Omega Speedmaster Apollo 8 - a cautionary tale by a newbie

Hi All. My first post. Disclaimer. I talk about watches like a virgin talks about sex - with enthusiasm and ignorance - you have been warned and this maybe a good place to stop reading. I’ve always been both interested in and loved watches. My first proper watch was given to me when I was a kid by my father. It was a Seiko 6139 with the blue dial. Looked huge on my then ten year old wrist and I wore it everyday until I bought my first luxury watch in 1988. This was a Tudor Submariner and was the most expensive thing I’d ever bought excepting a house and my car. This too I wore everyday until I finally got round to buying an Omega Planet Ocean GMT. Sadly this opened the floodgates to buying more watches and like some form of horological crack addict, I’ve been adding them to the watch box ever since. Only the restraining force of my wife and the fact that I have finite resources for spending large sums on non essential items has kept me in check. I started by buying lots of affordable watches, only to discover that homage watches didn’t actually scratch the itch. Those went off to eBay, so some lucky person got to enjoy them for way less than I paid for them. However, it did enable me to start refining what I like and don’t like in watches. Sadly for me, the quality and design of a watch are more important than the cost. Even more unfortunately it turns out that with a few exceptions, if you want exceptional design and craftsmanship, it costs a lot of money. Hype watches sometimes tick the box, but luckily are often not what I’m looking for, even if I could afford to or find one for sale. I’m excluding some of the high end manufacturers that produce masterpieces that are unobtainable to the common man and I’m certainly that. I fell in love with the Apollo 8 Dark Side of the Moon when I first saw it on a Watch Advisor review. As a typical obsessive watch nerd, I searched the internet for reviews, videos and images for weeks. The quality of the engraving, the finishing, the materials used, the movement, the history, the whole concept. well, you get the idea. I thought a lot about buying one, but decided to get the new Moonwatch Sapphire Sandwich first. This I eventually did and then my thoughts turned back to the Apollo 8. My local AD didn’t stock the model, but promised to obtain one. They did, but it took several months. Eventually I got the call and went to pick it up. I loved it. The quality of the engraving, the finishing, the… well, you get the idea. Anyway, after wearing it for a couple of days the love wore off. The awful truth dawned. You can’t appreciate the quality of the engraving and the spectacular detail without using a loupe, but the worst thing was it proved difficult and often impossible to tell what time it was without studying the dial for several seconds to establish where the hands were. A beautiful watch as a piece of decoration. As a means to quickly tell the time… not so much. Into the watch box it went and there it stayed. Speedy Tuesday would come around and the Moonwatch would be taken out and worn, but the Apollo 8 was left on its cushion. This went on for quite some time until I decided that I carried a phone that could tell me the time accurately and if it took me five seconds to decipher the time on my watch, it was only in the steps of the finest horological tradition, where art and craftsmanship takes precedence over such low brow activities as knowing the actual time. so, when it’s not a Tuesday where I’ll wear the Apollo 8, I have other watches for such mundane tasks as letting me know what time it is, accurately and at a glance. Still great pieces of design, but without the beauty of the Apollo 8. So I relented. Yes, I wear a Moonwatch on a Tuesday, on the other days of the week it maybe a Pelagos (the big one obviously - I have large wrists), a Batman, a Mudmaster, a vintage Tudor Submariner or a host of other watches all of which have clear easy to read dials. But occasionally, I wear  the Apollo 8. In my mind I imagine I can see the detail with my naked eye (I can’t) or can tell the time at a glance (still no) but just enjoy having it on my wrist for the day anyway. Would I have bought this watch if I’d been able to borrow it for a week? No. Having bought it and lived with it for several months, I’m now glad I have it and appreciate it for what it is. I just don’t expect it to reveal  the time without putting up a fight first. Back now to annoying my wife by watching endless YouTube watch review videos and internet watch articles. I’m in total awe of those that give of their time and knowledge so generously to entertain and enlighten on this our hobby. If you made it to the end of this wall of text, thanks to you too for taking the time.