The Pen Addict 103/transcript

The Pen Addict Podcast Transcript
Episode:	103
Title:	Twitter Q&A
Release Date:	April 22nd, 2014
Hosts:	Brad Dowdy Myke Hurley
Guests:	No guests this episode
Additional Information
Official page:	Episode 103
Audio File:	Audio Episode 103
Podcast page:	The Pen Addict 103
Length:	6565 min <br />1.083 h <br /> minutes
Previous Transcript	Next Transcript

Myke Hurley: Hello and welcome to episode 103 of The Pen Addict podcast on 5x5. The Pen Addict is a weekly show where we discuss pens, paper, and the analogue tools that we love so dearly. My name is Myke Hurley and I am joined, as I always am, by Mr. Brad Dowdy.

Brad Dowdy: How are you, Myke?

Myke Hurley: I'm good, sir. How are you?

Brad Dowdy: Good, good. You don't play, do you? I don't think listeners understand how professional Myke Hurley is. Because we've been chatting on Skype, just catching up, doing some things we need to do for about 5 or 10 minutes. And Myke goes, all right, mate, you ready? I said, yeah, I'm ready. Hello and welcome to the...

Myke Hurley: Hey, man, you just turned that stuff on. You're just ready to go, you know?

Brad Dowdy: Yeah, I'd be like, okay, let me gather myself, let me collect my thoughts. And man, you're a pro. I love it.

Myke Hurley: I just switch it on, you know? It's game time.

Brad Dowdy: Yep, yep, it's on. It's on. So, well, good. I'm doing good. I got some of the... well, not some of the... all of the winners from last week's episode 102, where we gave away all the episode 100 prizes. Yep. Everyone was... all the winners were real excited. They got in touch super fast. I didn't have to hunt anyone down, which I'm always happy about. Just shows me that they were listening properly. And I think within two days, everyone had gotten in touch, gotten everyone's shipping information, and I got everyone shipped out yesterday. It was fun packing those boxes.

Myke Hurley: Oh, I bet. Yeah, I bet. We haven't had people tweet us. I just had a smile on my face. Yeah, we had people tweet us that night, if I remember. Yeah. Like, a few hours.

Brad Dowdy: So, like, 7 Eastern is about when that one went live. And I think within an hour, I think maybe the first one had said something. And then, I think we had three of them that night, three out of the five that night, and the next two, like, within the next day.

Myke Hurley: People were ready. They wanted to know if they had won.

Brad Dowdy: I know. I know. They were anxious, which I would be, too. That was some cool stuff. So, I had fun packing up all those boxes. And it was neat kits, I guess, that you'd say, that we had put together. So, I'm excited to be able to do that again one of these days. And I think we will. So, I think that's a good idea to do that on a regular basis. It's very cool.

Myke Hurley: So, fun things maybe do every year, I think.

Top Five Pens List

Brad Dowdy: Yep. Yep. One thing I try to do more than at least once a year is update my top five pins list. And it's been on the radar for a couple months now. And I finally got it mostly done. So, a bunch of people have been emailing me asking when my next update is going to be. And I'm hoping to post it Wednesday, if not Wednesday, Friday. So, it'll definitely be this week. But I just wanted to mention that to see if anyone had any top fives that I don't currently have listed. I don't want to mention any additions. Like, the last time I added fountain pen inks. And this time, someone wanted me, a few people wanted me to make a specific blue-black fountain pen ink. Since that's the ink color I use most. So, I'm adding in a top five blue-black inks list. And I'm adding in a top five multi-pens list. For some reason, I didn't have that on there. And I've had several people ask me for that. So, if anyone has any ideas or things they want to see on the top five list that I don't already do, let me know. But let me know soon because I'm working on it and I'm going to publish it this week for sure.

Myke Hurley: What about a sort of non-writing pen pens? So, like, highlighters, markers, brush pens.

Brad Dowdy: That's a good idea.

Myke Hurley: So, like, not gel ink, not rollable, not ballpoint, not fountain pen. That type of idea. I don't think you could have a list for all of the things. But maybe just, like, these are some pens that I really like that are none of the above.

Brad Dowdy: Yep.

Myke Hurley: Because I would like to see that, you know.

Brad Dowdy: I like that because I do have a favorite highlighter. And I do have a couple of favorite brush-type pens. So, that aren't listed anywhere on that page. That's a good idea. Cool. So, let's say something like a non-standard pens or something.

Myke Hurley: Like a non-writing? I don't know. Like, not. I don't know what you'd call it because I guess all pens are writing. Yeah.

Brad Dowdy: Like, I couldn't have a full top five highlighter list or full top five brush pen list. Yeah.

Myke Hurley: I don't think anybody would necessarily need that anyway.

Brad Dowdy: Nope. I know, right? Brush pens I could see. But I'm not an artist. And, you know, I use them to write with. So, I like the ones that are very specific, leaned more towards writing. But you could – someone could – some artist could definitely have a top five brush pens. But not me. Anything else you can think of? I think I've got it pretty well on lockdown.

Myke Hurley: I'm going to assume you're not ready for pencils.

Brad Dowdy: No. I thought about it this time, but not yet. I think I – right now, I think I have like a top two.

Myke Hurley: Right.

Brad Dowdy: So, even though I've reviewed a couple more than that, there's two that I'm very confident in that I like better than anything else. But I need to give – I have a handful more I'm going to review before I do that. So, I will work on that maybe for the next update. But I think that's definitely on the radar.

Brad Dowdy: So, I don't want to give too much away tomorrow or for whenever I post it. But I think there's not huge changes, but there's some good changes. And when I – it's been like six months since I've updated. I usually like to update it about every three. So, there's actually quite a bit of change in this one. So, we'll see. So, if anyone else has any suggestions, ideas for that, get in touch and we'll see what I can do.

Myke Hurley: Whenever you do this, this is one of those things where I both want to and do not want to read. Because I know that if you've got updates to the top five, then there's potentially going to be something expensive happening in my future.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. It's the let's yell at Brad list update.

Myke Hurley: Yeah. Well, a lot of lists. Basically, a lot of the stuff you write is yell-worthy in a good way.

