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The Grey NATO – 395 – Slack Crew & A 2026 [Part 5]

Published on Thu, 15 Oct 2026 06:00:00 -0400

Synopsis

In this episode of The Grey NATO, hosts Jason Heaton and James Stacey record on Canadian Thanksgiving, discussing their recent activities including Jason's DIY wooden tailgate project for his Land Rover and James winterizing his Jeep and cottage. The pair preview their upcoming trip to New York Watch Week, including their Friday panel discussion on titanium watches with Marathon and Blake Buettner.

The main segment features "Slack Crew Q&A," where they answer text-based questions from their supporter community. Topics range from hypothetical scenarios (a world where watches are illegal, understanding of space-time) to practical recommendations (affordable yellow dial watches, Irish and Japanese whiskies). They discuss their evolving appreciation for titanium watches, whiskey preferences including favorites like Yamazaki Smokey Batch and various Irish options, and the design process behind their collaborative watch projects with CWC and Hodinkee. The episode concludes with final notes: Jason recommends Ben Macintyre's audiobook "The Spy and the Traitor" about Cold War espionage, while James shares his discovery of the improved Apple Reminders app for task management.

Show Notes

Transcript

Speaker
Jason Heaton Hello and welcome to another episode of the Grey NATO, a loose discussion of travel, adventure, diving, driving, gear, and most certainly watches. This is episode 395, and it's proudly brought to you by the always growing TGN supporter crew. We thank you all so much for your continued support. And if you'd like to support the show, please visit thegrainado.com for more details. My name is Jason Heaton, and I'm joined as ever by my friend and co-host, James Stacey. James, happy Monday morning to you.
Jason Heaton Hey, thank you so much, and happy Canadian Thanksgiving
James Stacey to you. Yes, indeed. We're recording
Jason Heaton a day early because I'm heading to New York tomorrow,
James Stacey but today's a holiday, I guess in the States as well. Yeah. Um, but for different reasons. Uh we've got uh our Thanksgiving instead of the end of November like yours. It's a smaller affair in Canada, but you know, people still take uh try and take the Monday off. It's not really uh a hundred percent sort of uptake on that, but uh yeah, it was a good
Jason Heaton I uh did a little DIY project that I put a couple of photos up on Instagram. Uh I was quite pleased with myself. I I I made a uh a wooden tailgate for the Land Rover. I've been plotting that for a while. So I it was actually um I look I am I am far from a woodworker or carpenter um so even the smallest triumphs are are are big for me and and this was a this was a fun one. It was uh pretty easy to do. I'd I just you know bought some some maple and had a some leftover kind of high quality plywood from a different project and uh kind of piece them together and and bought I had the hardware that I got from kind of the Land Rover supply shop uh in Vermont and um because I needed the hinges and the kind of the the latches and stuff like that but then I didn't pony up the thousand dollars for like an official, you know, metal tailgate, so I figured I'd build it out of wood and it it turned out really well. So this morning after breakfast I ran out and put a second coat of spar varnish on it. I'm just gonna I'm not staining it. I'm just gonna you know varnish the heck out of it with a few coats for some weather resistance. And uh yeah it's uh quite pleased with it. it turned out really well.
James Stacey That's great man. Yeah it's it's uh it's an awfully nice feeling when you sent it to me. I thought it just suited the vehicle so nicely. I thought the latch detail was very cool and the chain retention with the the kind of heat shrink you that you did with the piece of tubing. And I thought all of it it just kinda suited the vehicle quite nicely. So that's that's awesome.
Jason Heaton Yeah, I think that was the hardest the hardest part of it was uh was getting the um the chain that that kinda hold the tailgate up um threaded through that's actually bicycle inner tube. So it's not heat shrunk. It's actually a it's such a tight fit.
James Stacey Oh my goodness. That I you know, it's
Jason Heaton like pushing a chain through an inner tube was was no small feat and I ended up threading some or dropping some paracord through the inner tube first, tying it to the chain and then kind of trying to pull it through and push it through and but uh that keeps it from rattling. So it's weird effort. Yeah.
James Stacey Yeah we uh we uh have you know uh slept the jeep for the winter season so I had to get up to the cottage on the weekend to winterize the cottage, which is fine. It's a very easy process the way that we have it set up. And then got the Jeep
James Stacey going and drove it down to Richmond Hill,
James Stacey did a little tidy up, checked
James Stacey everything over, uh, you know, put a bunch
James Stacey of fuel stabilizer in it and then took it down to my folks where it's gonna spend the winter uh
Jason Heaton like it did last year. And uh and
James Stacey yeah, it was we I I'm such a sucker for this because it happens to be every time. But you know, it's the last drive of the season, so I take the the panels off the roof so I can and I'm I'm driving down alone. Sarah's going with our son in in the van um to family Thanksgiving. And like in Richmond Hill, it was a beautiful you, know, high sixties sort of afternoon.
Jason Heaton Yeah. Um, I'd cleaned, I'd, you know, tidied
James Stacey up the Jeep and and topped off some fluids and that's it was and it was like sunny and blue skies. And I was like, oh, this is gonna be a great drive. And I drive like 20 minutes and it's just lashing rain. And I'm on like a very very active I'm on the four oh nine. I'm on like a four hundred series highway
James Stacey um trying to get just around
James Stacey the airport. Yeah. and I was like, am I gonna have to pull over under a bridge? And then luckily the ways took me off onto uh Martin Grove and and I was able to jump out and throw the panels back on. I didn't end up getting very wet because I was moving through the fast like I was going a hundred and fifteen.
Jason Heaton Yeah. Uh through the heaviest
James Stacey part of the rain, and then once I got the panels on, it rained for the
James Stacey next two hours on the driveover.
Jason Heaton Wow. So it was it was uh
James Stacey so I got a free car wash, yeah. It was one of those ones where like it was raining hard enough that you can't hear. I had to shut the radio off. I couldn't hear the CVC, um, or my podcast. Uh, but yeah, got and then got got to my folks and it was kind of nice again, like kind of gray, but not raining or whatever. So wow. But yeah, had to had to retire the Jeep. Uh and then otherwise, man, like, you know, Canadian Thanksgiving here. So that's, you know, it's it adds some busyness to the week and closing the cottage. And then we're closing Hoodinky magazine uh this past week and then into tomorrow. And then we also, you know, prepping for New York watch week.
Jason Heaton Yeah. Uh so uh weirdly all
James Stacey sorts of different sorts of tasks, but I realized today I realized today I hadn't packed like even thought about packing.
Jason Heaton Yeah. So I had to go through the whole plane and luckily
James Stacey it's a pretty casual week. I don't I don't think I'm gonna I'm not gonna be down there in a suit.
Jason Heaton Yeah. And uh and that sort of thing.
James Stacey Um I'm debuting a new uh sort of partially formal jacket, what I sent to you earlier.
Jason Heaton Yeah, it looks like it's a I'll save my review once
James Stacey I've had a chance to wear it around, but I'm quite excited about that. Um not not quite a suit jacket or a blazer, but you know not quite a chorecoat either. It's something I found in the middle. we'll get to that on a future episode..
Jason Heaton Yeah But yeah, I'm partially packed.
