Watches, Stories, & Gear: Big Rockets, GTA Remasters & Field of Dreams

“Watches, Stories, and Gear” is a roundup of our favorite content, watch or otherwise, from around the internet. Here, we support other creators, explore interesting content that inspires us, and put a spotlight on causes we believe in. Oh, and any gear we happen to be digging on this week. We love gear.

Share your story ideas or interesting finds with us by emailing our Managing Editor at [email protected]

(header credit: Johnny Milano for NYT) This installment of “Watches, Stories, and Gear” is brought to you by the Windup Watch Shop.

SpaceX Constructs Really, Really Big Rocket

Space travel has been in the news recently for a whole host of reasons we’re a bit iffy on, to put it kindly. Billionaires buying their way into a few minutes of zero gravity isn’t what gets us excited about exploring space, but the big personalities with their company’s names on the side of their rockets get a ton of media attention. So it’s easy to miss something truly mesmerizing coming out of SpaceX, like the joining of their Starship space craft with the Super Heavy booster. The two halves of this monster ship make for a rocket that’s over 400 feet tall, and according to SpaceX’s own ego-centric billionaire, it will be capable of taking humans to the moon and Mars in the (relatively) near term. There’s still a lot of testing that needs to be done, of course, but seeing Starship and Super Heavy joined together, if only temporarily, is awe inspiring stuff. Read more, and see some amazing photographs, right here.

Building Your Favorite ‘90s Kids Game Show

If you watched cable television as a child or young adolescent in the 90s, there’s a good chance you had daydreams about the Aggro Crag. The kid centric game show Guts ran on Nickelodeon from 1992 to 1995, and over the course of 160 episodes, kids slugged it out American Gladiator style in a series of events that all seemed to have them strapped to harnesses, swinging from the air, and getting knocked about in a giant wave pool. Of course, every episode climaxed with a climb up the Aggro Crag, a mountain built within a TV studio that seemed to have a never ending string of booby traps within it. It’s quite possible that the Olympic dreams of a generation started right here. The Ringer has a fascinating oral history of Guts on their site this week, and if you’re curious about a peek behind the curtain of the show all these years later, it’s well worth a read.

Field Of Dreams Comes To Life In Iowa

If you’re a baseball fan, you were probably swept up in some rare magic that happened on Thursday night in Dyersville, Iowa. The small town, as many movie lovers are likely to remember, is the home of the iconic Field of Dreams field. That’s the movie where Kevin Costner builds a baseball diamond in the middle of his cornfield, urged on by a mysteries voice, soon to be populated by ghostly ballplayers. It’s a wonderful film, a modern fairytale about sports and family, and after years of planning (and a pandemic induced delay last summer), Major League Baseball was finally able to stage an actual game in a cornfield just like in the movie. A meticulously produced introduction took place right before the first pitch, with Costner himself walking out from the stalks of corn to play MC for the night, as the score from the film swelled in the background. Players from the New York Yankees and Chicago White Sox followed from the corn, and many seemed to be truly caught up in the moment. All the better that the game ended in a walk-off homerun, followed by fireworks, recalling yet another classic baseball movie. It was a great night to be a baseball fan, and the New York Times documented it here, with some pretty amazing photography. 

Acura Teases New Integra

With Monterey Car Week underway there has been plenty of news from premier brands about either very expensive, or obscenely expensive new variants of sports cars. But one bit of news has us most excited, and that was the surprise announcement from Acura that the beloved Integra nameplate will make its return next year, likely as a MY2023 car. The Integra has a bit of a cult following from enthusiasts that grew up with or around the cars in the ‘90s, with nice (unmolested) GSR and Type R examples commanding a pretty penny these days. After a rocky start to the millenia, Acura seems in a good place to bring the Integra back, and will hopefully be able to keep it at an accessible price. If not, maybe swing the platform over to Honda for a new Prelude?

Rockstar Reportedly Planning Remasters Of GTA Vice City, San Andreas, & III

This is not the news out of Rockstar we’ve been waiting for, but it is good news nonetheless. While we continue to wait for GTA VI, it seems we may be in for a trio of remasters of some of their all-time great games. Grand Theft Auto: Vice City, San Andreas, and III are all rumored to be getting updates for a return to consoles (even Switch!) and PC in the near future, maybe even later this year. Kotaku reports that the games will get a fresh coat of paint in the graphics department, but the goal is to keep them feeling like the originals, even if they are being recreated in Unreal Engine 4. So pop on your favorite Hawiian shirt, tune the radio to Flash FM, and get ready to hit the mean streets in a sweet Banshee. More from Kotaku.

eBay Finds: LIP Rally Chronograph

Vintage chronographs are always in style, but the ‘panda’ dialed ones are especially sought after. This vintage 1960’s Lip panda chronograph is a beauty. Simple round case with thin lugs, should be about 35-36mm wide (seller states 38mm w/crown). The dial is a beautiful silver with black sub dials in the classic ‘panda’ configuration. Simple steel stick style hands with nicely detailed sub dial and chrono seconds hand. There is no picture of the movement, and the seller doesn’t state what brand/model of movement this one has, but they do state that it runs. So, if the exact model of movement isn’t important to you, this could be a good opportunity to snag a nice looking panda chronograph!

View auction here.