but that's what you pay for Zen. And I think it's worth it. I've, I've only got to handle a few in person and was very, very impressed by them. What up next? I always wonder about the German submarine steel comment. Like, are they cutting it off of, like, U-boats that are being recovered, or is it coming from, like, the... That's what they do.
Everett Actually, they break in to the military facilities, and they just, like, with a plasma cutter, and they just quickly grab a piece... Just take pieces of bulkhead? And they run.
Andrew And they're making such cool watches that the German Navy is like, ah, it's okay.
Everett Like it's the fucking sin assholes again. And then they're like, it's his name.
Andrew What's next? Okay. Next up for me, this is a brand that I never, ever, ever, ever thought that I would utter on this show. Nevermind talk about making watches. Dior. So Dior is, uh, among the LVMH Umbrella and they are making a attempt at watches again. They're using, because of their unique access, Zenith movements. And I gotta say, I really like these releases. It's two all-black watches. One in a three-hand four o'clock red crown. The other is a chronograph again with a great red pusher. These are really interesting. Because why? Like what? Dior? The, the, the perfume company? is somehow dropping two gorgeous watches. I don't know how I feel about it. Now, because they're Dior, where's the price on these? I don't know that the price is out. I'm not seeing one right now.
Everett It's a lot.
Andrew Yeah, they're going to be five figures. I don't see a world where they're not, especially using an El Primero movement in this chronograph. Oh, shoot. The article that I'm reading does not have much in the way of information.
Everett I failed. What? Yeah. Pick better articles. Be better. You know, I hadn't heard of these watches before you sent this to me, Andrew. Movement's cool. Watch is interesting. I can't help but think these look like Bertucci's. They look like murdered out Bertucci's to me. A little bit. Is that unfair? Is that unkind? Uh, they look like murdered out Bertucci's with, um, with like plastic bits and bobs.
Andrew A little bit. Um, I go more towards like, um, like Bell and Ross kind of techie feel like not quite their cyber line, but like maybe somewhere between, between that and like Panerai, you know, just like a little gaudy, but still like in the space where I, I like it.
Everett I think I'm embarrassed that I like it, but I do, you know, I kind of wonder, I mean, it, it, it makes a lot of sense for Dior to be doing this. Um, but I've got to wonder like, Why yeah, I mean really I know Dior does watches and they've done watches, but really they're doing like not Horology I mean, they just dropped an El Primero and a watch they doing the thing.
Andrew Yeah, it's their brother's money, but Like they're still doing it Yeah I
Everett Actually, Andrew, I'm just going to come out and say it. I think these are kind of stupid.
Andrew Uh, I think it's interesting. I think it's, and there's a tour beyond too, right? Uh, I think that's a previous, um, previous releases, you know, I think flying turbulent movement with a micro rotor.
Everett I think the, where my head's at is that if you, if Dior is going to make a watch, And they're going to try to release a serious time piece that maybe they don't come out with their pants all the way down. Right? Like, you know, put on some short shorts. Fine. Tease it a little bit. Yeah. Right. You know, show some thigh. But they're just like coming out doing the helicopter into the living room. And you're like, yeah, we were going to get there.
Andrew But I wasn't ready for it. Yeah, they're doing the Naked Man. So the tourbillon was from 2009. So maybe they're not doing the Naked Man. They've done this before. I think it's just we weren't paying attention.
Everett Yeah, I get it. Actually, every time we've gone over to his house, he's come out with his dick swinging around. Yeah. OK, fine.
Andrew Fine, Dior. It's interesting. And the question in this article is, what does it mean for the rest of the LVMH stable? And I think that's an interesting question to ponder on. We have this enormous conglomerate with the ass of Zenith. Yeah. What does it mean? I mean, Bulgari's doing cool stuff. We've seen Louis Vuitton throw their... But they always have been. Louis Vuitton's throwing their hat in the ring. Like, let's see a Tiffany & Co. watch in Tiffany Blue with an El Primero.
Everett Yeah, I know. I figure if fucking Laika can do it. Yeah. But you know, Laika came out with the short shorts on.
Andrew You could see the tip out the bottom though.
Everett Zenith. Speaking of Zenith and El Primero movements.
Andrew Right where it ought to be now.