James Stacey I've got my packing table out and it's covered and stuff. So I'll get to that. And uh and then Sarah and I are actually going this evening to see uh Medium Build, who I've talked about on the show before. Oh,
Jason Heaton sure. He's doing a concert uh downtown
James Stacey tonight. Uh so we're gonna go check out uh medium build. Uh so I'll I'll get home and then you know get a few hours sleep and head early to the airport to get get down to New York to kick off a very busy week in the city, which of course includes on Friday, which is the sixteenth at five PM. It starts a few minutes later, but please be there at five, uh so we can start on time. Uh we have our marathon titanium panel. I'm very excited about this. I think my I I figure now this w when this episode comes out, you'll only have 24 hours. So we can share um that we are doing the chat with both Harrison McCrindle from Marathon, uh, a good buddy of ours uh is is very much a guy in the know at the brand and and their product level and and and that sort of stuff. And if you're at uh the Toronto show, there's a good chance you spoke to him. Or if you've been really to any of the shows they go to, the wind ups, he does a lot of those as well. And then our good buddy uh Blake Bettner will be our fourth on the panel. I'm very excited about this. I think it's gonna be a really good crew. That's at five PM on the Friday, so it's a nice way to kick off wind up while also ending, you know, whether it's watch time or indies or whatever else you're doing in the city, come out Friday night for that. It's gonna be a really good time. It'll be about an hour and uh we're really, really excited to do it with uh with Marathon. It's just gonna be fun chat.
Jason Heaton Yeah, that should be great. I haven't seen Blake in years. I think it's probably it was probably a w a previous wind up that I think we were on a panel or had him sitting with us for a while and uh yeah, it's it'll be good to see him and and see you again after just a few weeks and uh yeah it's funny. It's ca call it the titanium panel. It reminds me of, you know, like didn't Ford do a series of cars where they like it was a certain trim level where they called they put the the titanium badge on the back. This is like
James Stacey T GN titanium. Yeah. I'm
Jason Heaton not sure there was any titanium in those things.
James Stacey I could be wrong. Maybe there was some titanium trim or something like that. I'm not sure. Looking forward to that. I think it's gonna be a a really great uh week in the city. I'm there uh tomorrow through uh the Saturday. We have a great uh uh we have a great Hodinkee hap hour happy hour planned. We have a great Hodinkee happy hour planned, which currently um I think we've now set a record. We expanded the number of people who could come because Grata can hold a lot of people. And we now have more than double that number in the wait list.
Jason Heaton Wow. Wow. So I'm
James Stacey I don't know I don't know where to find a spot or a budget for like f three hundred to four
James Stacey hundred people. Yeah. I
Jason Heaton just like I don't know how to pay for that. Yeah.
James Stacey This might have to be like uh Hodinkee Happy Hour brought to you buy uh I don't know the Amex Centurion or something like that. We might have to find a sponsor. You know, I I have a budget that we try and stick to. Wow. And Lord knows I'm not great at doing that either. Um but it's gonna be a really fun night and the nice thing about the marathon titanium panel is there's no RSVP needed. We've been assured by the folks at Windup that uh there's plenty of room for everybody, so let's test that theory. I'd love to see a big crowd, and the folks at wind up were kind enough to open the bar, so we're not even paying for that. I've got to be fully up front. If you want to come in and grab a beer or or whatever they've got, uh please do. Uh it is on uh the team from WindUp. They've always been incredible kind of partners uh with us and uh they offered it and of course we're not gonna say no. So come out have a beer on on wind up chat titanium with us. There's gonna be a really fun QA at the end and that'll be sort of the end of my working schedule for the week and I hope to do a nice pass of wind up Saturday. Uh I hear it's quite busy, so who knows? Maybe I won't get in. And then uh I'm gonna whisk myself home and spend Sunday with the family before uh a busy week of stuff I can't talk about, but it's actually happening in Toronto for uh for Hodenke, so some good stuff coming out. But we'll see that uh we'll see the fruits of that week in the spring of uh of twenty seven.
Jason Heaton So it's you know, it's funny how the seasons go.
James Stacey Uh you you were saying it was quite warm for you guys this weekend 'cause it was cooler here. It's getting cool
James Stacey here. Yeah, when you talked about closing up the cabin, that's
Jason Heaton such an omen of of what's to come, you know, it's sort of a shrine at the end of the season, but it did not feel like that this weekend. We had a very hot record setting weekend. It was I think it hit ninety Fahrenheit both days, um, which set records here. Yeah, crazy. And uh it was hot and very dry and very windy, which with all the leaves blowing around, it just it felt just downright parched. Um wasn't wasn't a pleasant heat. You know, it wasn't didn't feel like a good sultry summer day when you want to go jump in the lake. Although um we had booked uh Christy and I had booked a a sauna session for last night. We know we we used to do that quite a bit last year, like over the winter and fall. And fall was a October was always a great time to do it last year because it was, you know, it's cool, you're in the sauna. These are eighty-minute sauna sessions, so you go in for 10-15 minutes, you come out, it's right on the shore of a lake, so then you go jump in the water, which is refreshingly cool. it's just kind of this perfect in-between season for that. Well, you know, last night was upper eighties still at six PM when we went. And you know, it's two. Two types
James Stacey of sauna. Hardly a diff hardly a difference between
Jason Heaton what's inside and what's outside the sauna. But it it ended up feeling really great. Um the the the water was really chilly in the lake and it just kinda felt good to to kind of come out of the hundred and eighty degree sauna, walk down to the lake, get in, you know, flop around in there for five minutes, then you're cooled off and go back in. So it was it was nice. I I I I like sauna season and uh so it was a good kind of kickoff even though it was so hot.
James Stacey for me, but before that, how about a quick little wrist check? We're wearing stuff in kind of in the same vibe, maybe maybe inspired by next Friday's uh event.
Jason Heaton Yeah, definitely. Um I've got the FXD and and that probably will be what makes the trip to New York. You know, we're we we're kind of trying to come proper for our discussion. Um and uh the FXD fits the bill. It's that or I I've got the uh Arcan instrumentum and I've got the um of course the CWN one in titanium as well as this one. So I'll have to make a game day call as to which one makes the trip, but uh odds are in favor of uh of the FXD.
James Stacey Nice. Yeah, good stuff. All right. Well, I'm wearing my aerospace. Uh I spent the last probably week, week and a half wearing the Algin stealth. Um, which I I think is now and like I'm not the one that really necessarily suggested this. I I saw it a bunch in the comments on the story that I or the the you know uh Instagram post that I made about it.
Jason Heaton Yeah it it is kind of like you can find
James Stacey these in a bunch of different versions for under $200. And like in many ways it it doesn't replicate all of the fanciness
James Stacey of an aerospace. Yeah. But it definitely does
James Stacey a similar thing. It's a silly weird thing. But if you if yeah to the people in the comments, including one guy who went out and bought one, you know, did don't want to pony up the two or three grand. And this actually comes to a question we're gonna get to in just a couple of minutes.
Jason Heaton Yeah. But you don't want to pony up the two plus
James Stacey thousand dollars for an aerospace? Yeah.
James Stacey I don't know. These are compelling. I think they
James Stacey scratch a similar, a similar itch and not in a way that a bunch of the other like I don't think you can go get a Maverick XL and have it feel like a forty
James Stacey millimeter aerospace,
James Stacey despite the fact that they use the same movement or the you know the Bell and Ross doesn't have the same appeal. But these kind of really zone in on like a kind of a tribute to the same idea, if you will, while also being different enough that they don't feel like they were going, we're just gonna make an aerospace.
Jason Heaton Yeah. Yeah. I'm wearing my aerospace.
James Stacey I've got it on the Ming. It's almost certainly the w one of the watches coming with me. There's a couple I want to bring. Someone asked to see one, uh a specific watch, so I'll bring that with me. So I'll have a uh uh maybe one or two in the pockets as I normally do at the uh at the Hodinkee happy hour and and if you catch me at at wind up and that sort of thing. So should be good. Looking forward to it. But yeah, I I just I wear the aerospace a lot.
Jason Heaton Yeah. Kind of like you in the FXD. Yeah. For good reason. Yeah. I mean titanium.
James Stacey Back over ten years of the show, I kinda
James Stacey was lukewarm on. Mm-hmm. Like if a watch was titanium or
James Stacey not, it I I wouldn't be like, Oh, that's the version for me.
