[SOTC] It's my cake day, so here's a cake day SOTC for y'all

SNK8xx: my first dip into Seiko watches from years ago. I don't wear them much any more, mostly because the 7S26 doesn't hand wind and it's annoying to have to wave each watch around a bunch before every wear. Still, fun little fliegers.

Seagull 1963: I love it though, as with most folks who have one, I have no idea if it's the legitimate thing or one of the many clones. I'm not sure that I care if it is or not, to be honest. Either way, it's a stunning mechanical chronograph with an interesting history that I got at a great price.

SRPB59: You don't see many pilot watches that pair a clean, legible dial with a slide rule bezel. And at 44.7mm across, this is just about the biggest non-G-Shock I can get away with on my dainty left wrist.

SRPJ13: I've wanted a Cocktail Time for ages, so finally pulled the trigger on The Aviation. The dial is amazing, especially under magnification.

Aquascaphe: After eyeing them online for months and months, I picked up a blue gilt Aquascaphe Classic at the 2022 San Francisco WindUp Watch Fair. Sometimes it's hard to pull the trigger without seeing the piece in person. Getting hands-on with it and their other models was really special, as was getting to know some of the folk behind the brand. I love love love Baltic's retro-meets-modern aesthetic, and their build quality at that price point is hard to beat. I bought it on their blue tropic rubber strap, but this thing is a total strap monster. I most often wear it on an Hermès single tour I pilfered from my Apple Watch strap collection.

Clearly Gent: Much like Casio, Swatch primarily occupies a nostalgic part of my brain. This is their recent re-issue of arguably the most iconic Swatch of all time and the one that screams the 80s in the loudest, clearest voice, at least to me.

Seestern GS Homage: I love Grand Seiko and, one of these days, I will get one. Until an appropriate life event presents itself, I have this thing to tide myself over with. Seestern is a Chinese watch brand that mostly makes homage dive watches. Like with other AliExpress brands, what they lack in originality they (at least somewhat) make up for in quality-per-dollar. Why they made a Grand Seiko homage is anyone's guess, but look, they built a decent-looking 44GS-like case, slapped an NH35 in it, covered the movement with a pretty dial, nice applied, faceted indicies and faceted hands, and capped the whole thing with a sapphire crystal. It's got 200m of water resistance! You could do a lot worse.

Cartier Tank Must: I gave myself one of these on leather for a promotion I got at work. A few months later I also picked up the bracelet for it as well as a double tour strap from ABP (pictured). The Tank is, quite simply, the most iconic ladies dress watch, but it's so much more than a dress watch! It dresses up and down so well. I love pairing it with a T-shirt, jeans, and sneakers just as much as I enjoy wearing it with a dress to formal occasions. The proportions and finishing of the modern Must manages to totally scratch my TLC itch and (thankfully) at a fraction of the price.

MoonSwatch: About five months after waiting in line for hours on launch day, I managed to time a visit to Swatch's San Francisco boutique just right and picked up one of the Mission to Uranus. It's such a fun colorway—a great piece for a chill summer day.

Seamaster Cosmic: At some point in the late 60s my mother went on a trip to Europe that included some time in Switzerland. She asked her father for help picking out a gift to bring home for her brother. He immediately described in rather precise detail the exact watch to bring home for my uncle: the Seamaster Cosmic ref. CD 166.0036, powered by Omega's in-house cal. 752 automatic movement. When she got to Switzerland, she thought back on how quickly he was able to specify the exact watch to get, and decided to buy two of them: one for her brother, and one for her father. My uncle still has his. I inherited my grandfather's when he passed in the early 80s.

G-Shocks: I've got two G-Shocks in the "First Yellow" color that's exactly the color of the Sony Sports Walkman I had when I was a kid: a square and a solar CasiOak. I've also got a black square and a tri-graph 6900, both of which are also solar.

It's hard to go wrong with a teeny tiny gold Casio, and my A159WGEA-1VT fits the bill perfectly. Wonderfully nostalgic piece that dresses up surprisingly well.

My first watch purchase after transitioning was a Boulevard Sunset Rose from MVMT. I realize there's a generally low opinion of MVMT among watch enthusiasts, but this piece was an accessible entry point to women's watches for me, and is sized well for my wrist. It's a decent looking fashion watch I use as a travel piece I don't have to worry about losing.

The Casio Royale is pretty much the perfect budget travel watch. And with 100m water resistance, you could get away with leaving everything else at home.

I have a cream dial A-2S Field that for the life of me I can't find on Bertucci's website. My first field watch. I bought it ages ago, pre-transition, and rarely wear it these days.