Brad Dowdy: Yep. Yep. But I've been happy, though, doing this top five since I've had like the top – just like the top overall pens like across all categories. People will go out and buy like all five of them or something or at least four out of the five because one of them is a fountain pen, the TWSBI 580. But the other four probably would cost you about $10 or $12 total. So people have been going out and buying all those and going, you know, telling, you know, thank you very much. This is great. I didn't realize, you know, there are things like this out there. I see why these pens are good, better than what I was using. So that makes me feel good. I'm at least able to help out a little bit like that for people that are trying to discover some new writing instruments. We've got a loaded up episode here today. I mean, doing it a little bit different than our normal format. So let's go ahead and talk about the pen blog of the week, and then we're going to get into listener tweets, which I put a call out last night, I think it was, yesterday afternoon. Because we just recorded last Thursday, and between last Thursday and today, I've worked like constantly. I haven't had time to put together necessarily segments for an episode. So I like to hear from the listeners and what they want to hear us talk about, and it jars my memory on some other topics that I've forgotten about. And just to answer some very specific questions that people have. So we're going to do that today. But real quick, the pen blog of the week is Kronikos Esteliographicos. How did I do?

Myke Hurley: I think that sounded pretty good to me. Yeah.

Brad Dowdy: So this is a website, if you're a reader of my blog, which I'm assuming you are, and a fan of my ink links, that you will see Mr. Bruno Tout's Kronikos Esteliographicos blog all throughout my blog. This is one of my favorite pen blogs ever. Because he focuses a lot on the Japanese pen market, a lot of the new pens, but a lot of the old pens, where I've been able to learn about the history of some of the favorite pens that I like. He's doing a whole series on the Pilot Vanishing Point and its origins. He's always talking about Sailor and Platinum, how some of their pen models came to be. So it's not necessarily a review site, but it's more of a historical look at a lot of these pens, how their design came to be, how they did in the market, why they're not on the market anymore. He's got some really rare and unique items on here. And if for some reason you've missed out on this blog, it's a must-add. This is one of my singular favorite blogs to read whenever Bruno makes a new post. It's usually the first one I go to because it really speaks to me in the things that I like. So it's always a good learning experience. And I've referenced it a lot. He's had some good reference posts that I've referred other people to to try to get answers about, I don't know, vanishing point nib units or some strange things like that. But it's very good. He's been very helpful over the years answering questions for me. So y'all should definitely check it out.

Myke Hurley: Good stuff. Good pick.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. Very good. Very good. All right. You want to dive into it?

Myke Hurley: Yes. Now, this is one of those things like these days. It used to be like when I'd see you say, oh, you know, we've got a, we want to do an episode on with your questions or whatever. I used to retweet the person, but I didn't do that anymore because it's that you get so many responses. It's kind of not worth it.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. So I've got like what? Four pages, four pages of tweets in here.

Myke Hurley: I kind of looked at the tweet. I was like, I wonder how many. And I saw like the number. I was like, I'm not going to do this. Brad can collect these because otherwise I'll just be doing it all day.

Brad Dowdy: Yep. Yep. So what I wanted to do is I copied pretty much everything that I saw. And if I miss you, I apologize. It was not on purpose. I might have just overlooked it. But there's some that are definitely worth answering and having a discussion about. There's some of these that are really good that I want to elaborate that I might push off into like a bigger topic in a future episode, if that makes sense. There were a couple of them that grabbed me that is like, you know, I want to expand on that more than, you know, the minute or two that I'm talking about most of these. But let's get into it. The first one, and I don't have a lot of experience with this, so I'm actually calling on the listeners for this. It's from Mina. She says, hi, can you recommend any pens for someone who has arthritis in their hands? And she, since I don't have a lot of experience with this, the only thing I can think of that's really made, what you're looking for in an ergonomic style pen is a wider barrel and a softer grip. Now, not having arthritis, I can't really speak to how that actually works in reality. But the theory is that you'll have the wider grip, so it's more comfortable, and a softer grip, so it's more comfortable to help alleviate some of that pain. So something like the Pilot Doctor grip is a good pen to look at. Also, any of the Uniball Alpha gel grip pens, they're a large barrel with an extra soft grip, and those are something that I would look at. So if anyone has any more specifics around this topic, shoot me an email or a tweet, and I will forward it on to Mina to see, to give some other ideas. But those are my suggestions right out the gate.

Colt Pens

Myke Hurley: So, quick point. I'm on Colt pens right now. Dr. Grip has been discontinued. The whole line? It says, the Doctor grip range has now been discontinued. That's what it says. Wow. Colt pens. Although they have some in stock. Oh, no, no, they're discontinued. But they have put together an ergonomic pens page. Could be useful. I'll put that in the show notes.

Brad Dowdy: Yep, and JetPens has an ergonomic pens page, too.

Myke Hurley: I'll put that in there, too. The show notes for this episode are at 5x5.tv slash penaddict slash 103.

Myke Hurley: Good call, good call. Sorry about that.

Brad Dowdy: No, no. That's surprising. You can still find them. That's surprising.

Pen Availability

Myke Hurley: Because when I Googled, I also found an Amazon link. So, you can still buy them. But I don't think that... I would probably guess that suppliers can't order them in anymore.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. I'm going to have to check into that. Because that's kind of surprising. Because that's kind of a historically popular line for them. But I don't know. Maybe they'll pivot into the Acroball Dr. Grip or something. And do something with the better refill. Because it's a standard ballpoint refill. And actually, those Dr. Grip refills, the ones that I've reviewed, have been excellent. So, yeah. That kind of surprises me. So, yeah. Color me shocked.

Brad Dowdy: All right. J. Robert Lennon. Do you follow J. Robert Lennon, Myke, on Twitter? You should. I'm not sure if I do. He's a good dude. He's hilarious. And he's got some smart stuff to say all the time. He wants to know, will NotCo someday make pens? I'm not going to say no.

Myke Hurley: I think it's inevitable. At some point. Like, at some point, you'll make a pen. But it's a totally different thing. Like, it's not Jeffrey's area of expertise. It's not yours.

Brad Dowdy: It's come up in conversation. Put it that way. It's not imminent by any stretch of the imagination. But it's on the one of these days, this would be nice list. So, it's on the radar, but nowhere near imminent.

Myke Hurley: Maybe the range. Maybe Colt Pens have just discontinued it from their catalog.

Brad Dowdy: That's possible. That's possible.

Brad Dowdy: Sorry. I didn't mean for you to get wrapped up in the Dr. Grip. Sorry.

Myke Hurley: I was just thinking about it then.