Jason Heaton Yeah. And that's really tr really changed for me. Yeah. Yeah. Are we getting old and just weak and we need lighter weight on our wrist or something?
James Stacey I guess maybe I think for me it's it's literally I'm I I've spent the majority
James Stacey of my time in the watch world in a zone where we were just praising mid-century steel sport watches from Rolex or other brands, Doxa, et cetera.
Jason Heaton Mm-hmm. Uh, you know, from fifty
James Stacey eight, fifty nine to seventy, something like that. And these all feel different because they weigh less, because they're gray, because they're not shiny.
Jason Heaton Yeah. And I blame I think I probably blame
James Stacey the Pelagos. Yeah. Yeah. That was
Jason Heaton a game changer for sure. Well and
James Stacey I think it kind of like I'm sure we'll get into this
James Stacey in the in the talk, but I think it also kind of formed like a sorting line. You're
James Stacey either a Pelagos guy or a Black Bay guy.
Jason Heaton Mm-hmm. And I think I've I naturally just
James Stacey fell into I th I thought that the Pelagos that like you I think you coined the term the apex predator of dive watches when it came out.
James Stacey I think it it's still like that kind of appealed
James Stacey to me more than another watch of the black base great, you can't
James Stacey fault it. But it wasn't you
James Stacey know, it wasn't the first one to go, oh, we're gonna refer
James Stacey to our history. Right. Right?
James Stacey We'd already had the long jeans. We'd already had the diver sixty five. Both great watches. Both watches I've had.
Jason Heaton Yeah. Yeah. There's maybe it's
James Stacey a novelty thing. Maybe it's the fact that I think we're now what 10 months into 2026 and? the most interesting thing I've experienced this year in my zone of watches, not in the greater world of watches, but like in my zone, is the Ming bracelet.
Jason Heaton Mm-hmm. It's just it remains
James Stacey a magic trick. It doesn't wear off, it's super
James Stacey comfortable.. I love it So, anyways,
James Stacey that's a that that's a lot for wrist check. Little added taste, little uh uh sample of what you'll get a T titanium panel with marathon.
Jason Heaton Yeah, but let's jump into Slack Crew A.
James Stacey So, of course it is my burden to describe what this idea is. This would be like probably the 10th or 12th time I've done this. This is the fifth outing of the crew and a for 2026. Normally we do QA's
James Stacey where uh folks in the Slack channel
James Stacey and in the supporter crew send in audio files to the TGN email, thegranado at gmail.com, and then we put those into a show. It kind of sounds like a call-in show. These days we're kind of only doing those when we have enough to record. I think we actually just hit that line, so we should have another QA soon.
James Stacey But we figured we would flip
James Stacey that on its head and have the Slack crew. So these are folks who are in for at least five dollars a month to support the show? Do a text-based thread in the Slack asking questions. We kind of we're not even really picking them, we're just doing as many as we can in a year. So when we don't have a natural episode or say when we're gonna do an episode that's gonna come out the same week as New York Watch Week, which means next week we'll have more to share uh about that experience, this is a good timing for crew and a. So these are text questions from within the Slack crew, and it kind of gives you an idea what's going on in their crazy minds and what folks are talking about in the Slack. So if you're interested, you can always check out more at thegranado.com to support the show. It's five bucks a month, and it helps Jason and I do all sorts of fun stuff, including, you know, hangouts and chats with Marathon and the rest of it. So with that, uh let's get into this first one from Milltime. Shout out Milltime. A law has been passed that watches are illegal. Owning a watch is banned. Do you surrender your watches willingly or lead a horological revolt? What watch do you secretly wear in private?
Jason Heaton This is fun. This is uh Yeah. Yeah.
James Stacey Horological fascism. Yeah. Yeah.
Jason Heaton Yeah. it really kind of uh I I was seeing the plot sort of you know unfolding in my brain about this uh and and which watch I would I would keep and this did your
James Stacey what what movie did your brain or movie or book did your brain attach this to? Is it like a nineteen eighty four
Jason Heaton can't be reading? Sort of vain. What was I thinking? Yeah, like um well okay, I'll I'll just jump into my answer. I mean I I I think you know, as um on the surface, I'm going to I'll I'll surrender all but one of my watches willingly, just to kind of, you know, kind of stay stay under under cover, sort of um off the radar so to speak. But I'm gonna keep one that I will wear secretly in private and it's going to be my uh my nineteen fifty four Brightling Navitimer. And I feel like this is like one of those dystopian plots where there's gonna be an underground sort of cadre of people that meet in secret. Um you know, lots of code words and you know, dark basements and back rooms and things where we're sort of plotting the the overthrow. Um and I just felt like the Nava timer would be this sort of I don't know, like a talisman from the the golden era, you know, something that that it's almost like a something you sort of pull out it privately and kind of show somebody, you know, pull it out of my pocket or pull back my sleeve and show to the other revolutionaries, and it sort of becomes this sort of rallying point or or emblem of the of the revolution. Um you know, whether or not that makes me the the leader of the revolution, I won't I won't go there. I that you know, leave that up to the people. But uh it felt like something contraband should be something from an earlier, earlier era. Um, almost like, you know, like I don't know, I haven't seen this movie in ages, but you know, it's sort of the planet of the apes thing where he he's walking the beach and there's the remnants of the Statue of Liberty kind of poking out of the sand or something, you know, this kind of
James Stacey Yeah, that's fun. I I like that idea. Keeping one's not gonna work for me.
Jason Heaton I don't think. You're gonna keep them all.
James Stacey No, I sorry. I think what I would do is I would I would turn some
Jason Heaton over, but in the process of like filling
James Stacey out what I assume would be forms and paperworks, regimes love those things, I would stage a a robbery. Uh so it's I you know, uh it turns out I lost ten or twelve that got stolen. Yeah. So th they're out on the market. You guys gotta find them, but they're gone now, right? The I'm sorry. I thought they were here. I went to the to the safe and uh they're gone, right? We'd work out the details later. Um, and
James Stacey then I think uh you know my mind went to V for
James Stacey Vendetta. Oh sure, which I watched recently with my daughters, and in that movie, uh Stephen Fry plays
James Stacey Dietrich, mm-hmm and uh Dietrich has many
James Stacey proclivities, many of which are illegal in that sense, and he's hiding them.
Jason Heaton Yeah. Um and uh and when
James Stacey he starts to spend more time with Natalie Portman's character, he opens up to her because she's on the path of fighting slash breaking a lot of laws and shows her this room, this hidden room in his house. It's like a lounge and it's full of all these things that aren't allowed anymore. Uh artwork and you know and and other uh paraphernalia we'll say. Um I I would be the I would be like Dietrich.
Jason Heaton Yeah. Uh so I I would have a hidden room
James Stacey in my home where I could maybe have a compatriot over we could enjoy our watches uh safely and uh and then the rest would be part of like an underground network. I wouldn't revolt. Um I would I would uh on the outward I would comply and I would simply live a a double life where I could still appreciate, maybe even collect, maybe even, you know, preserve the knowledge of watches and watch
James Stacey making. Yeah. Um, knowing that,
James Stacey you know, regimes, especially those that burn the brightest, don't always last the longest.
Jason Heaton Right. Um and then you know, eventually I
James Stacey would I would plan to pass this along to the next generation uh and with the hopes of it eventually, you know, coming out of the dark
Jason Heaton times. I like it. I like it. All right. And I
James Stacey you know, he was asking what watch would you s you know, it would be it would be all of as many as I could keep.
