Great collection, quality over quantity 👌

May I ask why you won't get a Casio?

Edit: never mind, you answered that already! 🍻

My wrist is almost scratching the 8" mark, so I voted B. Yeah, there are still plenty of big watches available, but the trend is moving towards "the smaller the better", with some manufacturers even completely abandoning the 43 (and above) mm category, and instead just releasing smaller updates of their most popular watches. My very first automatic was a Seiko 5 with 37 mm, and it actually looked like a toy on my wrist. Over the years, I've noticed that 40 mm is my sweet spot. Everything below that higly depends on the lug-to-lug, but most of the time, it's just too small. The only exception to this rule are digital watches. For some reason, I don't mind the smaller size here.

I've had a very similar experience with a bunch of watches that are overly hyped in the watch community.

Bought a Timex Q a few months ago, since everyone and their grandma (even Watchfinder) was raving about how much of a bargain it is. Well, it arrived and.... it just didn't click. Yeah, from a distance it looks nice and the overall build quality is so-so, but for ~100€, I'd expected a little more. The icing on the cake, however, was when I TRIED to set the correct time, but it was simply not possible since the minute hand kept jumping around like a flea when I pushed the crown in. After 15 mins., I gave up, put it back in its box and returned it the next day.

I also heard a lot of praise about the Orient Mako II, so I bought the blue variant about half a year ago. I already own an Orient Envoy (nice dress watch with an open heart), and was very pleased with it. So I figured, a dive watch from Orient can't be that bad, right? Well, it can. Not only was the bezel misaligned, the dial also didn't live up to the hype. It looked like the cheapest Casio compared to my Envoy, also the indices aren't applied but rather just pressed, which is an absolute no-go for me (especially in this price range). So yeah, I sent it back after 2 days.

Last but not least, a watch that I ended up buying again, but in a slightly different variant, was the Casio G-Shock GA-2100 "CasiOak". Bought the black variant with the white indices first, but it looked so bland that I just didn't feel any joy from wearing it. Since I'm a fan of the 80s and love me some neon colors, I swapped it for a GA-2100VB. This one looked the part, but legibility was almost non-existent. Finally, I decided to get the metal variant GM-2100 and YES - that was it. The entire hands/indices/LCD layout just looks soooo much better in this full metal design. It wears like an entirely different watch, even though it's technically just another color variant of the base model!

In conclusion: Don't buy into hyped watches. What's good for one person might just be a nightmare for another. If a watch gets praise from the entire community and isn't all that expensive, just order it from sites with an easy and straightforward return policy and simply try it out. Better yet, if your local AD happens to sell the watch, simply go there and ask to see it. It's what I did with the PRX for example, and it ended up being my favorite watch. In the case of my Tsuyosa, I ordered it from Amazon and after playing around with it for a couple of hours, my verdict was that the hype was actually true and it really is a very nice watch for the price. If my experience would've been negative, I could've just returned the watch in a heartbeat!

My rotation varies from once a week to daily, depending on the watch but also (more importantly) the occasion. I wouldn't wear my Casio calculator watch at a wedding, but I would also look ridiculous wearing a dress piece at my good friend's bbq. 🍗🍖🥩🥓🌭🌽

I see your point, and while I have to agree it was just a prototype back then, the fact that Bulova re-issued it as a commercially available product means that the demand for it must've been high in the first place. It very much reminds me of the Seagull 1963, which initially was also just a prototype with 30 pieces specifically made for the chinese military.

In conclusion, while I don't necessarily buy a watch for its history or heritage, is nice to have 1-2 pieces that, apart from just looking good, also have an interesting story to tell!

Thanks for this amazing story, my hands would probably have been shaking so badly that I wouldn't have hit the screws at all! 😅

This reminds me of one of my scariest/most amazing encounters with high horology at work. I was casually walking by one of my co-workers, when all of a sudden, I stopped and turned around with my mouth open. I must've looked like a complete idiot at that monent, but I couldn't care less because what I had just seen was beyond all my expectations: This guy was casually wearing a Patek Philippe Nautilus on his left wrist!!! My co-worker, who was well aware of the fact that I'm into watches, just couldn't hide his grin while whispering, "Yup, it's a real one. Wanna touch it??" Still in shock, I mumbled something that faintly sounded like yes, while my shaking and sweating hands grabbed what was probably the most expensive piece of jewelry I've ever held in my hands: A beautiful Nautilus with a dark blue dial, its tiny hands glistening in the bright sunlight that was shining through our office window. While I worked hard not to faint at any given moment, my colleague told me the reference number and the little backstory as to why IN THE WORLD he owns a Nautilus (it's actually his father's or something), but tbh I can't remember a single word he said, since at that very brief moment in time, I was carrying a ~$100,000 timepiece in my hands and it felt like I had just found the freakin' holy grail!! It's situations like this or your Rolex story, that just make our hobby so worthwhile! 🙏

If you want an almost identical watch that's just ever so slightly thicker but offers AMAZING backlight for roughly the same price, the A168 is the one you should get!