Brad Dowdy: It's not Dr. Who cancellation. You can settle down. All right. Stuart. Stuart from Informal Scribble. He says, A question I would like you both to discuss. What fountain pen would you recommend for somebody that is turning 31 next month? I have it on good record that he's talking about himself. Because we've actually talked about this on Twitter. He's looking at something like the Pilot Falcon. And what else did he say? It's the Pilot Mickey Falcon. Edison Beaumont, maybe? I can't remember. But anyway, he was wanting to change it up a little bit and get something cool for his upcoming birthday. And I have a lot of questions like that. What do you give for a birthday? What do you give for a gift? And it's a really hard answer. For him, I recommended, and he actually, it wasn't a Beaumont. It was one of the Franklin Kristoff pens.

Brad Dowdy: I kind of recommended maybe the Franklin Kristoff, because I think he might like one of the Masuyama type nibs, maybe more so than the Flex nib of the Falcon. But the Falcon's a pretty awesome pen too, so I'm not really going to help you out a lot here, Stuart, other than saying those are two good choices, and you're not going to go wrong with either one, depending on what you want to do with the pens.

Myke Hurley: So what was the Falcon?

Brad Dowdy: The Pilot Falcon.

Brad Dowdy: It's a Flex nib. It's a gold Flex nib pen, which it's excellent. It's definitely one of my favorites. It's one of the best writing pens I have, and it's got a flexible nib.

Myke Hurley: So my sort of feeling about those birthday, especially landmark birthday presents, is go for the expensive executive pen.

Myke Hurley: That's how I feel about that, because I think that's what people expect and want in that scenario.

Brad Dowdy: So I found this tweet, and he's actually looking for something to get out of the fine nib rut. So he's looking for either a Flex nib pen or something like a stub or italic nib, and looking at those type of brands that carry those. So yeah, the Pilot Falcon and any of the Franklin Kristoffs, because they're all swappable into those really good Myke Masuyama nibs that I'm enjoying thoroughly. Cool.

Stationery Reduction

Brad Dowdy: Stuart also asked, and this is one of the topics that came up repeatedly that I think I want to make into its own segment. He says another topic would be, what are both your daily carries, and have you been able to reduce your daily carry down? So I want to table that discussion, because what I would like to do with you, Myke, if you're game one day, is have like a bag dump episode. Sure.

Myke Hurley: Sure.

Brad Dowdy: And not just talk about pens, but just talk about the other things that we just carry. I think people would be interested in that.

Myke Hurley: It's clear out a month.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah, I know, right? So the reduction topic comes up a lot, and we'll talk about that a little more down the line here. But I think that's an entire segment that I want to plan for and get you and I, I think, doing a bag dump episode would be pretty good. And we can cover, you know, the challenges we have, because I have challenges with that all the time.

Brad Dowdy: So yeah, we'll table that one, Stuart, and we'll circle back around. I've already made a note on it that I wanted to do that. So Joe Lebo, Roar and King Cleaner, Salix or Scabiosa? Which to first ink up my new 580 with? Scabiosa, for sure. I love that purple. It's one of my favorite inks. It's definitely on my top five inks list. I think I have it at like number two or three. It's that good. I love Salix, but I have lots of blue black inks. And Salix is close to like being a top five ink, but not quite there for me. Scabiosa is like a top two or three overall ink for me. And I highly recommend that to anybody. And don't be worried. People sometimes worry about the iron gall properties. These Roar and Kingner inks are so well behaved and clean out so easy. I've used them in so many different pens and never had one hint of an issue. So Joe also asked, what's the best way to clean the inside top portion of a vanishing point near the trap door part? That's a hard little place to get into. I've just soaked mine in water for a little bit and then folded up a paper towel like into like a very fine little area and just kind of jammed it in there. I've never taken it all the way apart or gotten way down in there. I don't get too much ink trapped in there, but I don't know the absolute best way, but that's how I do it. And just kind of going through the front end of the nose and just kind of get it cleaned out in there.

Myke Hurley: What about, this probably wouldn't work actually. I was thinking maybe if you used water and then one of those, you know, you get like, I can't think of what to call it, like air in a can.

Brad Dowdy: Oh, yeah. Well, you know what might work is the nasal aspirators that actually use the clean nibs. Yeah. That actually might work. That'll force air through there.

Myke Hurley: Basically, you want to get air at high speed, I think, would be a good way because wear paper towels would be good and I agree with them. I worry about getting a piece jammed in there.

Brad Dowdy: Yep. Yep. So, yeah, I think aspirator is a good call because it can come from the nib end and it can come from the barrel end. So you can get it both ways, Myke. You can get it on both ends.

Myke Hurley: Oh, Brad.

Brad Dowdy: It's a pen podcast, man. We got to talk about things.

Brad Dowdy: Mr. Chase McCoy. He had a boatload of questions and they were all good, so I'll put them all in here. What are your thoughts on the Midori Traveler's Notebook? Now, do you own a system like this at all, Myke? No. I do not either, but I love the idea of it. I always love seeing people's pictures of them and think it's a really good format. I like that you can have the, you know, you have the one cover and usually two to three separate notebook inserts. I mean, I guess it could range from one to however many you can fit in there, but most common is three.

Brad Dowdy: I've just never had a use for that type of system, but I think the idea is awesome and I would recommend it to anyone that wanted a system like that. They get a lot of great, great reviews. I've never heard anyone say, oh, I just hate my Midori Traveler's Notebook. They're really good. It's just not a functional item for me, the way I work, but I think it's an awesome item in just the design and functionality of it.

Myke Hurley: So, is the idea being that you can put two notebooks in and you can have pockets?

Brad Dowdy: It doesn't really, it doesn't have a lot of pockets. Like, it's just wrapped with a rubber band type of enclosure on the outside and it's just a flat piece of leather, so there's no pockets on the leather side. If there's pockets on the, I think people have, you know, there's all kinds of hacks and there's all kinds of inserts you can buy for it. So, there's probably some pockets that are able to add in there. And, well, I'll ask Toffer. I think he's getting ready to travel and I think he's a Midori guy. I think he, like, carries his passport in there. So, people, like, really can kind of pimp these out for their needs.

Myke Hurley: Guess where I had my passport when I went away last weekend?

Brad Dowdy: What? Yeah.

Myke Hurley: In my Rotovar and Taschenberg letter.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah, I knew that was going to be the answer. I like it. That's good.

Myke Hurley: Things become more and more useful for me all the time.

Brad Dowdy: That's great. That is very cool. There you go. So, Chase also asked the popular question, what are good pens to give as graduation gifts? This is a really tough question because I just don't, I get this one in my email inbox at least once a week for this type of gift just from, you know, someone who really doesn't have any experience with it. And I tend to just go kind of like what you were saying with the classically styled pens, but I recommend, like, the Lamy 2000 rollerball and ballpoint a lot for someone who's not wanting a fountain pen.