Jason Heaton Yeah. Yeah. You know, I'd I'd I'd have
James Stacey the I'd have the aerospace. I'd have uh I'd ha you know, I'd I'd try I'd try and think of it a little bit like a Noah's Ark scenario. Right? Like what could I save that? You know, I'd need one aerospace, I'd need one Rolex, I'd need
Jason Heaton one tutor, I'd need a great Seiko,
James Stacey I'd need I'd need an example of all the different flora and font
Jason Heaton Yeah. So I it might actually mean that I get
James Stacey more. Right? Right. I might I like if I knew this was on the horizon, I might start buying. On
Jason Heaton the black market. Right. Yeah. Sure. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I like this. And
James Stacey then theoretically it would mean they'd be in in some cycles, in some worlds, like if you remember in Blade Runner 2049, the little wooden sculpture,
Jason Heaton the wood was worth a fortune, right? So
James Stacey like there's a world in which there is this bartering system that might come from these objects in the future. But uh yeah, thanks so much for that one, Mill time. That was a lot of fun.
Jason Heaton Uh let's move on to one from uh Nick Hascomb, uh who says there's been there's been lots of great discussion about appreciating the object aside from my ownership being a part of it, which I have found convicting and helpful. The tougher to overcome for me lately have been the objects that were in scope but due to market hype are now out of reach again. Then he says, I finally had the extra garage spot and funds to buy the 997 Carrera S, but in the 14 months they jumped up another twenty thousand dollars, firmly out of range for what he's willing to spend. I've also really felt this with the realities of home ownership feeling impossible for my wife and I, so it's not just the watches and cars. Have either of you experienced similar jumps or shifts that stung a little more and took more discipline to find contentment at previous goal as previous goals crept past what you were planning for. Interesting uh question. I sort of understand this. Um sympathize to a certain degree, but but uh I don't know. I have some some different thoughts. What about you? How do you feel about this?
James Stacey Yeah, I I would I would assume that Nick and I are of a similar age.
Jason Heaton Yeah. Um, because I've experienced
James Stacey this since since I was 20. Mm-hmm. Um, I've experienced it with places that were that felt right and then got popular and and they weren't the same anymore. Could be a restaurant, could be a a concert hall, could be, you know, a you know, a social space of some sort. I've experienced it with um activities, uh hikes that weren't popular and became popular, or you know, major you know, let's say you want to do Whitney. There was a time when it was less competitive than it might be to get a bid now.
Jason Heaton Yeah. Right? Yeah. So I've experienced that
James Stacey for sure. Cars, absolutely. This has happened to me several times in the last twenty years where I dragged my feet on something and they got popular again. It's probably happening to me right now with Z three M. Like as we
James Stacey speak. Yeah. Yeah. I'm probably getting priced
James Stacey out of again, kind of it's not that I'm saying that the Z3M isn't gonna be worth or or even that Nick is saying that the a 997S isn't worth the extra 20, it's not worth it to him.
Jason Heaton Right. So you're kind of priced out just based
James Stacey on the philosophy of of how you're valuing what you might be buying. And man, the house thing for sure. I owned a house in Hamilton. I owned a condo in Vancouver. And then coming back to one of the more expensive cities in Canada. I just like I can't I'm not convinced that that this is gonna be great a great way to spend money. Yeah.
Jason Heaton And it's just the the monthly sum of a of
James Stacey of that scenario versus renting just doesn't make sense anymore. I would prefer to own a house. For sure. But yeah, I've I I f I feel uh very much uh Nick Nick what you're saying for sure. This definitely happened for watches. I sold my 144 SD a watch I I wish had kept.
Jason Heaton Yeah. Um my one four
James Stacey four GMT and they are like three to four X what I sold mine for now. So I wouldn't I wouldn't buy one for four or five thousand dollars.
Jason Heaton Yeah, I I this is definitely a phenomenon. I and I think, you know, you're right to point out the you know p potential symmetry in your generations. Um, you know, the it's it's all it's been kind of a topic in the news for the past few years about how just, you know millennials and younger are just being you know just been priced out of kind of the home ownership thing and it's just uh it's becoming less of a reality or less of a goal and that that um it's just something I I didn't experience and I feel fortunate for that but also feel feel bad for for those uh younger than me that that are won't get that same experience. Um in terms of my own kind of take on this, um, you know, I I think I'm such a proponent of that phrase that we use a lot, you know, appreciating something without having to own it. Um, that said, you know, there was a time when, and that this is certainly a what they call a first-world problem, or it's kind of a a silly, silly example, but um I I can remember back in you know, the nineties, early two thousands when I was starting to make some kind of decent money, kind of in more corporate work that I was doing at the time, when uh you know even like a Porsche nine eleven was was still pretty affordable, like in terms of kind of in in the
James Stacey yeah, for sure. in the general
Jason Heaton uh you know price category that I could afford. I don't remember what they were back then, but you know, uh under twenty thousand dollars, you know, for for something from, you know, the eighties, like you know, 911 SC or or just kind of a base 911 or something from from the 80s and 90s. I mean they were just they were around and they weren't that expensive. And you know now it's just it's it's absurd even thing. I would I wouldn't even think about it. Um same with I I guess uh I'm I'm in a parallel vein in terms of you know watches four digit Rolexes I. you know, I I had a a 1675 GMT master kind of earlier on in my watch collecting days that I guess I maybe I underappreciated or I was in kind of a a flipping mode back then and I got rid of that and I kind of wish I'd held onto it. I guess that's more a little different than the question, but it's it's more regret that, you know, now um I've just kind of moved beyond that point where I want to spend the kind of money that it would take to buy a watch like that anymore. And I think for me, it's it's less about price inaccessibility these days than it is just kind of moving on from a a a an accumulation standpoint and a desire to have less. And I think maybe that's also a a generation thing. You know, I'm I'm in my mid-50s and it's it's just a different stage of life than I was when I was between, you know, 35 and 50, where it was like, oh, I you know, I I I kind of want to collect things and I wanna kind of explore new things and and own things and whatever. And I think I've I've kind of just crested that that uh apex and I'm just sort of on the not on the downside that sounds pessimistic, but I I I'm just kind of in the mode of like wanting less. And so I think that is what's drives my my desire to not have as much and and kind of be able to appreciate things. That said, I mean some things still sort of, you know, tweak my my interest to whether it's that titanium hand heart that popped up on BST that someone thankfully bought um or you know a
James Stacey cool or a paner eye, you know. I've I saw
Jason Heaton radiomere that was fairly affordable that I was trying to scheme a little bit, thinking like, could I make that happen
James Stacey I I feel you, Nick, for sure. It's uh I may and I could be dead wrong. maybe maybe you're uh younger than me, which I think means you've got it even harder. Uh you know, I at least had a crack at building the equity of
James Stacey a couple homes. Mm-hmm. And you know, that turned
James Stacey into more of a retirement option than a owning another house option. Uh maybe someday I'll I'll go back the other route. Uh but yeah I, I uh feel it for sure. Thanks for that question. Next up we've got one from Matthew Berth who asks, what are your top
James Stacey picks for an affordable yellow dial summer
James Stacey watch? Well, how about we do an affordable
James Stacey yellow dial fall watch? I
Jason Heaton was thinking maybe Matthew's based in Australia and he's just coming into summer. Yeah.
James Stacey yeah, yeah. We waited on this. Matthew Berth from Perth.
Jason Heaton Yeah. But I I've got
James Stacey a I've got a list. what what kind of hit yours? Yeah,
Jason Heaton I've got a list as well. Um kind of range. What's your cheapest? The cheapest. Okay, so um well, I guess it's a toss up, but I it's probably the SCURFA Diver one yellow dial.
James Stacey Okay. Um he's got one with a kind of a steel
Jason Heaton or I guess but it's probably aluminum, but a a silver bezel that that's pretty sharp and scurfer does a nice job with aluminum and or sort of.
James Stacey And they do the treasure seeker as well, which I think is just a bit more.
