With retirement, your hobby will undoubtedly take a much bigger part of your life. Where do you find the space to do it? If it is golf, perhaps you even need to buy your own golf course. Most of us require a more modest space. In this guest post, Brian A Schmidt, Publisher, PrefabMetalBuildingKits.com offers advice on The Perfect Building for Your Hobby.

Hobbies provide a special diversion from the every day humdrum of life. Young or old we are drawn to hobbies by our interest. Because our interests are so diverse, the number and types of hobbies are diverse as well.

As we grow older, we don’t necessarily become less active. We are active in different ways. We have more time to spend doing the things that we would have liked to do when we were young but were always too busy ‘living life’ or ‘making a living’.

Many of the things we are talking about are considered our hobbies.

We all have hobbies of one type or another. Maybe you collect stamps. Perhaps it’s coins that you collect. Travel is one hobby that many active people (young and old alike) enjoy. Some may simply watch sports on the Flat Screen as a pass-time.

Many of us could benefit from having a hobby building in which to ‘play’. It could be a small twelve foot by sixteen foot hobby building. It could be a large open hobby shop of one thousand, five thousand or ten thousand square feet or even more. Either way, the sooner we get our hobby building, the sooner the real fun can begin.

Imagine having a building in which you could share your fun and expertise with plenty of room to work and to entertain friends and visitors.

Hablon weaving loom

A hobby building can be used for any number of pastimes. Perhaps your special hobby building will be home to more than one of your hobbies. You can enjoy working on your model railroad hobby while your partner works on a weaving loom.

The first thing that may come to mind for a special building is a hobby that involves cars. Hobby car builders, car detailers, car mechanics, car customizers; yes a hobby building is perfect for any car enthusiast (including the collector). But hobby buildings are certainly not just for car enthusiasts.

Quilters for example could benefit by have a building for their hobby with large open spaces and large walls to hang the completed or semi-completed works on. Just think… all of your components could be laid out or readily available virtually at your fingertips.

Scrap-bookers would find that a nicely laid out building with lots of cupboards, drawers, bins and table space would be perfect for their hobby.

Painters through the ages have had their studios. It’s that special place where they could go to be creative and get away from the hustle and bustle of every day life. A specially designed building to suit the artist’s personality would be a boon to any artist. (And a small gallery in part of the building could prove to be lucrative!)

Woodworkers would of course greatly benefit from a building that removes the noise and dust from the home and places them in a special building designed for the intended purpose. Room for all of the equipment and tools and large open spaces for assembly… ah, perfect!

Gardeners too know what a hobby building can do for them. All of those garden tools neatly stored… Potting benches to work on in inclement weather… Winter storage for bulbs and seeds… Perhaps you would even have a little greenhouse attached.

Now here’s something that you may not have thought about. No matter what your hobby is, a purpose built structure can become a meeting place for you and your friends to get together more often; possibly even a drop-in center for other enthusiasts in your hobby. Having friends over and discussing your fascinating hobby can be a great pass-time in itself.

As I mentioned earlier, hobby buildings come in all sizes. But they can come in all shapes and materials as well. Smaller buildings can be wood framed or made from light gauge metal while larger buildings may be wood or steel framed.

Even metal buildings do not have to look like the typical “box building”. In fact there is one pre-engineered steel building that has been built for an amusement park that looks like the Titanic – complete with ice-berg! What look would suit your hobby and personality?

Many of the smaller buildings are available in kit form for the do-it-yourselfer. Anyone that has handyman type skills would be quite capable of assembling these types of hobby buildings.

Pre-fab metal building kits are fast becoming the building material of choice for larger buildings. They can be designed and engineered to have any look you like while being able to withstand hurricanes and earthquakes. These buildings are non-combustible as well. Oh yes… they also require much less maintenance than other building types.

Being non-combustible makes metal shop buildings ideal for hobbies that include soldering or welding – car related hobbies, metal artists, stained glass artists and the like.

Because metal buildings don’t rot, twist or crack and are unaffected by insects, there is much less maintenance on these building kits. That means more time for your hobby!