Myke Hurley: Yeah, I think it's dangerous for us to always say fountain pens, fountain pens in these scenarios. It's probably most of the time a bad idea to go fountain pen.

Brad Dowdy: Yep. I almost never say fountain pen unless someone specifically says they want a fountain pen. Otherwise, I usually say rollerball and I usually say something like the Lamy because I know it's pretty much a timeless design and it's actually a pretty good value when you're starting to shop for these type of things where people are comparing them to, like, Mont Blanc rollerballs that might be $200 or $300. The Lamy rollerball, I think, is around $100, maybe a little less, something like that. And it's just a style. It looks cool. It feels cool. And it's never going to go out of style. So that's one I actually tend to recommend a lot for people who don't have a lot of experience and are wanting something interesting to give as a gift.

Brad Dowdy: Then Chase asked a third question. This is going to be a good question. What are your top five most exciting pens? Not the best ones necessarily, but the ones you feel everyone should have. So that's a hard question because I don't think those two things jive.

Myke Hurley: My top five exciting pens are not the ones that I feel everyone should have. Yeah, exactly. I agree with that 100%.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. My top five most exciting pens would probably start with my Edison Menlo, which is a pump filler, which was made specifically for me. You know, that's exciting for me. My Franklin Kristoff Pocket pen, that's the eyedropper. That's a very exciting pen for me because it's cool looking. It's interesting. People always ask questions about it. It's got a killer nib, but should everyone have that pen? Probably not. You know, there's – it's not quite that thing. If I could name a pen that everyone should have – can you name a pen that every – okay, Myke, everyone in the world gets a pen. What are we giving them?

Myke Hurley: Retro 51. Retro 51.

Myke Hurley: I'm obviously partly kidding.

Brad Dowdy: I don't know. I thought it was pretty serious. I thought it was a valid answer. That's a tough question.

Myke Hurley: I think, though, that you probably would be better off giving people like a – like, I don't know, one of the Moleskine pens or a Sharpie pen. Like, not the – Not the permanent. Yeah, not the permanent marker. Yeah. It's because they're better all-round pens. I think everybody could appreciate one of those, or maybe something like a Pilot G2 or something like that. Like a solid pen that everyone's going to be able to appreciate.

Pentel Energel

Brad Dowdy: Right. You know what's a good one is that I actually recommend a lot in email is the Pentel Energel. Because I'm not necessarily a huge fan of the G2, and the Energel always surprises people on how good of a pen it is. So, you know, that's one that every – a pen that everyone could own. But it's – I don't think that's – those pens are not exciting in the least. They're just high-quality workhorse-type pens. So, actually, I'm going to make a note here and think about this question a little bit more, see if I can come up with, like, a top five most exciting pens that are reasonable for everyone to have. What do you think about that?

Myke Hurley: That sounds like a great idea.

Brad Dowdy: Like, I think, you know, I think probably, like, a Fisher Space pen would make that list. Sure. You know, something like that.

Myke Hurley: Yeah, but I agree with you that exciting and everyone should have are not the same thing even nearly.

Brad Dowdy: Yep. So, I will work on that list. I'm making a note right now. So, except it's exciting, not exist – it's not the top five most existing pens. Well, that too, though. It's the top five most exciting.

Myke Hurley: Well, I guess the top five pens that exist, that's definitely a list that you're working on.

Brad Dowdy: See, this is where you're pro, too. You can talk, write, cut, paste, and show note all at the same time. I can barely walk and put one foot in front of the other one. I don't know. It's not talking to you.

Myke Hurley: You do a lot more of the talking than I do.

Brad Dowdy: For a reason. All right. Artist, artist, not artist, artist, Charbonneau, Flex Nibs, Brands, Descriptions, What's a Soft Flex versus a Music Nib? Sorry if I missed an episode that covered this. We have not covered, done a whole episode on – I call these specialty nibs for the most part. And I don't have a lot of experience with things like the Music Nibs or there's other nibs called the Zoom Nibs. So maybe we'll put together a segment just on specialty nibs. Flex nibs I'm a huge fan of. I don't have a lot of experience with them, though. I love how they feel. And I love my Pilot Falcon on how it writes because I can write very fine with the tip of it.

Brad Dowdy: And then I can add that flex when I'm writing if I need to, to broaden the line or add some character to the lines I'm writing. But I don't know that I have a huge amount to say about that because I'm not that experienced with it. I mean there's people who are seriously into the Flex Nibs and can talk about the range of Flex in those nibs. So that's something I'll research more and we'll do another segment on what are the specialty nibs out there, what do they have to offer you, and what you need to look for when buying them. Especially for things like the Music Nib and the Zoom Nibs and the PO Nibs that I have. So we will cover that some more.

Brad Dowdy: And Elizabeth says, not necessarily a podcast topic, but recently tried Pilot Acroball and love it for work. Great recommendation. That's one of the most commented on pens that I get when I recommend it. They're like, most people find out the same thing, that this is a really great pen. It compares to the Jetstream. Some people probably like it better. I could argue that it's better. Jetstream just has a few more options than the Acroball does right now. But the Acroball is an amazing pen and I'm finally glad that Pilot brought them over into the U.S. Do you have an Acroball? Did I send you one a long time ago?

Myke Hurley: Yeah, you did.

Brad Dowdy: You probably don't use it. It's probably not a heavy rotation pen for you.

Myke Hurley: No, not even nearly. I liked it a lot more than the Jetstream. Yeah. Because I don't like those. Yep.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah, if they would expand on that line a little bit like Jetstream has done, I think it could actually overtake the Jetstream. They're just playing catch up at this point. They're a good decade behind in that technology, in the hybrid ballpoint ink technology. So people are setting their ways with the Jetstream. But if they try an Acroball, they could make some inroads into Jetstream's market share. This was, I think, the best question out of all the questions we got. Jesse Sadler says, Excitement of expensive pens versus fun of being excited at $2 pens. Part of the draw of pens is that it can be an inexpensive hobby. I totally agree with that. That's how I started the blog. That's how I started Pen Addict with these inexpensive $2 and $3 pens that, honestly, at the time, just blew my mind. Like, I didn't know such a thing existed as a Pilot Hi-Tech C with these super fine .3 millimeter needle tips and all these huge range of ink colors. I almost, I get more excited at finding a great $2 pen than I do a great $200 pen. Because my expectations are that that $200 pen better be freaking good. And so, do I get excited about it? Yeah, I get excited about it, but in a different way that I may use it more and maybe have more satisfaction using it. But it's more fun to find a great $2 pen for me that can, you know, enter into, like, my pen rotation. Like, a Uni-Ball Sino DX. I think it's $2.50. It's always been around the same price. It's hard to beat that pen. And that is, I don't know, that's still one of the core things I try to do at Pen Addict. Even though I'm reviewing more fountain pens and more expensive pens, my favorite thing is still finding those great $2 and $3 pens.