Jason Heaton Yeah. And then the other one too was um a affordable one is uh the Clements Monroe in Highland Amber. So the Monroe is is Tom Clements' uh take on a field watch. Um I actually have the white dial version, and it's just such a a great little classic looking watch with a cool handset. Um and his Highland Amber um is just a a lovely warm shade of yellow uh that that I really really love and uh I think that'd make a great uh summer watch as well if you don't want to go strictly uh dive watch. 'Cause I think I think he does a an amber uh yellow dial diver as well. Um and I just think I don't know for some reason. The
James Stacey phot I think the photic. Yeah, the photic. Yeah. I shot the yell yellow dot. the gray bezel
Jason Heaton But in this case I'm gonna say Monroe, just for just to be different. So those are the kind of the two affordable ones. Uh I I've got others, but what what do you have on the affordable side of things?
James Stacey Uh sixty bucks Canadian will get
James Stacey you a Timex Men's Mark One.
James Stacey Oh wow. Which has a yellow case and a yellow
James Stacey dial. Uh it's probably about 40 bucks US. Um, I've seen one in
James Stacey person, Jeremy from um Sharp
James Stacey Magazine. Uh when I was in Halifax with Rolex for sale GP. That's what he was wearing. And I mean, it's very yellow, but very cool. Um, kind of a field watch with a yellow case and a yellow dial. And we're talking, let's call it 50 bucks, somewhere around there.
Jason Heaton Yeah. Citizen Ciosa comes
James Stacey in yellow. Hmm. Oh, sure. That's gonna be, you know, depending on what's available in your area. I think you know, you're in the neighborhood of a few hundred dollars. Um, I think that still counts as affordable. Uh going up a little bit more, they make a SSK O one seven uh Seiko, the Seiko five GMT, the modern one. They make that with a yellow dial. I think it's one of the best ones because the yellow's fun.
Jason Heaton Yeah. Um, so that would be an option.
James Stacey I think those that's probably we're talking what now we're in the five, six hundred bucks.
Jason Heaton Mm-hmm. Uh something like that. Uh
James Stacey you could go down a little bit, go online and find, I mean, Seiko did Seiko 5 sports in the field watch, the aviator style, and the kind of like dressy on a bracelet, but not quite really dressy, more like an OP.
Jason Heaton Yeah. They did those versions. It's a it's a ton
James Stacey of different reference numbers, but SNKs would be one of them in yellow dials and they're on eBay from like 120 up. And some of them are very cool. And if you want something that's more in that orange yellow, like the you know the Bahama yellow OP from a few years ago that you can't get anymore. That was awesome. I think it was a 16200. Uh that's a very fun one. Raven Trekker. That's gonna be five, six, seven hundred bucks. They made a 39 millimeter in yellow, different bezel options. Let's see.
James Stacey Pollen module A comes in yellow. I have
James Stacey a module A in pink that my daughters like quite a bit. That's I think in the $700 range. I think you're probably going to be spending into the thousand plus for a yellow dial C4th, but if you can find one, excellent yellow.
Jason Heaton Yeah. Again in that orange space.
James Stacey What did you have as we're pushing up into the high hundreds?
Jason Heaton Yeah, well actually the this one would be well over a thousand, but um I guess I don't know what what where we're drawing the line at affordable, but the uh b you know the scurf and the clements are my first two picks for affordability. But if you want to really let's say break the bank uh for a summer watch that I I think arguably you'd push into many seasons if you spent this much, but would be the the sub two hundred T diving star docks of seventeen fifty. So um maybe not affordable by most expensive as well by most uh categories. But oh you know what else you could pick up too is um I I see these pop up from time to time. You know, do you remember the old uh Brightling has always done a nice job with yellow and and you could get like an old I suppose it would be like an old super ocean or something from You can probably get one of those for maybe a thousand or less. I don't know what they're going for these days, but you know, I I always felt like those those old brightlings, you know, the
James Stacey Yeah. Avenger Seawolf was a great yellow.
Jason Heaton Yeah. If you're okay with a bigger one. Um some super oceans, some steelfish, you know, stuff like that that that they made back then. They were gonna match, but
James Stacey that's gonna be more. Such tough watches. They were kind
Jason Heaton of like the the tag hoyers of that era, just we're um we're just such good solid, you know, etta based movement, thin, you know, good divers. Um so, you know, if you can find like an old old Brightling with a yellow dial, I think that'd that'd be a good way to go. But uh yeah, that was my list.
James Stacey Yeah. I I mean that's gotta push you from what
James Stacey fifty bucks to two, three thousand dollars.
Jason Heaton Yeah. Yeah. You know, depending on
James Stacey what brightling, what age, that sort of thing.
Jason Heaton Right. Um but yeah, if you could if you could
James Stacey find a quartz bright link from the late nineties,
Jason Heaton you m yeah, you might you might be in the thousand dollar
James Stacey range for a something a colt. I don't know if they did a cult
James Stacey quartz in yellow. Yeah. Yeah. They
James Stacey might have. Yeah. They made a lot th they made so much cool stuff back then.
Jason Heaton Yeah. Uh but yeah that that's uh that's our
James Stacey our list, Matthew. I'll I'll put it in the show notes. Um I don't think you go wrong with that Timex.
Jason Heaton It's a cutie. Yeah. Uh let's move on to a question from Chris P who says, James, you and Jason are finally set up with the Slack moderators, a small aviation company, one aircraft that hand delivers incredible EDC packages around North America. Who would perform what roles to ensure success and notoriety? What favorite smaller city would you base yourselves out of? Uh note it can't be a major hub, this is general aviation world. And lastly, what aircraft would you use? Bonus points for any cool design elements. All right. What uh where are you going with this one?
James Stacey All right. So for me on this one, I've I've gotta be
James Stacey honest, I know very little about aviation in general.
Jason Heaton Yeah. Uh as a kid, I spent a lot of time at
James Stacey the Warplane Heritage Museum and I I know a little bit or I know a fair bit about two or three planes. Yeah. It's that sort of
Jason Heaton thing. Yeah. Uh you know, for this I I
James Stacey think if if I was suggesting a place, maybe we do it out of Hamilton, we could be in a hangar next to the Warplane Heritage Museum, so we'd have something to do when we weren't shipping something. But as far as like suggesting a plane, I I don't really know that much about the sorts of planes that would make sense for this.
Jason Heaton Yeah. Um, it's just it's kind of outside
James Stacey my range of of enthusiasm. Um, I like those those planes that have you know the the like the bush planes with the big tires that can kind of like land anywhere and take off anywhere, but I don't know if they carry that much gear.
Jason Heaton Yeah. You know what I mean? for what we're shipping
James Stacey around. Yeah. As far as roles, I've I'm I've I mean I see myself as a pilot, but maybe not. I don't know.
Jason Heaton Well, I was trying to guess we could base it out of
James Stacey a um uh an area outside of Minneapolis as well.
Jason Heaton For me, the the the place to base would be you know somewhat central. I I'm gonna go something like if if we're talking kind of smaller city, I'm not sure what qualifies as that, but I'm gonna go with like Denver. You know, FedEx is based out of Memphis and you know, I g kind of looking at that size city for for an aviation company. I think Denver or kind of one of the outlying suburban airfields, I think it would be kind of cool to to base there in the mountains and uh you know feels like a good kind of hub for for that sort of thing. Um are
James Stacey you allowed to just make an airfield wherever you want? We could make one at my cottage.
Jason Heaton Probably. yeah. Can you just like do do what you want
James Stacey and put up a wind sock and be like, sure. Yeah,
Jason Heaton right. I I don't know I don't know like this is where I
James Stacey literally don't know any of the rules. Yeah. and
Jason Heaton I in that case, I mean I think my my plane choice was the De Havilland twin otter, which is you know kind of this legendary modern well, it goes back decades, but the expedition plane um that you can put skis or floats or big balloon tires on. So I think you know, if we're if we're at the cottage we could land it right on the lake..