Everett Zenith is a brand that is still wearing pants all the way to its knee. I'm thinking pinstripe suit. Which is fine. Which is fine. It's tasteful. And, you know, we still do know where it's going. Zenith released a Chronomaster Sport this week, and it's a lot like prior Chronomaster Sports. However, It's 30% lighter because it's made fully out of grade five titanium, I should say. The case and bracelet is made fully out of grade five titanium. It's a titanium Chronomaster sport. That's it. That's the whole, I did not bury the lead. Maybe I did just a little bit, but I got there. And they've made this for ostensibly the ultimate tennis showdown or UTS championship. If you've never watched UTS, it's Fascinating. It's like sort of a high pace tennis match. They don't play it in typical game set match. I think it's like four quarters. It's fun. And they also like the players talk and make noises and it's like more casual and the crowd gets kind of rowdy. It's like, it feels like exhibition tennis really. But it's tennis for the people. It is. It's super fun. Anyway, so Zenith, I think is the official sponsor of UTS. And so this is their UTS watch. And golly.
Andrew Do you think you're going to get more swing speed if you're not wearing a heavy watch?
Everett Sure. Yes. A hundred. So a couple of things about this watch. One, obviously titanium. Cool. Two, it is not our typical Chronomaster sport dial. You know, there's that white that's got the blue and red and accents. You've got the black that's got blue and red accents. This is, besides like the tip of the second hand, well, so it's got the counterbalance of the second hand, the tip of the second hand, and then a 36,000 VPH text at the 12 o'clock block. Besides that, this is pretty monochromatic. You've got a titanium case. You've got a sort of like gray silver dial. And then you've got a gray tone. You know, Zenith with these Chronomaster sports always does three different colors on the sub dials. Here we've got like a white, a silver and a darker silver. Turns out this is actually the same set of colors that they used for the Aaron Rodgers. Chronomaster sport, which I read that and I was like, no, and I looked, yeah, that's what it is. That doesn't make sense. Yeah. So it's like a green dial, but it's got these same like white, silver, gray sub dials.
Andrew Uh, man, Andrew, I'm here for it. It's good. Uh, and, and actually, um, the thing that I was most excited about, it's only, $500 more for the bracelet. 11.8 on a bracelet. That's $11,800. And 11.3 on rubber. I don't see a world where you want to wear this on the rubber.
Everett You know what this is cheaper than?
Andrew A lot of things. A Daytona.
Everett Yeah. It's a little bit more expensive than a Speedmaster. It's less expensive than a Daytona. I'm just saying things at this point. I'm just making noises with my mouth full.
Andrew I think it's less expensive and it's a brand new box. You're going to pay less than almost any Rolex on the market.
Everett It's a hundred meters of water resistance. It's got all the El Primero things.
Andrew The case profile on this watch is just, it seems like it would, It's just the sportiest watch that's ever been made.
Everett Yeah. The way the chamfer comes off of the case and that sort of aggressive curve down.
Andrew Yeah.
Everett Yeah. I'm with you. I think it's a really terrific watch.
Andrew Yeah. These are great.
Everett Maybe like maybe like one of the unsung heroes of the watch of the luxury watch world.
Andrew Unsung huh?
Everett I mean think about it.
Andrew I think
Everett Yeah, in terms of what Zenith has done, horologically speaking, and in terms of the line they tow, design-wise, in terms of their ability to put out high quality products, they don't get the play that you might... That they deserve. Think they should.
Andrew So in that regard... Yeah, Zenith is... Uh, I mean, at least in, in the circles that we exist in and are aware of, um, certainly under regarded for, for both their contributions historically and what they're currently doing. They're kind of a sleeper hit. Like you see a Zenith on somebody and they did that on purpose.
Everett Yeah.
Andrew And they know exactly what the fuck they're wearing. They didn't just happen upon it. You know what you did.
Everett Mm hmm. Yeah, I think it's a really terrific watch. And if I was not buying so many fountain pens, I'd be seriously considering it. This over an Alpine Eagle, huh? Oh, interesting. You know, different watches, right? Yeah. I'm only going to get one. It's probably an Alpine Eagle for me. If I'm getting one sort of watch in that price range, it's the Alpine Eagle.
