This morning the postman delivered a little parcel from keitht (our very own authority on hummers) and inside was this little beauty:



I'm a strictly mechanical watch man, no quartz watches here and I've not had a hummer before but really wanted to try one. I was not sure how I would get on with it but my initial thoughts were as follows.

First of all the first thing I did was hold it up to my ear to hear the little tuning fork do its business. What a lovely little sound it makes. It is almost like the low background electronic hum that you get from transformers and stuff. It is most lovely. Hummmmmmmmmmm

After that I thought I'd have a look at this thing I had just bought. The dial is stunning with a quite mesmerising texture to it (it is best seen in keith's original sales post - his photos are better than mine!)

http://forum.tz-uk.com/showthread.ph...ght=f300+omega

The dial kind of shimmers in the light and is in cracking condition for a 40 year old watch. Then we have the feature that I have fallen in love with on this watch and that is the applied hour markers, omega logo and omega wording on the dial. It just oozes quality. I was appreciating the applied markers and and dial texture with my loupe and what did I see? The little omega sign on the plexi in the middle. I wasn't expecting it and when I saw it again just shouted out to me as a watch of quality. Keith's restoration work on this is second to none. Keith, I take my hat off to you sir.

The second hand sweeps smoothly, and when I say smoothly I mean smoother than any watch I own. Not like any of my automatics which if you look carefully jitter slightly, this thing is as smooth as a silky negligee slipping down over Keira Knightley's... anyway... I digress. That seconds hand is smooth as you could imagine (i do my fair share of imagining ).

The next thing that I was unsure I'd get on with was the date function. I only have one watch with a date (my Seamaster Prof) and I usually avoid dates. But I have realised why, I avoid them because i hate resetting the date on a watch. My Seamaster gets worn each night at least so is always wound so no problem there. My new Hummer has a battery so there will be no need to set the date all the time. The date does not worry me at all because of this.

It is a nice size, not too big but not too small. Maybe 36-37mm width without the crown but it probably wears slightly larger because of the lug to lug length

Keith supplied the watch on a rather nice plain black leather strap which will go really well when I wear this watch with my suits (and it is a very appropriate watch to wear with a suit, classy, slightly dressy with the silver dial and rather understated), however I was having a bit of a play and tried the Di Modell Rallye with red stitching as I thought that the red stitching might make the red applied Omega logo "pop". It did the trick and I think it really suits the watch.

But - what I'd really like is brown strap with red stitching for it. Anyone got any idea where I could find one? Something similar to the Di Modell Rally??

After wearing this watch for all of 5 hours I can see it getting a great deal of wrist time and staying in the fold for a long time (I'm not a huge flipper). Whilst I like manual and automatic watches and have a (quite irrational) feel that quartz watches lack a certain soul to them I have no qualms about having a hummer, I can hear it's little song and feel a certain comfort in knowing that singing away inside is a lovely little bit of vintage electronics.

...a very happy man today.