Timely Moments & The Zulu Time Podcast

For those who don’t know me, follow my page, or listen to my podcast, my name is Dan. For those of you do know, “Hello and welcome to this first article, written by Recon Team Watch Blog (RTWB) contributor Dan from @timely_moments”.

  

 For me my watch collecting journey started back in early 2012, so let’s rewind, at the time I had just completed my basic training with the British Army, and I had processed onto my “trade training”. This element of training was specific to the Corps and specialisation that I had been selected for when I undertook Intelligence Corps Selection, prior to joining the army and commencing my basic training at the back end of 2011.

 

 Before joining the army, I rarely wore a watch, yes I had some growing up, everything from a Buzz Lightyear digital watch (my first watch, which I would later re- purchase years later) through to the odd digital Casio and even a Timex Indiglo Expedition. My beginnings within the collecting community starts in a very similar way to many of the current serving and veteran personalities that I have had the pleasure to engage with through this weird, wonderful and frankly nerdy hobby of all things watches and horology. When I joined the Army I was required to buy a watch, and being the type of person that I am, I went straight to the internet to Google various watch types to see what I could buy. The watch would be required to handle the rigors of basic training; which I knew meant it would have to be robust, waterproof and legible in all lighting conditions, all the while being constructed in a dark or plain material. I had a sneaking suspicion that a luminous cased ‘Ice Watch would only stick out and frankly when it came to basic training I didn’t want to stick out and be “that guy” with the bright coloured watch. I went through my basic and trade training courses with a generic Casio square don’t ask me where it is all I remember is breaking the strap at some point towards the end of my Junior Non-Commissioned Officer (JNCO) Cadre, which meant I finished the exercise phase with the watch thrown into my top pocket, no great loss as I also found that the Casio plastic/rubber strap actually gave me heat spots and irritated my wrist, so if anything the strap finally giving out just strengthened the case for me to delve back into researching about watches in order to replace it for something that was firstly more comfortable, but also something that would last longer.

  

 I would eventually unearth a plethora of information about military watches through blogs, forums and YouTube. It got to the level it has clearly remained at ever since, the level of constant interest, and obsession to the level of medical affliction. I would soon be reading up about everything from movements, to case type, to water resistance and I would eventually come out the back of the research with two things, one a Suunto Core for work (a fantastic ABC Wrist Computer) and a love of the history of issued military watches.

I was set, I was determined to collect one of every type of general service issued watch commissioned by the Ministry of Defence per decade since The Second World War. I am pleased to say that during my posting to Cyprus between 2015 - 18 I would actually achieve that within the collection. Along with the British Issued pieces I would be fortunate enough to also add some other very unique issued watches to other nations. These other watches notably within the collection included all three of the Seiko references issued to the MACVSOG during the Vietnam War as well as an issued Roamer Anfibio to the Rhodesian Army during the period of the conflict within Rhodesia.

 The other side of the collection also started to amass within the collection during my time in the Mediterranean, the side of the “military special project”. The unit I was serving in at the time was a mix of service and specialist trades from Army Counter Intelligence through to Air Force Military Police and even Army Signals and vehicle mechanics. I believe that if it wasn’t for the mix of service, personalities and specialisations within the unit I wouldn’t have ever come across the concept of a special project until a lot later in my collecting journey. I first special project I came across was a Breitling Aerospace during a meeting with an USAF U2 Dragon Lady Pilot, he had an Aerospace with an applied U2 on the dial, it was subtle but clearly had an effect and the effect was on of “fuck that is cool!” The second special project I saw was during a briefing I gave to a WO2 within a particular unit that was temporarily deployed on a training and validation exercise, it was a titanium Breitling Avenger Seawolf with a Pompadour blue dial.... go figure. The special project watches that I would see in meetings or in the corridors of my unit would all add up and eventually inspired me to design my own project watch. The design would eventually come to fruition in the last year of my time in the Mediterranean through the Bremont Military and Special Projects Team. Since that initial special project (and the delivery of the Intelligence Corps Avenger II GMT) I have continued to design and add special project watches all of which mark certain milestones within my military career to date, everything from serving in the Intelligence Corps, through to transferring into the British Army’s Photographic Trade.

 Throughout my journey within the ‘Watch Fam’ I would like to highlight that I came for the watches, but stayed for the people, people like Justin the founder of the RTWB and the other RTWB contributors, along with my own followers of both my instagram (@timely_moments) as well as my personal audience and guests who support my podcast (The Zulu Time Podcast). I hope that this introduction (or re- introduction) about me and my journey within horology has been an enjoyable read, I hope that you enjoy my future contributions to the blog and until next time, take care.