Andrew But if I can get them all, I'm obviously going to get an El Primero. Yeah. I made a joke about winning the lottery the other day at work. My boss was like, yeah, you just wear Rolex and travel the world. I was like, no, no, I would not. I would, I would likely not be wearing Rolex and traveling the world. There are other things. Uh, and she kind of looked at me weird and I was like, yeah, let's move on from that topic. You're not ready for that.
Everett Okay. You're doing the thing. You don't know what it is, but you might want to stop.
Andrew Yeah. You're about to open up a box that cannot be closed. Okay. So Seiko, Grand Seiko, pardon. They're different brands, Andrew.
Everett They are. They're different brands. They're discreet. Okay.
Andrew I know. God. We're going to have to record this whole episode. Grand Seiko SBGH431 and 343 debut the modern 62 Grand Seiko case in a 38mm and they come in two really lovely ice cream flavors. Grand Seiko is going to describe them in some eloquent, eloquent, elegant, fantastical, whimsical way with about 74 adjectives. One is mint chocolate chip. The other one's cotton candy and they're gorgeous.
Everett No, this is obvious. No, stop it. Andrew. Obviously pistachio and strawberry. I, uh, that is exactly the color of strawberry ice cream.
Andrew That's the color of cotton candy ice cream.
Everett A, what the fuck is cotton candy ice cream? And when was the last time you saw a brand new gallon of strawberry? It looks like that. I don't. I'm calling it. I don't need ice cream. A, we need your comments. Write in. Pistachio and strawberry. Will at WatchClicker.com, tell us your opinions.
Andrew Yeah. And let them know that you're just deeply disappointed with them. So this is just another, Grand Seiko is doing some stuff, right? They've, this is probably release number seven or eight of the year for them. We're two months in. And they're churning some stuff out. They're pulling these down from a 40 millimeter case. I don't know what else there is to say about it besides this is a new size debut in really lovely colors and it's Grand Seiko.
Everett Well, so OK. So first 62GS is the first automatic watch in the Grand Seiko collection of all time ever. So it holds a bit of
Andrew It's in a place of honor.
Everett Honor. And when they re-released these a handful of years ago, I think there was a lot of people that was like, it's a 40 millimeters. What the fuck? Grand Seiko. This, I think brings this watch much more into line with what I would expect it to be. I mean, I think this is a 38 millimeter watch all day.
Andrew Yeah. But I also, I, Grand Seiko does some odd things for really good reasons that they never share why. I just assumed that they had a reason and accepted it. I like it better than 38. 9S, 85 movement, high intensity titanium, 100 meters of water resistance. The kind of confusing part to me is that they're 12.9 thick.
Everett Well, what do you mean it's confusing to you? It's exactly what I, I saw this and I was like, this thing's going to be a whopper. It's going to be, you know, what's going to be.
Andrew But why make it smaller and not make it smaller?
Everett Because it's Grand Seiko. What are you talking? They don't, that's as thick as they, that's as thin as they can go. Yeah. If it's under 14, we're like, nice work, Grand Seiko. Yeah, but we shouldn't. All right. I've got some other thoughts about this. So one, 7,300 bucks. The dials are beautiful. They're gorgeous. The handsets, amazing. Of course they are. They're Grand Seiko. They do those things. The, the case, the mid case, fucking perfect. It's too thick. And there's a, there's a problem with, I think there's a problem between, there's a discord between the case, the, the Zaratu polishing and these, that sort of, uh, grammar of design case. and the bracelet. I don't think, I don't think they match up well. In this case, it seems to me that the brushing on the case, the way they've done it and the, those really stark, sharp angles, uh, the, yeah, I don't think the bracelet matches the case here. And for the amount of money you're paying, I want it to be, I want there to be a little bit more accord.
Andrew I think the bracelet does. I think the problem is in the end link.
Everett You know, it's hard for me, it's hard for me to accept that Grand Seiko is releasing mainline everyday watches for $8,000. But given that, it's like, fix your shit, Grand Seiko. This doesn't, you can't have a bracelet that doesn't match the watch. And this bracelet doesn't match this watch. For 8,000 bucks, the bracelet needs to be designed with the watch, with the watch in mind. And that didn't happen here. So you can fuck off Grand Seiko. Not really. I love it. And I love them, but this is a, it's a mess for me. I think it's gorgeous. But I agree.
