Prodigal Questionnaire: Breitling Cosmonaute 809
By The Prodigal Fool, published on 6 September 2010
Vanity Fair has the Proust Questionnaire. Theirs is “candid, surprising, fascinating.” Ours? Not so much. It’s more: contrived, surpassed, fallacious.
We’re kidding of course. No way do the guys at Vanity Fair have a monopoly on revealing interview techniques. When it comes to penetrating the reasoning behind a watch-buying decision, we think you can’t do better than the Prodigal Questionnaire.
One watch. One decision. And 12 little questions that shine a probing, edifying light on them both.
Today, we’re putting our friend Swiss Pauly on the couch to examine his decision to buy a 1960s Breitling Cosmonaute 809.
One o’clock: Where or how did you purchase this watch?
Two o’clock: What living person is it most like?
Hellen Mirren: Classic, out of the ordinary and aged but still beautiful.
Three o’clock: What is the watch’s greatest achievement?
Four o’clock: What talent would it most like to have?
The ability to be less conspicuous and attract less attention.
Five o’clock: Where should the watch live?
East Berlin or Moscow in the late 60s / early 70s.
Six o’clock: Which hero of fiction wears or should wear this watch?
Seven o’clock: What are its real life heroes?
Well, the Cosmonaute started off as a 24-hour version of the much-loved Navitimer. So I suppose you would say that the Navitimer is its hero. But really the little 809 always had space-travel on the brain. Although it was worn in space during the second orbital flight by an American astronaut, when NASA came to choose the watch to be issued to astronauts for the later flights leading up to the first moon landing in 1969, the Cosmonaute was, er, ‘ruled out’ (excuse the pun). You see, its most desirable and iconic feature – the slide rule – meant it wasn’t water or air tight. As any watch fan knows, the timepiece that did win the honour was of course the Omega Speedmaster. I guess that makes the Speedmaster the Cosmonaute’s biggest hero.
Eight o’clock: What’s your greatest regret about buying this watch?
That it was so easy. A watch like this deserved at least one counter bid!
Nine o’clock: If it had a name, what would it be?
Andrei, Dmitri, or Boris.
Ten o’clock: What do you most value about this watch?
That it is out of the ordinary, slightly difficult to use for purpose (at least at first), and as a result it attracts admiring glances and comments wherever it goes.
Eleven o’clock: What is the trait you most deplore in it?
That I treasure it too much to use it everyday.
Twelve o’clock: Keep, sell or trade?
Keep. I often suggest that I may cash it in to buy a more modern timepiece, but am put off by friends and most notably my wife. I think therefore that it will be part of what I hope will be an ever-expanding collection for many years to come.
If you’re interested in the Cosmonaute – a truly fascinating and historic watch – there is a very thorough account of its history and development over on Watchuseek.com and, as always, we also recommend the scarily detailed Navitimer.net.
Who’s next on the couch?
The Prodigal Questionnaire is published on the first Monday of every month.
We’re always on the look out for interesting watches chosen by interesting people. If you’d like to be the subject of PQ, please drop us a line.
Prodigal Questionnaire: Breitling Cosmonaute 809
Vanity Fair has the Proust Questionnaire. Theirs is “candid, surprising, fascinating.” Ours? Not so much. It’s more: contrived, surpassed, fallacious. We’re kidding of course. No way do the guys at Vanity Fair have a monopoly on revealing interview techniques. When it comes to penetrating the reasoning behind a watch-buying decision, we think you can’t do [...]
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4 Responses to “Prodigal Questionnaire: Breitling Cosmonaute 809”
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I sympathise. I have an Navitimer 806. Same looks. But normal 12-hour dial. Love it.
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Im envious of your watches guys
very nice -
Breitling, old friend, welcome back: The Navitimer Calibre 01 Limited Edition « The Prodigal Guide
12 October 2010
[...] Breitling worth buying but it’s also a worthy successor to our cherished 806 and its sibling the 809. The good news is that they’re only making 2,000 of the steel model (the only one worth having in [...]
nickorloff
7 September 2010
I had one of these stunning pieces for 4 or so years, and I’d tend to agree with most of the answers. But in the end, I found that what had attracted me to the watch, the 24 hour dial, was what stopped me wearing it more often: unless I wore it 3 or 4 days running, I struggled to tell the time at a glance, always having to really look at the dial to know which hour it was 22 past.
For someone that can wear 3 or 4 watches in a day, wearing the same one for 3 or 4 days was never going to happen.
It’s gone to a new home, and I’ve replaced it with something with a ‘regular’ 12 hour dial and a GMT complication, so I can practice telling the time the way a Cosmonaute does.