The Pen Addict 14/transcript

The Pen Addict Podcast Transcript
Episode:	14
Title:	Vanished in Customs
Release Date:	May 17th, 2012
Hosts:	Brad Dowdy Myke Hurley
Guests:	No guests this episode
Additional Information
Official page:	Episode 14
Audio File:	Audio Episode 14
Podcast page:	The Pen Addict 14
Length:	3737 min <br />0.617 h <br /> minutes
Previous Transcript	Next Transcript

Myke Hurley: Hello and welcome to The Pen Addict, a weekly show where we talk about pens, paper, and all of the lovely analogue tools that we love so dearly. My name is Myke Hurley and I'm joined, as always, by your host, Mr. Brad Dowdy, The Pen Addict himself. Hello, Brad.

Brad Dowdy: Hey, Myke. How's it going?

Myke Hurley: Very well, sir. Very well. This episode is sponsored by Squarespace and Pernote. We're going to talk to you about those fantastic sponsors a little bit later on in the show. So, the eagle has landed.

Brad Dowdy: It was quite the ordeal, wasn't it?

Vanishing Point Pen

Myke Hurley: Yes. Anybody that has been following me on Twitter has been seeing me talking about my vanishing point woes this week.

Myke Hurley: But it has finally arrived. It arrived yesterday after paying... I think I paid in shipping the amount of the pen cost by the end of it. I've learnt my lesson. And I will no longer be using the guaranteed shipping option because it's... you know, the cost doesn't really make it worthwhile.

Myke Hurley: Unfortunately, it's no fault of JetPens. It's totally the UK customs officials that made it as difficult as this, but...

Brad Dowdy: I don't even understand how that works at all. I don't know that we want to digress into that, but that just boggles my mind.

Myke Hurley: Yeah, I think it's best for everybody involved if we just leave it. Leave it there.

Myke Hurley: So, it arrived. It arrived with something else. It wasn't the only thing that I purchased. I also bought myself another Retro 51 Tornado. Oh, that's right. I bought the King version, which is very attractive. Cool. But I mainly bought it just because I want another one at home. And I've come to the realization that I think I may start collecting them.

Brad Dowdy: Okay. That's not an uncommon thing, I don't think, with the Tornado and other Retro 51 models. I mean, it's kind of... I don't know that it's made necessarily for that, but they do a good job of, you know, updating with new items or limited items and things like that. I think that's a pretty good idea. Yeah.

Myke Hurley: Especially because I'm going to include a link to a recent blog post from Retro 51 where they showed a new bunch of styles they've got coming out soon. And some of them are really cool.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah, was that the ones with kind of the two-tone barrels?

Myke Hurley: Yeah, and like the copper blasted ones, which look like they've been rusted. They look incredible.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah, that's going to... yeah. They'll get you. Yeah.

Myke Hurley: I tried getting them on Twitter to send me one. Like, but I don't think they took the bait.

Myke Hurley: Because I want one. And it seems like it's going to be a while until they're released. But they look very cool. So I'll put a link in the show notes to them because they took to my fan's things. So the vanishing point then. So it comes in a very interesting package.

Myke Hurley: Doesn't it?

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. It's like a... It's like suspended in plastic. It's like a big picture frame. Yeah. The pin's suspended in a weird... I tried to explain that when I opened mine up. I don't know if it's... It's like a plastic, but it's real pliable and it just kind of grabs around the pin.

Myke Hurley: Like a rubbery plastic.

Myke Hurley: And yeah, it's very, very interesting.

Myke Hurley: But it was nice to open it up and see something like that, to be honest.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. It's very well done. It's sturdy.

Myke Hurley: Yes. And it adds to the overall experience, like the mystique of the thing, if it were. Yeah. Now, I opened it and was instantly pleased with the feel. So I've got it in a matte black finish. And I'm very pleased with the way the pen actually feels. Like the matte finish is very nice.