Andrew I think, I think it's an in link problem. I think this bracelet can work with a better, uh, not integrated to the watch, but a better design integration between the in link and the watch.
Everett They need to do something. Yeah. They need to do something. I'm not sure what it is, but great movement. 9S85 movement, which is phenomenal.
Andrew Yeah, I'm sure a really beautiful story about the color choices.
Everett It's strawberry pistachio. What's the? Is it strawberry? No, it's cherry. The Spumoni is chocolate. Strawberry, pistachio. And cherry, or is it strawberry? It's strawberry, OK? Well. There you go, I think Spumoni. I think Spumoni is actually cherry. It's Neapolitan that strawberry though, is that it? Is that it? I think that's it. I think we're out. When was the last time we made it through a list?
Andrew Yep. Chocolate, pistachio, and maraschino cherry. Or spumoni. You do know your sweets. I should never challenge you on that. Andrew, other things. What do you got? I got another thing. I got some cookbooks recently. Um, and one of them I got really because I'd eaten at the restaurant and I was like, anything that he's willing to share, I am here for. Uh, so the, the book is Momofuku. It is by chef David Chang, um, written with, uh, Peter Meehan, Meehan maybe? Meehan. I'm going to go with that. Um, It is, I should have brought it up, it is gorgeous. It is coffee table book worthy. So it's more than just a cookbook. It is like almost a memoir intertwined with his cookbook. There are recipes from each of his endeavors, his restaurant endeavors, and kind of stories intertwined with the recipes telling the story of how it got started. Um, how the restaurant got started, like the inspiration behind it, the struggles that they had keeping it afloat, the things that they did wrong. It was like a really interesting exercise in a chef's vulnerability. Like, no, we fucked this up. We did this poorly and we didn't respond quickly enough. Or like we knew we were doing it poorly, but we couldn't figure out how to do it better until we did. And then we figured it out and we, so we did better and you're right. We weren't good enough, but now we are. Um, really beautifully written. The photography is amazing. The quality of the book is terrific. Uh, so the title is Momofuku, um, which is the name of his, I don't know, multi-locationed restaurant. Um, I went to the one in Las Vegas. It's his noodle house. Uh, and it was phenomenal. It's one of the best meals that I've ever had. And it's so simple. It was just spicy ramen. But everything was perfect. So anyway, I get this cookbook and, uh, I started cooking things out of it. Everything I made out of it is absolutely phenomenal. And I gotta say, this is a great, this could be a coffee table book.
Everett Um, the cover is gorgeous.
Andrew Yeah. It's like a wood cut with a peach, maybe orange.
Everett Yeah. I think it's an orange, maybe.
Andrew $34 from Barnes & Noble. I think it's a little less than that on Amazon.
Everett You know, it might be a peach, isn't it? Meehan. Isn't Meehan the one behind Lucky Peach?
Andrew I think so. It looks more like a peach to me. Beautiful book, great writing, great recipes. Everything from it that I've made has been phenomenal. Some of it's like good, funny writing. There's one recipe in there for his ramen noodles. He like, he tells this long story about getting to the right ramen noodle. That's an endeavor, right? Finding the right ingredients for what you're trying to do. And right at the beginning of his recipe was like, here it is, but honestly, buy instant stuff. It's way easier. And he just tells you, yeah, it's not worth making this. Yeah. It's worth it. The restaurant at scale at home. No. So I love it. It is gorgeous book. All the food's great. And I have so many gallons of ramen broth in my freezer.
Everett Yeah. Isn't that funny when you make ramen broth, you got to make a ton of it.
Andrew It's silly not to. Yeah. So you make like Five gallons, and you need half a gallon.
Everett You know, I'm thinking the last time I made ramen broth, I thought, you know, I should get a canning set up the next time I do this. I don't know really what's involved in canning, but it seems like something people have been doing it for hundreds of years. I've got jars.
Andrew I have jars and a pressure cooker. I'm kind of scared of canning. Because of botulism? Because of botulism. And I know it's totally, it's, I'm too meticulous a person to actually be impacted by botulism.
Everett I bet botulism isn't as bad as you think. Well, people die.