James Stacey Oh this looks great Yeah. Oh true. yeah yeah and
Jason Heaton I think they don't even need to make a runway. They can haul gear, you know, so I think uh
James Stacey that that'd be a good one. I think um
Jason Heaton you know in terms of the EDC, James I I think you've got to be in charge of of product and product design. You've got a knack for that. And uh I I you know, ha having shipped off a bunch of straps and and various T GN merchandise, I'll I'll I'll handle the kind of the packaging and fulfillment side of things. But uh I guess we gotta get the mods we gotta get the mods uh involved here.
James Stacey Chris Sol Chris Sol would be our our uh air traffic controller I was thinking
Jason Heaton the same or is he flying? I was thinking the same no I was thinking he's like dispatcher air traffic control yeah yeah.
James Stacey and then it's it's uh it'll be Jackson and Jake in the plane co
Jason Heaton pilots. Yeah, right. And that's our n that's
James Stacey our next podcast. It's just them chatting as they fly around.
Jason Heaton Yeah. Yeah. There you go. Yeah. Jackson's got that great voice. He can a
James Stacey TGN special. Yeah, right, right.
Jason Heaton Yeah. I like it. Yeah. I I yeah,
James Stacey they could both probably do a pretty solid like uh you know pilot pilot over the radio sort of voice. Draw.
Jason Heaton Yeah. Yeah. That's great. Oh, there you
James Stacey go. All right. All right. Thanks so much for that one, Chris P. Uh next up we've got one from Nial B who says, uh I know you're both big fans of Scotch or bourbon. Do you have any favorite Irish or Japanese whiskies?
Jason Heaton Got a couple here. I have both. Yeah.
James Stacey Yeah, sure. What do you got? Uh
James Stacey let's do Irish. Irish,
Jason Heaton um I've enjoyed uh Green Spot um and Redbreast Twelve. I haven't had a red breast in a long time, but that was kind of my introduction to Irish whiskies. Um and they just make kind of a solid twelve-year um whiskey. I I will say that when it comes I I realize I'm now setting myself up for the ire, pardon the pun of uh of many listeners, but I I I just have never completely embraced Irish whiskies. I find them a bit sweeter than than Scotch, um and and therefore I have have yet to find just the right one. I've had some good ones. I mean some some you know older Middletons and and the green spots good and I I do like red breast, but I I'm always I always come back to Scotch um or in some cases Japanese and we'll get to that soon. But uh what are what are your Irish whiskeys?
James Stacey Yeah, I have to shout out Doc Parsons.
Jason Heaton Yeah. Uh for giving me uh the chance
James Stacey to sample more than you know a glass in a scenario where I've maybe had two other whiskeys that day, so who knows what's going on with the palette. Um but in the past two years, so for one uh for the Toronto show last year and then the Toronto show this year, uh Doc brought me a bottle of yellowed spot, which I absolutely adored. Really fantastic.
Jason Heaton Yeah. Um and now when I see it at
James Stacey a restaurant, I I know I I can know to order it and that I'll enjoy it. Um, and then this year he brought me a uh bottle of dingle lunasa single malt, which is uh bourbon cask. Uh and I I I'm just really enjoying I'm trying not to go through it too quickly. Uh Doc if you're listening. Thank you so much for uh both bottles. Uh both are exceptionally different. Yeah, I've I've really enjoyed uh both. So th those would be the two that I have had again more experience with than yeah like a glass of uh of the red breast or something like that.
Jason Heaton Yeah. Yeah. How about Japanese whiskeys? How
James Stacey about for Japanese? Yeah, Japanese.
James Stacey I don't think I've had one I didn't. Same
Jason Heaton here. Um if I'm honest. They all kind of run together in my brain because they're they're just all so good. I uh the the ones I guess that I've bought more than once or kind of keep coming back to based on just you know on familiarity is uh Nika makes the um the coffee grain uh whiskey which you know uh for those unfamiliar we're not talking coffee as in you know coffee the beverage but um I guess it was named after a Scotsman whose last name was coffee, C O F F E Y, who developed a certain kind of still uh for distilling whiskey. And uh so Nica makes a coffee grain because uh as legend goes, um the one of the distillers from Nica many years ago was visiting Scotland to kind of for some education and in the whiskey making process and took to uh this particular kind of still and and brought the technology back to Japan and and they make this coffee grain uh whiskey which is quite nice and then um just a a twelve year Yamazaki is is a go to for me as well.
James Stacey Yeah. How about you? Uh and and for me, uh I agree with both of those. I think coffee for what I could get, like walk down to my local and and find here, uh that that would be a great choice for sure. Um it's also a nice one if you're if you can't get it locally, it's almost it's usually available at duty free if you're traveling. Makes a great gift. I don't know that anyone who enjoys a brown spirit whiskey, um, wouldn't enjoy the coffee. It's quite nice. Um what I will say as far as a notable one, so much so that I remembered it when the when I read this question, um in 2024 in December, I was in Tokyo for a Hodinkee Japan event. And I spent a day with my buddy Michael Schaefer, who goes by Capital Sunset on Instagram, a fantastic automotive photographer. He shot a lot of the Hodinkee
James Stacey photo reports from Goodwood
James Stacey Revival, for example. We were hanging out for the day and we ended up in this huge mall in Ginza and we were down in the basement and we came across just this incredible whiskey shop. tons of bottles, all sorts of like wild stuff in locked up cabinets and that sort of thing. And it had a little bar, and and we were chatting with the guy and he recommended we sit down. So we sat down and we each had a small pour of Yamazaki smokey batch.
Jason Heaton Wow. Which was sort of like Yamazaki's
James Stacey Talisker. Mm. It
Jason Heaton was awesome. Wow. It was just absolutely fantastic.
James Stacey It was a little bonfire and a glass. Tasted great, smelled great. Uh you know, I was I was already full of of some of the best ramen I had ever eaten. Uh and then we did that. It was a fantastic way to have, you know, a day.
Jason Heaton Yeah. And uh and so that one I remember quite
James Stacey strongly. And if you can find it, it's not cheap, it was expensive. Um, but a nice moment on a cool trip, my first time in Tokyo. Uh so yeah, that was the Yamazaki Smokey Batch, which I think they're now on Smoky Batch 2.
Jason Heaton Um, but I'll put it in the show notes if you're keen. Yeah, boy, I would like to find that locally here. I wonder if that's around. That sounds great.
James Stacey Yeah, it looked like pricing on number two was in like the three hundred dollar range for a bottle.
Jason Heaton Mm. Okay. Some d in that's
James Stacey that's celebration space in my mind. Maybe from Celebration Plus. Yeah. Uh but you know, if I make it if I make it down to uh down to the new spot to check out your workshop and that sort of thing, maybe we make it happen.
Jason Heaton yeah. Good point. Thanks
James Stacey very much for that question, Nell. All right. Uh
Jason Heaton Jason Harrier has a a rather uh interesting and involved question here. Um he asks if we discovered that space time doesn't fundamentally exist, that it's merely a framework our minds use to organize an infinite set of events within a holographic quantum reality where everything happens simultaneously, would a watch still mean anything to you? This is interesting, you know, this time around we had that question from Milltime, which had was a very speculative fiction question, so to speak, a as is this one. And then we've actually got two whiskey questions.
James Stacey Yeah, I mean it's it's kind of a complicated question, but I would say if if we're still existing in a perceivable reality where time and being on time matters,
Jason Heaton yeah, and we're still measuring
James Stacey said allotment of time in terms of minutes, hours, seconds. I I think I would feel exactly the same way about a watch as now. Like I I think we all grow up with the idea that our understanding of w of time, or at least definitely the way we measure it, is a construct and we've built tools to f make that construct as kind of frictionless as possible. Assuming that that the need to be on time for things and that sort of stuff, if the watch was still useful for the framework and the organization, I think I'd feel exactly the same about a watch as I do now, even if it turns out that the background of existence wasn't based in what the t watch was measuring.