Myke Hurley: The clip, being in the position that it is, which is on the writing end of the pen, was initially quite... Even though I knew it was there, it was still peculiar for me. Sure. And it maybe gets in the way a little bit for me sometimes, but not so much that it causes a problem. But just with the way that I write, sometimes it's there where I'm not necessarily expecting it to be. But it doesn't cause me an issue, really, I don't think. Good. The knocker is incredible.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah, it's really sturdy. And I just... Yep. It's just all the time being clicked because it feels good.

Pen Clip Design

Myke Hurley: It's got a real power behind it. Like when you retract it, it's like, yep, pen's retracted. It's got a very nice power. And that comes from when you're... I mean, you posted your review, your sort of video, which will be in the show notes, obviously. And what happened to you is exactly what happened to me when you unscrew it. The end just flies off because the spring's so powerful.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah, yeah. You kind of have to cup over the back of your hand when you're unscrewing it because the back end of the barrel really pops off. It gets kind of spring-loaded. And it just pops off of there. So, yeah. It's gone flying across the desk more than once. Yes.

Myke Hurley: And it comes with a converter standard, right? Yes. But I purchased some Namiki cartridges. Mm-hmm. Just because, you know, I've decided I want to get another Prera as well. Okay. And the reason I want to get one is because I am in love with the broad nib.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah, and you got a broad nib in the Vanishing Point, right? Yeah, I did.

Myke Hurley: Okay. And it is the same thickness as the Safari, pretty much. Okay, good. The medium nib. Yeah, which I really love. I love the medium Safari.

Brad Dowdy: Right, that's the sweet spot for you.

Myke Hurley: Yep. Because it's comfortable but not too big. The Namiki ink is very nice. It dries quickly. But the actual writing experience of the Vanishing Point is incredible. It feels really good. And I am very, very pleased with this purchase. Good.

Brad Dowdy: Good. Yeah, it's kind of the total package. Yeah. Pen. I mean, it's got everything. It's got looks. It's different. It's got build quality. Yep. Yeah, it's got uniqueness. It's got quality. And it's got versatility. It's nice.

Myke Hurley: It's got really good weight. Yeah. Nice, nice heavy pen, which as I've always said in the past, a heavy pen always feels like an expensive pen.

Brad Dowdy: Mm-hmm. And even so, it is an expensive pen, but I haven't had any issue carrying it around. I feel comfortable that I'm not going to do any damage to it carrying it around in my pocket or clipped to my shirt or anything like that.

Myke Hurley: The actual nib itself is interestingly designed. A lot of it comes out of the end of the pen.

Brad Dowdy: Mm-hmm.

Myke Hurley: And it looks quite unique to me.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah, it's much narrower than a traditional fountain pen nib. Yeah. Even the smallest nib you probably owned before, it's still probably half that size or so.

Myke Hurley: And that's because of the, I assume, because of the mechanism.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. I guess it's part of the retractable nature of this pen to make it that way. You know, and when you take out the whole inside of the pen, the whole nib section and cartridge section all comes out in one, and you see the way it's designed, it's really long and skinny to allow it to be retractable and still work well. Yeah. I guess to get the right amount of ink flow and be retractable and to do its job, it's good.

Myke Hurley: Have you started using the cartridges yet? I have. I have. How do you feel about cartridge as opposed to the converter?

Brad Dowdy: Yes. So this past weekend, I cleaned it up, just ran some water through. I had Pelican Brilliant Black Ink in my pen, which I liked, using the converter. And I wanted to switch to cartridges before I started going into work, just because, just ease of use, honestly. I mean, if I'm using it at work, you know, all the time, and I run out, I just want to be able to pop in a cartridge. I don't want to keep ink at my desk and have to deal with that.

Brad Dowdy: Just not interested in doing that at work right now. Yeah. So I switched, I cleaned it out. It cleaned out very easily.

Brad Dowdy: Dried it off, popped in the cartridge, and I was ready to go. So the cartridge has been good so far.

Cartridge Cap

Brad Dowdy: And I like the additional part that they give you, the cartridge cap. Right? It's like the metal piece that goes over the cartridge.

Myke Hurley: Oh, yeah. I found that quite interesting.