Brad Dowdy: Oh, my Pilot Explorer enabler, Jalti from, gosh, where's he from? Denmark. I'm going to butcher that. He's going to be mad at me because he talks to me all the time. He's the one who sent me the dozen Pilot Explorer. He says, talk about pocket pens. What will it replace the Pilot Explorer? And what the Pilot Explorer had going for it was size. It was a little bit smaller than a standard length pen. It was a little bit wider than a standard diameter pen. Had a good grip. Had a great clip.

Brad Dowdy: I don't know that it's necessarily a pure pocket pen. And I'm actually having some struggles with pocket pens right now, trying to find that right thing. I've got a review of really more of a keychain pen coming out later this week. It was on Kickstarter. It's called The Move. But I've got the Lamy Pico, which is a good pocket pen. That might be a good choice, but you're stuck with the ballpoint refill. So I'm having some challenges, and I've got some ideas. So hold that thought, Jalti. And I've got some ideas on that that are hopefully coming out on the blog soon. I hate to talk around that question, but I don't think there's a clear replacement for the Pilot Explorer right now in the way that pen is designed.

Myke Hurley: Such a tease.

Brad Dowdy: I know. I know. That's why I like these questions. They give me some good ideas for some topics, too. So they're helping us make the show that they want to listen to, Myke.

Myke Hurley: And the blog they want to read.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah, absolutely. All right. This is a good question. You ready?

Myke Hurley: Yeah.

Hobonichi Teco

Brad Dowdy: How are things working out with the Hobonichi Teco?

Brad Dowdy: Horribly.

Myke Hurley: Oh.

Brad Dowdy: But it's me. It's not you, Hobonichi Teco. I'm not a planner person. I knew this was going to be the case when I ordered it. This is why I haven't ordered a planner in years. The Hobonichi Teco itself is an elite product. I actually hardly use it these days. And when I do use it, it's just because I want to write on the Tomo River paper. So all the days that I've missed this year, you know, I'll have, you know, like fountain pen ink tests on them. So I'm using it for not its intended use. I'm not a planner guy. I tried to stick to it. Totally the same. Can't do it.

Myke Hurley: I don't like to be restricted so heavily.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. I don't think I made it through February daily. It was close, you know, maybe through the end of February. And since then, it's just been blank. And I actually stopped carrying it with me. And then sometimes I'll break it out just to scribble in it because that paper is awesome. If Hobonichi came out with like a gridded bound Tomo River paper notebook, I would buy 10 of them. But the planner portion itself is just not a functional thing for me. So I won't be ordering one again despite the fact it's one of the best products I've ever seen. As far as planners go, I just cannot personally use a planner. That is not my style, not my system. But it's not a knock on the Teco itself. So there you have it. It's been a fail for me using it. But that doesn't mean it's not an awesome product.

Brad Dowdy: Kanuni Rineshen, I think she's distraught now that she doesn't have a list to keep. So she wants to know, do we need to add anything else to the pens that shall not be named list?

Brad Dowdy: She needs a new list to keep, Myke.

Myke Hurley: That's a good question. Because, I mean, aside from my mention earlier in your mention, like we don't talk about the retro and the vanishing point like we used to.

Myke Hurley: I think probably, I don't know, maybe the Pelican M205 because I talk about it so much. Do you have one that you talk about more now than?

Brad Dowdy: I don't think so. I think it's pretty well spread around. And I don't think we have an overwhelming pen that's always talked about. Except maybe the Visionaire, just out of spite.

Myke Hurley: We don't talk about that anymore.

Brad Dowdy: So, yeah, I don't think we have one right now. I don't think we're okay. We'll do our best to find another one, though.

Myke Hurley: Yeah, I mean, that's what we're always trying to do, right?

Brad Dowdy: Mm-hmm. Yep. I would love it. Whoa. Hey, there. Jim Cant. He says, oh, talk about your grinds. See, if I just ended it right there, would you have to change our rating on the podcast?

Myke Hurley: I don't even. Probably, actually.

Brad Dowdy: Or you can just tell me what you had redone to your Lamy 2000. So, yeah, my Lamy 2000 2013 Atlanta Pen Show, I got Myke Masuyama to grind it from an extra fine, stock extra fine nib into like an extra, extra fine 0.2 millimeter.

Brad Dowdy: What do you consider? Like a Japanese extra fine nib.

Myke Hurley: Just a needle.

Brad Dowdy: Yep. Really, really super, super fine. The problem with that is that's a very, on a gold nib, which the Lamy 2000 has, it's a very delicate nib. So, it was fine for a couple of months, and then I think it just kind of got out of whack with me using it, and it started to pick up paper and dig into the paper a little bit more. So, it wasn't as smooth as it used to be. So, I brought it back to the Pen Show this year, and I basically had Myke Masuyama kind of back that off a little bit. You know, there wasn't much I could change about it, but he almost kind of rounded it off and doled it down, if you will, to now where it's more like a Japanese fine nib. And it writes super smooth now. It's not grabbing the paper anymore. So, yeah, that was all I had to do with that. It just, it was almost too extreme. What I had done to it the first time to where it became so fragile, I think it just stopped working the way I wanted it to work. So, luckily, we were able to just back that off a little bit, and now it's working perfectly. I used it all night last night, and I love it. So, yeah, it's back to a good shape now, probably like a Japanese fine instead of a Japanese extra fine, or even, I might have had it even finer than that. I mean, it was really, really, really needly. So, you got to be careful with those gold nibs and getting these extra, extra fine nibs. It can be done, but they take a lot of care and a lot of patience. And, you know, someone like myself, I don't think I write with a lot of pressure, but when someone like Myke Masuyama watches me write, and he like goes, ooh, you press hard, and I think I'm just barely writing. So, yeah, you kind of get an idea that you can actually do some damage to these nibs just writing with them when they're that fine. So, on this very same note, Lindsay Resnick, what should you do if you got a nib modification but now absolutely hate it? I tried it out at the show, and it was okay, but not anymore. You got to talk to the person that you had the nib work done with originally, and they will make an adjustment for you, usually at no charge, or if it's been a while, maybe at a discounted charge. But if you're not happy with it, everyone I've ever worked with on nibs will take it back and retweak it to get it to how you want it. As a matter of fact, I didn't expect anything from Myke Masuyama this time on my Lamy, but he only charged me $10 to change it again. I said, well, why just $10? He said, because it's a rework of what I've already done. And I said, okay. So, that was it. So, it just cost me $10 to get it. You know, it had been a whole year. You know, he probably, if it had been a month, he'd probably done it for free, you know. So, Lindsay, definitely, I don't know who you used, but I would get back in touch with them and send the pen off to them, say, hey, this is the work I had done. This nib grind is not really working for me, and can you adjust it into this? And I can almost guarantee you, they'll say, yeah, no problem. Send me the pen, and I'll get it adjusted to make it to where you like it. So, it's hard to judge something immediately at a pen show. You do the best you can, but it's not like you're going to sit there and write a novel to test it out, right? So, you kind of got to spend some time with it, and if you have to get it adjusted again, maybe that's something you have to do.