Let’s face it. We have worked hard all of our lives. We deserve to have a special place to enjoy our hobbies; a place where we can expand upon our talents; a place where we can invite our friends – because as you know, “There are no strangers, just friends that we have not yet met.”

Brian A Schmidt is author and publisher of Prefabmetalbuildingkits.com. His home is in a small community in Southwestern Ontario, Canada with his lovely wife Carol. Brian and Carol have three fantastic grown children and four wonderful small grandchildren. As the owner of a small construction company and construction manager for a few companies over the years he has had extensive experience in all sectors of the construction industry. These include commercial metal building kits, industrial buildings, residential buildings and institutional building. Gardening, woodworking in his hobby workshop and cruise vacationing take up his “free” time.

Post from: Senior Money Memos

Building for Your Hobby

Technorati Tags: building, Construction, hobby, metal shed

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We are not talking about dangerous driving wheels here, although you often read items flagging the Dangerous Presence of Senior Drivers on the Roads.

Driving may be a sensitive topic for seniors because their age sometimes affects their ability to drive. They are more likely to receive traffic tickets compared to young drivers. The two main reasons for this may be due to slower reflexes and poor eyesight.

In some ways, the wheels we are talking about here are even more dangerous. We are not directly referring to those hypnotic and addictive rotating wheels you will see in video slot machines at casinos, although that is getting closer.

As the Globe and Mail suggested there are Wheels of fate that are not always kind to seniors.

Subsidizing commercial bus fares to bring patrons to casinos – particularly during the times of the day when casinos are at their slowest – is common across Canada, with hundreds of trips daily. The Quebec government pays some of the highest bus subsidies of any province – more than $3.2-million over the past two fiscal years to transport patrons to its casinos, according to figures obtained under the Freedom of Information Act. Casinos du Québec spokesman Patrice Lavoie said the province lays out an average of $7 for each person brought to its casinos by bus.

Although such bus tours were long thought to be benign – retirement homes routinely shuttle residents to casinos as part of their entertainment – researchers now question whether these trips potentially set seniors up for future gambling problems.

Barry Hall, a professor of social work at the University of Calgary, says casino bus tours represent a shrewd marketing strategy that caters to the egos of lonely seniors, particularly women. “I have observed the buses … and I have watched very handsome young men come out and squire the elderly ladies who are absolutely enthralled that they are being treated as royalty.”

It is not only free or subsidized transport that is encouraging big losers to keep coming back.

NDP health critic Frances Gelinas says casinos know who the VIPs are and those at risk of becoming addicted, since they also tend to be the big losers who keep going back to casinos. “There is no link between the casinos and treatment. Casinos offer these people VIP cars, pick them up in black limousines and offer other enticing gifts,” she says. “Casinos know there will be people who have addiction problems and the government should do a better job of preventing and identifying problem gamblers before their lives are ruined.”

Gamblers are enticed by the manipulation of the casino environment once you step foot inside, Research shows the casino’s music, the pumping in of extra oxygen contributes to keeping people in their seats longer. Casino employees take whole courses on public relations to make the patron feel more welcome.

For example, the OLG has subtle messages, ‘if you don’t play, you can’t win,’ and people buy into that dream world. Casinos target every group out there, including seniors, by providing free transportation from seniors’ homes, to giving vouchers for free buffets, hotel stays and shows.

Some seniors are beginning to speak out. The P.E.I. Senior Citizens’ Federation is upset by these casino incentives.

They affirm that the government-owned casino in Charlottetown shouldn’t be encouraging people to gamble. It is appalling that Charlottetown’s government-owned casino gave nearly $100,000 in complimentary merchandise to its high rollers during the past year.

The bottom line on all this is staggering and extremely distressing. In Canada, gambling is a $13.67-billion business nationwide. Problem gamblers account for one-third of all revenues, studies show.

Post from: Senior Money Memos

Dangerous wheels for seniors

Technorati Tags: addiction, Gambling, gifts, seniors, Slot machine, VIPs

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A new campaign has been launched to urge boomers to realize the risks of gambling when nearing retirement.  The Responsible Gambling Council is the sponsor of the campaign that is warning baby boomers to give themselves a “reality check” and make sure that occasional gambling doesn’t morph into a serious problem as they head toward retirement.