Brad Dowdy: Mm-hmm. It's because the knock is so sturdy, they don't want to damage it hitting the back of your ink cartridge.

Myke Hurley: Oh, I haven't actually put that online.

Brad Dowdy: Does that make sense? Yeah, you should.

Myke Hurley: I should go find it. Yeah.

Brad Dowdy: I mean, it's not going to do anything immediately. It's more of an overtime wear, right? Because that cartridge is just plastic, and that little shell looks like a bullet. But you place it right over the cartridge insert, and it matches it perfectly. And that way, when the knock depresses, there's no long-term issues with the cartridge. But if you're going through cartridges fast, you're not going to do any damage. It's just more of a protection. Yeah.

Myke Hurley: Oh, this is me obviously opening my...

Brad Dowdy: Yeah, you just split it open, right?

Myke Hurley: Yeah.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah, it really pops open hard. Like I said, I haven't sent it to the floor yet, but I've sent it across the table for sure.

Myke Hurley: I can't seem to find... I don't know if we're along the right lines. It's not in the box.

Brad Dowdy: It was underneath the packaging of mine, like on the backside with the paperwork, because it came with a cartridge, right?

Myke Hurley: Yeah. Oh, there it is.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah, it should be with that.

Myke Hurley: Oh, I didn't even go that far.

Brad Dowdy: Mm-hmm.

Myke Hurley: Look at that use and care guide.

Myke Hurley: The packaging's really cool. Like, really cool.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. Yeah, I'm not a packaging hoarder. Like, you know, some people are with all kinds of devices, keeping boxes and things. I've kept that one so far.

Myke Hurley: Yeah.

Brad Dowdy: It's...

Myke Hurley: I feel like I can't really do this pen justice, to be honest. Oh, yeah. I feel like I'm not even giving it enough praise.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. You're not worthy.

Myke Hurley: Yeah. It is... It's... This is a pen that I've wanted for some time, like, because I asked you if such a thing existed. Like, I think, as I said, like, before we even started recording this show, you know, when we were in our planning stage.

Myke Hurley: So I asked you if such a thing existed, because I knew it would be something that I would want, because I love fountain pens, but don't like caps, right? So for me, it's kind of the perfect... It's like a match made in heaven, really. You know, it's, in essence, all I wanted from a pen. Right. And it kind of fits that bill, really. I mean, I haven't used it enough yet.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. And I've had the same feelings of, like, you know, when I'm from the pen addict perspective, you know, I want to review this pen and talk about it and discuss it. And I had the exact same feelings. I feel like, you know, if I do what I normally do on the pen addict, which is kind of a basic review, I feel like I'm only scratching the surface. Like, I'm not doing injustice at all for how good of a pen it is, you know, at least for me. And that's where it gets to be hard writing about that kind of thing for me, because it's really... It's more of a personal fit, right? It fits me for what I want and for what I want to do. And it's kind of hard to translate that into, like, a straight pen review. So, you know, like, I made an initial post about it. I was like, look, you know, I'm going to rave about this pen, but I don't want it to end there, right? I'm going to be using this pen. It's going to be part of my daily life. And, you know, I want to talk about other things, you know, down the line instead of it just vanishing, like a lot of pen reviews do, you know, on my site and aren't, you know, necessarily looked at again with any regularity. I want it to be kind of a regular recurring thing. So that's why I shot the video. And, you know, I've already had a bunch of people asking for nib width comparisons and all kinds of things like that. So I'm going to, you know, like I said, I want to do the pen justice. And plus, let's be honest, you know, we both invested a lot into it. I mean, that's a lot of money.

Myke Hurley: It is a lot of money. It's not cheap. Right. But the quality of the pen, like I own a Montblanc, which was a gift, and it was more expensive than this because obviously the conversion and stuff. And, you know, it's a very beautiful pen and the nib is very beautiful, but it just doesn't have the same build quality as this. Like it's not even close. And I just find that to be one of the most attractive things about this pen is it's built so well. Yep.

Brad Dowdy: I would agree.