Myke Hurley: But I would say, I mean, you probably would say the same if you're not already. Be a gentleman or gentleman lady, offer to pay the shipping. Oh, yeah, no doubt. Don't just be like, hey, do this for me for free.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah, no, no, yeah. Pay the shipping, ship it back out, pay the ship it back. But, you know, hopefully they'll do the work for no charge.

Myke Hurley: Yeah.

Brad Dowdy: It's kind of the experience that I've had, and I think that's pretty common, actually. So, don't think you had some kind of outlier experience, Lindsay. I think it's a common thing. It's just, you know, it's hard to tell immediately after you've had it done, is this the right work for me? And it's okay to ask them to readjust it further. That's the business that they're in. All right. Garrett, Mr. Gaz Kubat on Twitter.

Brad Dowdy: It's a two-parter, or it was at least in two tweets. Consider your favorite pens in regards to the dollar value. Do the more expensive ones seem drastically better than cheaper alternatives? I think a lot of people worry about the big price tag and whether it represents a much greater experience. This is like a whole episode worth of answer. But I would say, in general, does the big price tag represent that much greater of an experience? And the answer is no. There are reasons, specific reasons, why people will spend a lot of money on a fountain pen. But some of my favorite pens are because they provide such a great value as far as the cost versus the experience, if you will. That's why I praise pens like the Twisby 580. You can't get that pen. Any other company that makes that pen is going to charge over $100 easily, or at least around that ballpark. That's why it's such a great pen. Because, one, it's a great price. And two, it provides an immense value for the price. Spending $200 or $300 on a pen, I don't think gives you a greater experience, necessarily. Actually, I'd say probably not at all. Well, I get just as much enjoyment using my Twisby 580 as I do my Pelican M405, which costs like $280.

Brad Dowdy: I mean, the pen was five or six times more expensive. And I consider those pens almost peers, if you will, in the enjoyment that I get out of using them. I would pick up the Twisby 580 as much as I would the Pelican 405, despite the one costing five or six times more. They're almost peers in the enjoyment I get out of them. So, this is a topic we can explore more.

Brad Dowdy: But I think the overall value of the pen gives me a better experience than the overall cost of the pen, if I'm making sense. Do you have anything to say on that, Myke?

Myke Hurley: 100% agree with you. 100%.

Brad Dowdy: Okay. Yeah. And, you know, it's hard to justify spending the high dollar.

Brad Dowdy: There's give and take with everything, right? I mean, you know, someone like myself, I end up talking myself into things just to try. And, you know, fortunately, I'm able to do that and play around with, you know, spending, like I said, $280 on a Pelican M405. You know, I probably use the 580 more. But I spent, you know, a huge amount more on the Pelican. I'm glad I have the Pelican. I enjoy it. I don't want to get rid of it. But it didn't provide that much greater experience than it did than the $50 or $60 TWSB 580 did. So that's the facts, Jack.

Pen Budgeting

Brad Dowdy: Greg Jackson, budgeting for pen addicts, what to do with the pens you've bought but no longer use? This is something I'm struggling with a little bit right now. So in the past, where I'd say most of my pen usage was gel, ballpoint, rollerball, you know, plastic tip pen, when I'd have loads and loads of extra pens, I'd give all the extras away. So I've given away tons and tons of pens. So that's one thing I do. I take them to the office, give them to people there, give them to friends, give them to the wife, let her take them to work, those kind of things. But when you get into fountain pens, you can't really give those away because a lot of people don't have experience with them and don't have anything to do with them.

Brad Dowdy: You know, if you can sell some pens, I'm totally for that. I haven't done that. I'm not at that point yet. But I have some friends that are saying, you know, okay, I'm limiting to myself to X amount of fountain pens. So, you know, say the number's 10 and I find something new I like, well, one of those pens has to go. And I can't buy the new pen until I've sold off the other one to make a spot for it. So that's not a dollar budgeting, but it's a inventory budgeting, if you will. And I'm wondering if that's more what you're getting at, Greg, is the buying of more pens than you can necessarily use in a lifetime, which is kind of what I have right now. But there will be a point in my purchasing that I will have to assess, you know, do I need another pen? What you really have to consider, what need is this pen filling when you're, you know, trying to budget for your pen inventory? And if it's not necessarily filling a need, then, you know, maybe think twice about it or you limit yourself to a quantity of pens and you never go over that quantity. And one of them has to go if you want to bring a new one in. So Brandon asks, how did you choose your vintage flex pen? Prior research or just talk to vendors? Any advice on vintage flex now? I in no way can give advice on a vintage flex nib pen. I've, you know, I did a lot of reading and research online. Two brands kept coming up as the kind of go-to brands, Waterman and maybe Todd. So I knew kind of those were the brands I was looking for. Those were the styles I liked. Those were the ones that always got good reviews. And there was enough quantity out there to where they'd be reasonably priced. So that's all I did from a shopping standpoint. That's how I chose it. But I still got, I still have to learn how to use it. I barely scratched the surface with it right now. And I finally got it inked up last weekend and started writing with it some. But I need to, I need to go at it more and try to get some more experience with it on actually how to use it. But I just did a lot of reading and research online. But by no means do I have all that knowledge to be able to talk about vintage flex pens at all.

Brad Dowdy: Trent Ham. All right, Myke, this one's for you. What's your favorite small sturdy notebook? For example, what would you take if you were backpacking for several days?