About 2.1 per cent of Ontario adults in the 55-plus age group have a gambling problem, which is lower than in the general population, the council said. But the bulging size of the baby boom demographic makes it a concern.

“The scary thing is because we’ve got so many boomers who are reaching into their retirement years now, over the next 10 years or so we’re going to have a much larger number of boomers. Although the percentage will be the same, the actual numbers will increase,” Terry Finn, chair of the Responsible Gambling Council, explained.

The awareness program is financially supported by the Ontario Ministry of Health Promotion, which sets aside a small percentage of gross gambling revenues to help problem gamblers.

John Borody, CEO of the Addictions Foundation of Manitoba, says we won’t know for a few years whether recession-related changes occurring in society now will lead to more people addicted to gambling or alcohol.  Problem gamblers are often at the lower end of the income spectrum and probably have a lower-lever education, he said.  Borody is emphatic that gambling is not a way to make money.

If you’re going to gamble, you need to do it with money that you can afford to lose.  Those are the two messages we would tell people, never mind the economic situation…. The odds are not in your favour. The odds are in the favour of the house.

For reference, the Responsible Gambling Council was established in 1983 as the Canadian Foundation on Compulsive Gambling (CFCG), the country’s first non-profit responsible gambling organization. Founded by Tibor Barsony, a compulsive gambler and pioneer in the field, the Foundation succeeded in putting problem and compulsive gambling issues on the public agenda.

The Addictions Foundation of Manitoba (AFM) serves Manitoba through 23 offices.  Its Mission is to enhance the health of Manitobans by reducing the harm of alcohol, other drugs and gambling through leadership in education, prevention, rehabilitation and research.

Post from: Senior Money Memos

Gambling Is Not Part Of Retirement Planning

Technorati Tags: baby boomers, Gambling, Problem gambling

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An important part of retirement planning is to figure out exactly what you will do with your time.  Having a hobby that you enjoy may even mean that you never have any spare time. .. and that is not a bad problem to have.

If you do not have a hobby already, there are a large number of websites to give you ideas.  Here are just a sample:

• Retirement hobbies and leisure time activities
• Retirement Hobbies for a longer life
• Hobbies For Retirement Happiness
• Retirement with a purpose
• More Retirement Hobbies

Of course the best retirement hobbies are developed before retirement.  If you have an interest in lifelong learning, then taking a refresher course in some other language like Conversational Irish (Ghaeilge Labhartha) may be just the thing for you.

If your hobby is also your passion, then that is the best of all worlds.  There was an interesting article in the Vancouver Sun about 74 year-old Geoffrey Scudder who is a retired entomologist.

Courtesy of
The Nature Trust of British Columbia

This English-born Vancouver resident has about 80,000 bugs in his basement lab. He taught for more than 40 years at the University of British Columbia until his retirement a decade ago.  His lab is stacked from floor to ceiling with about 400 wooden boxes full of dried bugs.  This has been his main research centre since he retired in 1999 and lost his six-room lab facility at UBC. Though retired from teaching, Scudder continues to act as a driving force of science and public education in the field of biodiversity in this province.

The bulk of his worldwide specimen collection is already split between the Spencer Entomological Museum at UBC and The Canadian National Collection of Insects in Ottawa (his Canadian collection), the British Museum in London (European, British Isles and African specimens), the American Museum of Natural History in New York (North American) and the Bishop Museum in Hawaii (Pacific region).

It would almost seem that the word hobby is too small or lightweight to describe the continuation of Geoffrey Scudder’s life work.  However for many other retirees, their hobby can become equally involving and fulfilling.  If you know of others whose hobbies are so enriching or you have your own hobby that is somewhat unusual, then why not add a note in the comments.

Footnote: If you are interested in books on Hobbies, then why not visit the Hobbies section of the Money Bookstore.

Post from: Senior Money Memos

Retirement Planning – Hobbies

Technorati Tags: entomology, retirement planning

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