Myke Hurley: So, you know, it is expensive. I know that and it makes it not an impulse buy or, you know, just like an easy thing. Like so many people that listen to this show have bought a Tornado. Yes. Because they're like $20. And it's not cheap, but it's not breaking the bank. Right. But, you know, this pen is not that. You know, you can't just, you're not just going to pick one of these up if it's on the end of the aisle at Costco. You're not going to do that because of the price.

Brad Dowdy: Right. This isn't just throw it in the cart pen.

Myke Hurley: But if you are interested in this pen and you think that it will be good for you, I would just say get it. Yeah. Because you're going to, you know, I would be very surprised if anybody that listens to this and thinks that it would interest them if they think that it wouldn't, you know, so if they think that it would interest them and they try it out and it doesn't, you know, if it's not what they want, I would be very surprised by that.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah, I would too. Because you're going to know looking at it and reading about it, whether if it's going to be a fit to begin with. So you'll eliminate, you know, well, you know, I grip the pen differently. This isn't for me or I don't like a retractable pen. It's not for me. But if you're looking for something else in your fountain pen, then it really might be something. And I mean, honestly, it took me a year to buy the pen of like really looking at it, reading all the articles I could find, making sure that, you know, spending this money was going to be worthwhile for me to that it was going to be a good fit for me to use because I don't want to spend that kind of money on a pen and let it sit there and collect dust. You know, it's not, I didn't buy the pen to sit there and put it on a shelf and look pretty, you know.

Retro 51

Myke Hurley: Exactly. You know, expect me to talk about this as maybe as much as I talk about the Retro 51. I know.

Brad Dowdy: We're going to have to change the name of our show or something.

Myke Hurley: I know. John, I still think I need more use. Like I can't say that the Vanishing Point is my favorite. Like the Retro 51 is my favorite pen of all time. Like I love it. I love it. But I've not used the Vanishing Point enough because even though, you know, it may be a better pen, it's in all respects, for example, it still doesn't mean it's my favorite pen. Right. You know, it's like I would say the Dark Knight is a better movie than, I don't know, Spider-Man. But I prefer Spider-Man, for example. Gotcha. You can appreciate that something is better doesn't mean it's your favorite.

Brad Dowdy: Right. And I'm on the same page with you on that. And I don't want to, just because I spent that amount of money, I don't want that to make, to force me into saying this is my favorite pen of all time.

Myke Hurley: Yeah. Exactly. Because it doesn't have to be that way. Right. You're allowed to just, I don't want to, exactly. I don't want to force myself into feeling like this has to be the best pen I've ever used because it's so expensive. Exactly. You know, if I would have got this today and didn't like it, I just would have sold it and you probably would have bought it from me.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. You know? Yeah. I wouldn't have recouped your customs fees though.

Myke Hurley: No, I don't think it would. It's so expensive.

Myke Hurley: It was nearly $100.

Brad Dowdy: I know. That's ridiculous.

Myke Hurley: It was ridiculous. So the shipping in total came to $150.

Myke Hurley: God.