Myke Hurley: There is this little company based in Chicago. Mm-hmm. Field Notes. Oh, I've heard of them. Look at those. Yeah, good stuff.

Brad Dowdy: Seriously, that's the one you'd want. Yeah, that's backpacking several days. Part of the, I guess, love for these type of notebooks, the memo books like Field Notes and Dome Paper, is that they're not the most sturdiest. They're going to get beat up. And if you're taking that notebook on a backpacking trip for several days, I don't want to come back with a pristine notebook. Right? I mean, I want it to have dirt and fingerprints on it. And, you know, it's part of the memory of the trip. But, you know, I don't necessarily want, like, a hardbound pocket notebook that's not going to get destroyed. I mean, there's a balance, right? I mean, if you're doing something hardcore and, you know, and where it actually, it's going to literally get destroyed, you know, in a river or something like that, well, then that's a different consideration. But just for, like, you know, small travel, I don't see anything better than a Field Notes memo book or a Dome Paper utility journal. It's just, it's part of the deal is get those things banged up. They look better used than unused. How about that?

Myke Hurley: Perfect.

Brad Dowdy: Mm-hmm. Jim wants to know, how about talking about how to keep your pens at home, trying to find a box that will keep them nicely but not break the bank? I've actually talked about that recently, and I use cigar box storage, and I order them from a guy named Bama Pen, and we've linked to them in the past. I pay $40 for a refurbished, felt-lined cigar box pen storage that I think holds 12 pens. It might be 10. I don't have it in front of me. It's 10 or 12 pens, and I think that's a completely fair price for the work that he does. I don't have storage other than that. If it's not for my fountain pens, all my other pens, like my, all my Kickstarter pens, Retrax, Retro 51, anything I'm using regularly goes into the blocks and the grooves by Myke Dudek. So those are the things that are all sitting on my desk for pen storage. Everything else goes into, I don't know, like bins in the closet. But the stuff that I'm keeping out and handy that I use a lot is either going into the cigar box pen storage or into one of Mr. Dudek's fine pen holding accessories. Christopher Graves. I might need some help with this one, Myke, because this is a good question. I'm really into innovation and stationery. As the Kuro Toga, the Tombow Olno, and the LiveScribe Pen. Live, LiveScribe Pen. What are some of your favorite stationery innovations?

Myke Hurley: Maybe a bunch of the stuff that Evernote's doing.

Myke Hurley: So they have like the Evernote notebooks and with Moleskine they have the Evernote post-it notes. That could be a place to start. Some interesting ways to bring the two things together.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah, I think my answer is actually a little bit simpler and maybe more obvious, but I think it's MicroTip gel pens. Just because you didn't, you know, five or, well, not five years, ten years ago, you couldn't necessarily get any pen under .5 millimeter. Gel, ballpoint, rollerball, whatever. And now the technology has come in to where manufacturers can make these really fine points. I mean, that's kind of hyper-specific to me because that's what I enjoy. But that would be one of my favorite innovations that now I can get a pen that suits my writing needs better. And it's just in the fact that they were able to make something that much finer with the same quality that they made the much larger pens in. So that's kind of my favorite innovation. Oh, I meant to look this up for Christopher. It says, I don't carry my specs in a floppy leather pouch, so why my precious pens? Are there any hard cases for carrying one or two pens on the go? Yes, there are. And I meant to look it up. I think it's Pelican that makes a box. It's like a hard, it's a leather box, but it's, I mean, it's super structured. And it won't break down, and it holds two pens, I think. I'll have to look that up. I'll have to ping Christopher. I meant to look that up before I got on the show today. And I think Kaweco makes either a one or two carry hard leather cover, too. But I think Pelican is the one that makes a box style. So I'll have to look into that for Christopher. So Pierce, who's my new friend from the Atlanta Pen Show, he bought the Franklin Kristoff Model 40 Pocket. And he's using it as an eyedropper. And he wants to know, is it normal to see ink in the section on top of the feed housing? Or talk about eyedroppers in general. It's, yes, absolutely normal to see ink in the section on the top of the feed. Mine do it 100% of the time. And it's nothing to worry about at all. It doesn't leak out of there. It doesn't get out of there at all. It's just the normal flow of the pen. And in something like the Model 40 Pocket that's clear, like a demonstrator style, you're going to see all the nuts and bolts. So that's probably in all of our pens right now. We just can't see it in all of them. So, yeah, that's completely normal.

Brad Dowdy: Using that as an eyedropper has been kind of eye-opening to me. And I haven't really experienced any other eyedroppers yet. But I now, where I used to not consider eyedropper conversion pens at all, now I will consider them. Because it's actually easier than anticipated to keep them intact, keep them sturdy and safe and clean. And they work great. And it's really easy to fill and generally easy to clean. So, just got to add a little silicone grease and you're good to go.

Brad Dowdy: So, Terry asked a question that we've had a hundred times. But, you know, Terry might be new to the show. So, I wanted to see if you had any different answer to this, Myke. But Terry wants to know, as a newbie, what would you guys recommend as a starter fountain pen? And it's pretty much the Pilot Metropolitan still. Or the Lamy Safari, if you like that style. I don't have anything better than those right now. That's still the go-to fountain pens for me.

Brad Dowdy: As a very beginner fountain pen user, you want to get into something new, try something different. Those are your two choices. And I don't think there's a third. Your thoughts on that? You agree, I think?

Myke Hurley: I agree 100%.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. That's actually come to be an easier answer in the past six months to a year since the Metropolitan came out. Yep. And I know it's not a pen. I don't necessarily love that pen. There's a... The section is a little bit not great for me. But it's too good of a pen to not recommend. It's just that good. So, Tony Roman. And before I get to Tony... Yeah, we're almost done here. Okay, cool. I was going to say, do I need to cut this off at some point? We've got a lot of questions. Tony, I want to say thanks to Tony for all of his Twitter questions and just all of his following. He's one of my favorite people to chat with on Twitter. He's always got good stuff to talk about. And I really like talking with Tony. So, he says, my transition to the dark side is nearly complete. I use fountain pens 95% of the time. How about you guys in day-to-day use? What you got, Myke?

Myke Hurley: Oh, it's constant. I use fountain pens. I'm a fountain pen user.

Brad Dowdy: So, you're at least 95. If not 100.

Myke Hurley: Maybe not 100, but like so close to it, it might as well be.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. I'd say, for me, it's a little different because I'm actually having to test and review pens. So, I actually use other pens a lot just because I'm trying to learn about them. But if I'm choosing a pen and I say, okay, I'm going to take some pens with me and I'm going to go right, it's going to be a fountain pen.