Jason Heaton Yeah, that makes sense. I I I totally agree. And that that was kind of where I was headed as well, because I I think um we we we actually don't really know the the the actual basis of or or the concept of space-time and and there have been so many theories that have kind of called into question our understanding of it. And yet there's still a necessity in day-to-day life to, you know, pick what when we're going to record the podcast. Um you have to have some peg in the timeline or in the, you know, in your day that we can both refer to and that that requires some kind of a timepiece, as well as something like tracking a lapse time. You know, whether you're cooking something that takes X amount of minutes or whatever you want to call them in this new reality, um, you need to be able to track that sort of thing or your no deco Nico or your no deco time if you're diving or or something along those lines that a watch would still be quite useful. Um and I think too, you know, a watch is is something that I'm I'm not one who says that you know, I don't set the time on my watch, I just wear it because it's a beautiful object. Um that said, I do wear it because it's a beautiful object and I I wear it because it's this it's this tiny little machine that that can go everywhere with me and I can wear twenty four seven and I think you know, there's a certain human interaction with it that you don't get from virtually anything else that you can use day to day. And I think that's you know that's the power of of watches for me. And so you know, regardless of this this kind of new understanding of of space and time, um, I think I'd still embrace a watch fully, just as I do now.
James Stacey Cool. Thanks very much for that question, Jason.
James Stacey That could be a good one for people to dip into on uh on the Slack.
Jason Heaton Yeah. Uh next up, as we're rounding out our last
James Stacey two questions, we've got one from Dan Veronesi who asks, uh, there have been some pretty cool limited edition watches between the CWN1 and the Hodenki program, what is the design process for these? Um I
Jason Heaton can I mean for this for C W N one if you
James Stacey want to jump in. Yeah, and if you want to kind of you
Jason Heaton you're a little more familiar with the Hodinkee ones obviously but yeah, the the the C W N w the C W N one was you know, I I think for years we'd kind of bandied around this idea of of doing a a T GN watch and we're always a little hesitant to do it unless it could be truly unique and and different. And you know, our our mutual love of kind of the Monin style case that that CWC has made and among other brands kind of led us to think, well, could we riff on that a little bit? Um and it was around that time that, you know, we asked CWC like, well, what would make this truly stand out? And that is that they'd never done a titanium watch. And I think, you know, we we just posed that question, and lo and behold, they were considering it and actually kind of working on on a prototype or an on an idea and we thought, well, can we be your launch partner for that? And one thing led to another, and um you know, we were kind of going back and forth on design features. I think James, you kinda took the lead on sort of T GN specific design features, you know, the the orange tip on the s on the sweep hand and lack of text and the the twelve hour bezel and we kinda went back and forth with with Malcolm from CWC with with renderings and then a prototype and um kind of took it from there. So that that was that was kind of how that came about. It was certainly um I I think we were we were organized in it, but we were also were, you know, we didn't really know what we were doing at that point. We just sort of uh stated the argument and found a partner that uh that was willing to get take a chance it with
James Stacey it. Yep. Yeah.
James Stacey Yeah. I I think that that was it was a pretty straight line with CWC.
Jason Heaton Mm-hmm. W for the Hodinkee ones, it's it's
James Stacey I mean, this is a program that's been long before my time and uh and certainly one that my wife has been much more uh a part of, in including leading. Um you know, from a general standpoint, it either comes from a an idea that someone has, like a lot of the early ones were like Ben liked a watch, or or somebody on the team, or the whole team really liked to watch, but said, What if it was this?
Jason Heaton Mm-hmm. And then they went to the brand and said, D
James Stacey would you want to partner and do this? And sometime brands go, that doesn't align with our what we're doing right now or our ability or our interest in doing LEs at all or and and other times they go, Yeah, absolutely, let's let's get this going and and and you put it together. A lot of times it's the it's that taking something that that is the the basis for an understanding of a brand or a brands, a certain line within a brand, and then just evolving it to be more niche, because you only have to sell it to 500 people or 200 people or in for some of these 10 people.
Jason Heaton Yeah. Right? Like if you're talking
James Stacey about a steel corn de Vash, a very early, very incredible, I think one of the high points of Hudinky's LEs, we didn't make that many. So it's not that difficult to find the the same s uh a nerd of a similar inclination, right? Same with uh the the Blanc Pond tribute to Mill spec, my favorite one that we've ever done.
Jason Heaton Yeah. Um, really not that difficult.
James Stacey Or uh the full gray, slim, hand wound aurus, sold in minutes. Right. The Doxa, more recent, sold sold very quickly. These are you're we're we're taking an expression where we go, Well, we love the army and we love the 200T. It's peanut butter and chocolate, right?
Jason Heaton Yeah. Like what happens if you just put
James Stacey it together? Right. Hopefully that's a reasonable answer for you there, Dan. Uh thanks so much for that question. If there's something more pointed that you wanted to know, let me know. Uh Sarah's on the Slack as well. You could ask her directly if you wanted. And uh if there's still interest in uh a Sarah retrospective on her time in in the L E world, uh I can talk to her about it for
James Stacey sure. Uh to wrap
James Stacey it up, we've got a question from Austin. Another one about whiskey. It's a good thing that we're only new and otherwise I'd be quite thirsty uh for a glass at this point. Um but uh Austin asks what whiskey would you most like to try a glass of if money were no object? He says the correct answer is probably old Port Ellen, but I will entertain alternatives. Jason, money no object. Uh somebody maybe maybe it's uh watches a Switzerland credit card next Friday.
Jason Heaton Yeah. Oh yeah. Wow. Okay. Uh what w
James Stacey would you love to try? Just once? Well there's
Jason Heaton one true grail that uh w would be kind of funny and and actually I think it's actually impossible. That is the uh um you know you remember years ago the the McKinley's uh scotch that they they dug up from under the hut in Antarctica that was with the Shackleton expedition in the early nineteen hundreds. Um, you know, they they were allowed to by some, you know, Antarctic treaty and heritage foundations, etc., to bring back one bottle for analysis and then um it was the whiskey was actually recreated and sold and I bought a bottle, one of those limited edition bottles, which is now long gone. Um but I I would love to try a glass of the original. And I have no idea if it would be any good, you know, the actual one. the recreation was was fantastic. Um I think that's the the holy grail for me, just just out of my interest in kind of polar exploration and and and whiskey uh kind of comes together in a way that can't be beat. Um but more accessible, I guess, not really not accessible, but more realistic, I guess, would be um you know, I I have a strong love for Talisker and I was curious about you don't hear much about like really old Taliskers, or at least I I don't, so I kind of looked it up. And they they've got a forty seven year old Talasker that they call I think they call it the Magma and they they do some process um using lava um that lends a specific flavor to it. And old Talasker would be interesting because you know the the smokiness of Talasker I just wonder if it would be a little more muted or if it would it would kind of retain that um if it was aged that long. And then I I don't know I maybe it's a cliche but like a 50 year old McAllen I think would just be fascinating to try because that the it's such a renowned you know the the old McAlans are just they they go for so much money. Um yeah
James Stacey and I I would just love to experience that sometime.
Jason Heaton How about how about you?
James Stacey Yeah I mean with old Port Ellen,
Jason Heaton by the way? No, yeah. It's
James Stacey new new to me. I I would have to Google it. Um for me, the the scotch that came to mind was Talisker. I've never had the 18 or the 25. I've had a little bit of experience of of whiskey of scotch that's been aged beyond like eighteen to twenty five years.
Jason Heaton Yeah. Um I I've had uh
James Stacey I think it was a Balmore fifty at
Jason Heaton an event once. Wow. Um and I
James Stacey I can't say that it was better than than the younger stuff.