Andrew Yeah, it's probably fine. Yeah. Just a little bit dead. Uh, yes, I've never canned. I mean, I have all the equipment. I just, uh, haven't, I've been a little scared, so I don't do it. Um, so Momofuku, Uh, and if you find yourself in Las Vegas, um, hit up, uh, Ooh, I don't remember the hotel it's in. It's in a new hotel on the South side of the strip. Um, hit that up. And then when you're done, go to the chandelier bar right outside of it and get yourself a Verbona cocktail and have a great night.
Everett Oh yeah. You told us about the Verbona cocktail. I have another thing, Andrew. Do me. I, as discussed, have recently got into fountain pens and Being the guy I am, I quickly bought one, nay, two, nay, six fountain pens, all in very short order. They range from MSRP. I'm going to give MSRP prices. I'm not going to state what I paid for any of these. They range from MSRP $40 to MSRP $880. Yeah, but you didn't pay that. I'm not going to say what I spent. I did, I've bought almost, actually of those, I've bought them all new. These are all new pens. And they really do, they really do run the gamut of like sort of entry level to sort of luxurious and like grails type of goat pens. These are all user functional writing pens. They're certainly fountain pens that are significantly more expensive than these precious metals or you know Arushi lacquered pens can go, you know. Eagle quills, like eagle feather quill. Into the many, many, many thousands of dollars. But really about a thousand dollars is the high end of tool, what I would call tool fountain pens. And so I'm kind of across, I've kind of purchased pens all the way across that gamut. Of these six pens, I like all of them. Andrew, I like all of them. There's none of them. There's none of them that I got. And I was like, Oh, this isn't, this isn't for me. Uh, genuinely, which is part of the thing we do, right? We, we spend so much time thinking and looking that we're like, okay, I'm going to buy a time. You know, you know, I'm going to like this. Um, One pen has stood out though. And if it was the most expensive pen, I probably wouldn't talk about it in this context. Uh, but it's not, it is not a cheap pen. And so I'm going to talk about a thing that some, some people listening will be like, Oh yeah, yeah, yeah. Other people listening will be like, you did, you spent, what?
Andrew You're listening to a watch podcast. So just bear that in mind as we move forward here. That's right.
Everett I bought a pen, so Japan has three, the big three fountain pen companies being Platinum, Sailor, and Pilot. Those are the big three fountain pen companies, much like Japan has the big three watch companies. And it's a pen from one of those three companies, which is Pilot, and I think Pilot sort of Pilot is sort of the, um, the Seiko of the Japanese watch world. This is actually an argument that's sailor, but nevermind for that. They make really good, nice precision shit. Um, it's not the most artistic, but it is really good precision shit. They have a pen and the reason this pen sort of popped onto my radar is that I had read this is a pen that Neil Gaiman famously uses and advocates. And I was like, that's interesting. It is the Pilot Custom 823 fountain pen. If you know anything about fountain pens, you will know what this pen is. It is what they call a vacuum fill, which is a bit of an oddity in the fountain pen world. Most fountain pens are either cartridge or converter pens or they're piston filled pens. So everybody knows Montblanc makes pens. Montblanc's pens are famously piston filled. Most sort of high end or medium end pens are cartridge or converter pens which is either a little ink filled pre-filled reservoir or a reservoir that you, by twisting, fill up. This is a vacuum-filled pen, so you actually fill up the barrel with this sort of unique system that you twist a plunger down and it creates a vacuum, and once it hits a breaking point, it breaks the vacuum and pulls ink up into the reservoir. It's really cool to watch. The Pilot Custom 823 is a really well-finished pen in fountain pens. The weird thing I've found about fountain pens is, unlike watches, I think by and large the fountain pen world does not give a shit about quality of finishes.
Andrew So watch people will micromanage hand polishing and... They'll take macro photos to see if there got to be any dust between the crystal and the dial during manufacturing.