Brad Dowdy: These days. I'd say I'm probably 80-20 because I still use a lot of my Kickstarter barrels. I carry the Render K with me all the time because it's got my high-tech C refill in it. And I carry the Tactile Turn Mover with me all the time because it's got the .38 blue-black Pilot Juice refill. So, I use those a lot.

Brad Dowdy: All right. A couple more. From Martin, I have a Lamy Vista and a TWSBI Classic, both with an M nib. What do you recommend going forward? More pens or, first, other nib sizes? This is a really good question. And I have a hard time answering this.

Brad Dowdy: You need to research what you're trying to accomplish, what you want to accomplish with your next pen purchase. There may not be a next pen purchase. Maybe these pens meet your needs. You have to ask, why do I want another pen? This is coming from a guy who's got an insane amount of pens and buys pens left and right without asking himself those questions. But I don't want people to look at it as, okay, I've bought this and I've bought this. What's the next pen I buy? Even though that's kind of the path I've taken. And I've enjoyed that path and I've learned a lot and I've found pens that, out through that experimentation, that I never thought I would have liked. But when you ask the question like this, I have a hard time saying, this is what you should try next. I mean, should I say, you should try a gold nib pen because you've only tried these steel nibs. I mean, that's a decent place to look at next.

Brad Dowdy: You know, something like Alami 2000, a Pilot Vanishing Point, that lower end tier of gold pens. Actually, I would recommend the Pilot Custom Heritage 91 over all those if you can find it, just because it's a better value than both of those pens. But philosophically, it's hard to answer this question because everyone's different. You know, maybe these pens are good for you. And, you know, so you need to look at, like something with the TWSBI Classic is a piston filler. That's a great option. You know, you can buy, like you said, you can buy an extra fine nib for that TWSBI Classic. You can buy a stub nib for that TWSBI Classic. That's why I always talk about TWSBI so much because they do a really good job at giving you the best bang for your buck with the most options. No one else can really compete with them in that price bracket at all. It's not close. But recommending that next pen, that's hard. The only thing I can say is maybe a gold nib pen, but I wouldn't force it. I mean, figure out, okay, what do I like about the pens that I currently have? What don't I like about these pens? And then see if there's an answer that kind of fits that. So I hope that's a decent answer, Martin. It's a really good question and it's kind of a hard one to answer. And I'd be happy to talk about it more with you if you have any more questions about it.

Myke Hurley: My advice would be not more pens yet because what you will inevitably do is buy more pens without necessarily understanding what your best and favorite nib size is right now. So I would maybe suggest if you haven't already, get a pen that does have a bunch of different nibs that you can get for it and just buy a few and try them out. So like a Twisby, if you haven't already got one, you know.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah, he's got the Twisby Classic, which is easily swappable nibs.

Myke Hurley: Right, then you should try and invest in a few different nib sizes and try those out. Find your favorite nib and then start buying new bodies that you like. That would be my advice.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah, so you're right in the middle of that spectrum right now with a medium nib. I'd try maybe an extra fine and then maybe a 1.1 stub nib.

Myke Hurley: Yep.

Brad Dowdy: And then you'll kind of see between those three, these are the types of things. This is the nibs. These are the nib sizes that I prefer and what pens and nibs are going to give me that best option going forward. So that's good advice.

Ink Properties

Brad Dowdy: Thomas wants to learn about ink properties and how to test them. There are so many different types of ink reviews out there. Thomas, I'm with you, brother.

Brad Dowdy: There are ink reviews that are epic in length and thoroughness. And what I would tell you is I would go to the Fountain Pen Network, go to their ink reviews board, and look at some of the default templates that people use. They cover every single thing about the ink that you can imagine. I'm never going to get to that point. There I go saying never again, Myke. Never say never. I'm likely not going to get to that point on the pen addict because I just don't have the time. Or those type of tests that people are doing do not interest me in my daily use of a fountain pen ink. I need to know a lot fewer things about an ink than some people. I just need to know, is it going to work good on this paper? And is it going to feel good when I write with it? I'm not personally concerned with waterproofness and bulletproofness and different kinds of tests and pH levels of the ink. It's not a concern to me. But the biggest resource is the Fountain Pen Network. And I would go look at those templates and see what on those templates appeal to you and then test out those things in the inks. You don't have to test all those properties. Test out what's important to you. That's why when I do my ink reviews, I keep them real simple. How does it look? How does it perform? What's the dry time like? I mean, is it obscene? And, you know, and that might be an issue. And that's about it for me. You know, the performance, the looks, the feel. But you can get way, way more in depth. And that's where I would start.

Brad Dowdy: Chris is asking me about my Typhoon, my Visconti Typhoon Opera Blue that I just bought. How am I finding it? And he compares it to another Visconti called the Homo Sapiens Steel Age Oversize, which is, ooh, it's a beautiful pen. And how are you finding the opera? It's really good.

Brad Dowdy: It's still hard to put into words. That's one of those justifications. Does it justify the money that you spend on it? Yeah, right now it does. But, you know, I'm going to get a full review on this. Right now, I'm very happy with it. I can't compare it to the other pen you mentioned, the Homo Sapiens Steel. That pen is a beautiful pen. Looked at it online. It's a stunner. I don't know if I'd be able to pick between the two. I don't have that much experience with it. But I'm very happy with my Typhoon purchase so far.

Brad Dowdy: All right, Myke. Last question. You ready? Ready. This is for you. Okay. It's from our friend Slug Nutty. What is the airspeed velocity of an unladen swallow?

Myke Hurley: I don't have – no.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. So the answer to that question is African or European. And we'll leave it at that. Thank you, Mr. Slug Nutty.

Myke Hurley: Thank you so much for listening to this week's episode of the Pen Addict Podcast. Thank you all for sending in your questions and for all of you for listening. If you'd like to send in questions for future episodes, there's a few ways you can do that. You can go to 5x5.tv slash Pen Addict and hit the contact button at the top. That will send us an email. If you want to find the show notes for this week's episode, go to 5x5.tv slash Pen Addict slash 103. Brad is at Dowdyism, D-O-W-D-Y-I-S-M, on Twitter, and he writes over at Pen Addict.com. My name is Myke Hurley, and I am at iMike, I-M-Y-K-E, on Twitter. Thank you again for listening, and we'll be back next week on Thursday of next week for another episode of the Pen Addict Podcast. Until then, say goodbye, Brad. Goodbye, Brad.