Jason Heaton Mm-hmm uh necessarily. Certainly it was more
James Stacey expensive. This was at uh car week years and years and years ago.
James Stacey But a t an 18 or a 25 Taliskar,
James Stacey I would very much be interested in trying them. You know, obviously the the ten uh we've enjoyed together and it and it's one of my favorites if we're talking about scotch. Um and then uh being a bourbon fan, I I mean I I recently had a truly the best whiskey I've ever had was uh I had recently with my buddy Sean at uh Dram Central in uh in New York. He had a bottle of uh Willet that was a very limited thing for one retailer out west,
Jason Heaton and we had some of that, and it was just unbelievable.
James Stacey Um, but I I would love to try a Pappy Van Winkle, the family reserve twenty-three. I I don't know what a shot of that would cost. more than I would be willing to stomach uh from a financial standpoint, of course, from a drinking less so. But uh yeah, those those would be the ones that jump to mind for me. Um I I do I do live still in a world where I'm not a collector of whiskey. Yeah,
Jason Heaton I'm I'm an an enjoyer and
James Stacey I really I find that it just has to cross a certain bar and I'll be quite happy. That, you know, I I love the Talisker, I love a lagavulin, um I enjoy uh you know bourbon much more difficult to get given the current political climate uh between Canada and the US uh but when I'm in the States I I don't I don't have to go I don't have to see the biggest number on the list to have something that I know I'm gonna enjoy.
Jason Heaton Yeah. Um, but it is a nice kind of a nice
James Stacey thing to kind of dream about. Yeah, good question.
Jason Heaton Couple of whiskey questions, uh this episode. And you're right. it's midday. Um it's not even noon here, and I'm I'm I'm my mouth is watering. So thanks, thanks. Thanks, but no thanks, guys. yeah, yeah.
James Stacey Good crop of questions. Appreciate the the strong influence.
Jason Heaton Yeah, right. But yeah, that was a super
James Stacey fun round of uh of the slack crew and a there for part five and twenty twenty-six. Thanks very much to uh Austin, Dan, Jason, Neal,
James Stacey Chris, Matthew, Nick, and Milltime
James Stacey for your questions. We've got so many more. So there will be more of these uh through the year. Uh and uh and then we'll probably run them into next year and then open up the thread again in the spring as we normally do. Uh, but with all of that covered for this episode, you want to jump into a quick final note and put a
James Stacey bow on it? Yeah, sure. I've been
Jason Heaton listening to an audiobook version of uh one of my favorite author's most recent book which is called Redwood, The Untold Story of the Cold War's Most Extraordinary Spy, and this is by Ben McIntyre.
James Stacey Oh, cool. Um MacIntyre's so good.
Jason Heaton Um you know SAS Rogue Heroes he wrote, Um, A Spy and a Traitor, Um, Operation Mincemeat, um just i the list goes on. He's just a an incredible author of um history, largely espionage or military history. He wrote one called The Siege about the SAS rescue of the hostages in um the Iranian embassy in London. Um just uh he just has such a a a knack for for covering this sort of stuff and his deep dive into the these unknown histories. And this one is is an incredible story about
James Stacey uh a KGB
Jason Heaton uh operative in Tehran in the early 80s, around the time of the Iranian Revolution, who um uh decides he wants to sell secrets to MI6 to the the British intelligence. And uh the reasoning is um interesting. There's both a personal aspect to it and and kind of his disillusionment with the KGB and the Soviet Union at the time. It's just an extraordinary story that I was not aware of, and kind of what was done with the secrets that he shared and the incredible hall of intelligence that he was able to able to provide. And it was just remarkable to me that this story isn't better known. I mean I'm sure it will be now. But uh it's just a great book. I I recommend I recommend anything by Ben McIntyre and um and this one's great and he actually reads the audiobook if you're into audiobooks, which I I do like on on dog walks. So I'm it's it's a long book, but I'm I'm getting close to the end and it's great. Highly recommend.
James Stacey It's a great, dude. Yeah. I'll uh I'll add that to
James Stacey the always growing list of books
James Stacey I must read. Yeah.
James Stacey Uh yeah, that's awesome. Sounds uh like a fascinating
James Stacey story. Yeah, it's a good one. I I definitely loved obviously
James Stacey SAS Rogue Heroes, so it's uh it's something to to consider adding.
Jason Heaton Yeah. Yeah. Good time of year
James Stacey to add up some books and make sure you've got lots to uh lots to do that's not just staring at a screen when the sun goes down a bit earlier than it than it might otherwise.
Jason Heaton Yeah, so true. What do you have?
James Stacey Uh speaking of staring at screens, mine's a recommendation of an app for your phone. Um, this is only gonna be useful for iPhone and Apple users. Um, but I've spent the last several years kind of ping ponging between different to-do and reminder apps. I was a big to-doist fan for a while, and then recently I built like a whole dashboard and database build in Notion to try and organize everything and then using Notion on your phone is a bad experience. And I decided I would you know rehash this whole search and start over fresh. Maybe go back to Todoist. I wasn't sure. As it turns out, kind of like my experience with several of the included apps on your iPhone. Uh, the reminders app is so much better than I remember it being when I tried it years and years ago. Uh this is my experience with notes as well. I used to be an Evernote guy because I didn't like the notes app and then I was with um you know I I've used four or five different other platforms for notes since then. Um and now I just use the Apple notes app. it's nice and easy to use and now it integrates very well with reminders. I I'm really impressed by all of this. I obviously I'm not going to walk you through using an app on in an audio sense, but I will recommend a video to watch, which is a um an explainer. It's called it's finally time to start using Apple Reminders. It's from about five months ago from a YouTube channel called From Sergio. And it's a really nice primer on what's possible, how to set it up, how to think about using it. And I've been doing this for about two weeks now and I just I absolutely love it. It's everything's on my desktop, everything's on my phone. If I want to add something, I can do it through Siri or I can do it just with uh the like action button on the iPhone. Um, and a little dialogue pops up even if the phone is otherwise locked, I can add something to my list. So if somebody recommends a movie or tells me I have to do something or that I've or I realize in the middle of the night that I've forgotten to do something, I can very quickly add it in. It goes into an inbox, which you can sort later. I highly recommend this experience. Um, especially versus some of these other apps that I have used or we're looking at using that have monthly costs. This is free and it's probably already on your phone, your iPad, and your in your Mac, uh, assuming you're on that platform. If you're not, I'm sure there's some great ones that people can tell you about in the Slack. Uh but I'm I'm an iPhone user and uh this has been exceptionally helpful for me as I try and just stay on top of stuff. You know what I mean?
Jason Heaton Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. This is good I. I really underutilize the reminders app. I mean I use it for a a handful of things kind of daily that just pop up, but uh I I I I have been looking for something a little more um robust and I think uh yeah, I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm still stuck in the you know reminders of probably ten years ago just in the way I use it. So
James Stacey yeah, there's there's a lot more going on there and it
Jason Heaton it just integrates nicely with other apps
James Stacey in the ecosystem, which is you know kind of the big win these days if you're on if you're on the Apple side.
Jason Heaton All right. Good episode. fun stuff uh on this uh holiday Monday. Um you're off to New York, and I will be seeing you in a few days.
James Stacey See you soon, buddy. Well, as always, thanks
Jason Heaton so much for listening. If you want to subscribe to the show notes, get into the comments for each episode, or consider supporting the show directly, and maybe even grab a new TGN signed NATO, get into the Slack and contribute to future Slack crewnes, please visit thegreynato.com. Music throughout is siesta by Jazz R via the Free Music Archive.
James Stacey And after last week's faux pas of using the same quote like twice in three episodes, uh I don't know if we've used this one before, but I do like it very much for one of these episodes, so we'll
James Stacey leave you with this quote from Voltaire
James Stacey who said judge a man by his questions rather than his answers