Everett That does not exist in fountain pens, Andrew. And I'm not sure if it's because of the way they get used, that they're natural. I don't know. Looking at some of the pens that, you know, you will pay many hundreds of dollars for, you know, RPs of 250, $300. And you get these things, look at the finishes. And I'm like, you know, coming from watches, I'm like, what the fuck is this shit? That's really not true with the Pilot 823. This pen is tip to tail finished excellently. The nib on it is fantastic. If you are a person, here's why I'm talking about this. If you are a person that wants to try fountain pens and you think, you know what, I want maybe one really good fountain pen and I don't want to fuck around with doing the work and I don't want to fuck around with like starting low and kind of working my way up. I just want to get the one really good pen. This is the one. If you want one fountain pen and you want to spend a little bit of money, but you don't want to spend too much money, get a Pilot Custom 823. That's my advice as someone who's brand new. Now, I'm brand new to the fountain pen world, but I have seen numerous other people with significantly more experience than me say the same thing. It is just a pleasure to use every single aspect of using it. Filling it is great. The ink capacity is huge, so you're not filling it constantly. The nib feels fantastic. It writes beautifully. It is just tip to tail, well-finished, incredibly pleasurable to use, and it's not super expensive. So we're going to include a link in the show notes. If you're listening to this at any time after about a week from the date of publishing, that link might not be good, but you can find these on eBay, for something like 200 to 250 bucks. That's a lot, right, for a pen. But in terms of what you're getting, I think it's a steal. Retail on these I think is about $100 more than that. I think it's like 325 or 350, which to me feels like a huge jump. But if you can get one of these for under 250 bucks, and you want that one fountain pen and that doesn't feel like too much to you, this is the guy. This is the one.
Andrew Are you prepared to explain why left-handed people need special nibs? Because this looks like a pretty symmetrical nib to me.
Everett I don't know anything about a left-handed nib. What I do understand is that left-handed people You typically use dry inks, fast drying inks and blotter paper when they write. I probably wouldn't consider writing with a fountain pen if I was left-handed.
Andrew Because of the ink smudge.
Everett Yeah, I probably just wouldn't fuck with it. Sorry, Andrew.
Andrew No, this is not something that even remotely interests me. I'm just, I, I'm conversationally aware that there are left-handed nibs and whole user guides on left-handed, uh, fountain pen tips, tricks.
Everett You know, I was really resistant to getting into the fountain pen world for a long time. I've had a, a Koiko sport, if you know, fountain pens at all for about 10 years, I use it frequently. It's actually, all patina to hell. Uh, I throw it in my bag. I use it all the time. I filled it. I've gone through almost an entire bottle of ink in the last four or five years. Um, which doesn't seem super fast, but it's pretty fast. You know, that's a lot of ink. Yeah. Um, and, and so that is, uh, that was always enough. I was like, I'm not going to do this. I'm not going to do this. So I think unless you're like really into it, it's maybe not something that you need to get into it. Like, and I don't, I just sort of fell down the rabbit hole and I'm loving it. But if I was left-handed, I'm sure I would not.
Andrew Are you going to get like a, like a multi-tiered kind of podium, uh, for your, for your desk to display your inks and then like a cool display for all of your pens so that you can select your implement and
Everett I will not be doing that for fear of being heckled by my, by my office staff and my law partners.
Andrew You have a banner on the wall of your office that reads watches. Yeah. That's it. It just says watches.
Everett Yeah. No, I'm not going to get the, I'm not going to be like displaying this stuff. This is a, yeah, it's an, Things can go from hobby to affectation. The watches banner I think is absurd and that's why I like it. I will not be displaying my inks.
Andrew I'll be getting you a banner that says pens.
Everett Pens. Writing. Andrew, we've done all of the things we set out to do. I do believe. Is there anything that you'd like to say before we let these poor people go for the rest of their Thursday?
Andrew I'm a lot of things.
Everett I'm glad to hear it. Hey, I want to thank you guys. I want to thank you guys this Valentine's Day. I know we missed it, and I'm sorry. I want to thank you for joining us for this episode of 40 in 20 of the Watch Clicker podcast. Do me a favor and check us out at watchclicker.com. That's our website. We actually do very little to encourage the growth of that website besides talk to you once a week. So go check it out. There's great articles and reviews. They go up every week, sometimes multiple times a week. Uh, and, and it's really well done. You can also check us out on social media. That's at watch clicker and at 40 and 20 underscore watch clicker. That's where we post pictures and updates about the things that we're putting on the website. If you want to support us and oh boy, we hope you do. You can do that at patreon.com slash 40 and 20. Like that's how we keep the heat on in this place. Uh, we have software needs. We have. hardware needs, and the folks that are supporting us help us do that and keep the show running. Don't forget to tune back in next Thursday for another hour of watches, food, drinks, life, and other things we like.
Andrew Bye-bye.