Myke Hurley: That is just massive. Yeah, I'm never doing that again. But it was worth it, worth the wait, and it actually is worth the wait. Yeah. Because if I, you know, if somebody gave me this pen and I used it, I would have paid that amount of money for it. Yeah. You know? So I'm happy with it. Let's talk about our first sponsor this week before we move on because we do have some other pens to talk about today. This episode is brought to you again by the fantastic company that is Squarespace, who provide you with everything you need to create an amazing and professional website. I want to tell you about a fantastic opportunity, a new offer that Squarespace has. When you sign up with any annual plan or buy annual plan, which start at the equivalent of $8 a month, Squarespace will give you a free custom domain. This is along with their reliable web hosting, powerful website creation tools, and WYSIWYG editors all in one beautiful package. You choose the domain that you want, which can include .com.net.org, and it remains yours. You don't need to jump through any hoops with DNS management, A records, C names, all that sort of stuff. Squarespace will take care of all of this for you right out of the box. This further makes Squarespace the perfect solution for somebody who does not want to have to get their hands dirty every day coding. It also makes the perfect solution for if you want to help a friend, relative, or local small business to set up a website. This makes Squarespace perfect. And if you, with your new fancy domain, want an email address that's associated with it, so if we want bradlovesvanishingpoint.com, if Brad wants, say, mail at bradlovesvanishingpoint.com, then Squarespace make it very easy to integrate and set up Google apps as well to give you that. Squarespace's plans start at the equivalent of $8 a month for the annual plan and $10 a month for the month-to-month plan. You can find out more about this by going to squarespace.com forward slash 70decibels, where you can start your two-week free trial with no credit card required. And if or when you choose to buy, if you use the coupon code 70decibels5 at 70decibels5 at checkout, you'll get 10% off your first purchase, and Squarespace will know that we've sent you. So thank you very much to Squarespace for sponsoring The Pen Addict and 70decibels. So what else do we want to talk about today? At the end of last week's show, you received a mammoth order, which made probably one of my favorite moments in the history of this show when you were opening that box.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah, yeah. It was pretty funny. I got a lot of feedback on that, which I didn't expect. And I was thinking, oh, this is horrible. This is terrible radio, if you will. And I'm just sitting here opening this box. No one can see what I'm doing and anything like that. I was like, oh, this has got to end sometime soon. But I had a bunch of people tweet me saying that was funny, and that was kind of neat. So that was pretty cool. But yeah, and what stinks is I started my new job, right? So I opened that package, and I've hardly got to use anything. I've got two new fountain pen inks that our German friend Lucas sent me the pronunciation of the one I was butchering over the air last week. And I'm not even going to go there this time because the file he sent me, it's like this is a really serious German pronunciation that I can't even – you know, my speech does not even go those directions to where it was.

Myke Hurley: You just have the correct usage of your tongue to manage it.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah, yeah. He was awesome sending that because it was really good. And in the name of the brand, the Roar and Klingler, I'm not even remotely close in what that sounds like. But anyway, thank you, Lucas, for sending me that. That was fantastic.

Myke Hurley: And they're in the show notes for last week's episode if you want to check them out again.

Fountain Pens

Brad Dowdy: Yeah, yeah. And so I haven't inked up anything with the two new inks that I got. I did give away the Monteverdi crystal.

Myke Hurley: There's R2. There's R2, sorry. Making his return to the show.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. I swear I put this thing on vibrate before we started. You know, I gave away the Monteverdi crystal fountain pen on the pen attic, which is a really cool kind of demonstrator, you know, clear see-through plastic resin barrel fountain pen. It looks really nice. It's kind of new at JetPens. So that got a lot of good comments. One of the pens that to really, you know, we're going from a vanishing point to a pen that I want to talk about that's $1.65 and that I really like and I was really anxious to get. And that's one of the, it's called the Uni Live Pigment Sign Pen. If I asked you what a sign pen was, does that bring up any thoughts or anything like that?

Myke Hurley: Nope.

Brad Dowdy: Because a lot of people, sign pens were popular.

Brad Dowdy: I remember them being popular like in the 70s. They'd probably go back further than that. But there was a pen, there was actually a pen called the Pentel Sign Pen. And what it is.

Myke Hurley: Do you remember a few weeks ago, I was talking about the pens that we used to use in school and they were called B-roll handwriting pens. This is what they look like. It's like this plastic nib.

Brad Dowdy: Yep. So it's a plastic tip pen. It's like a, I'm going to butcher it because you can't really see it. But it's like a, it's almost like a bristle tip. But it's formed in like a solid plastic. Right. I call them a porous tip pen. You know, they're like a white plastic tip with like, it looks like the black ink or whatever color ink is kind of just kind of leaking out the tip of the pen. You know, it's just kind of flowing there. And I love this type of pen. You know, they do have some issues with breaking down over time. But I like the tightness of the line that they do. And they're usually really dark and thick and sharp. It's a really good writing pen. You know, I think the back in the 70s and 80s, they were really popular for signing documents. You know, this is a pen that, not this Uni Live pigment signed pen, but like the Pentel signed pen that's so famous. You know, that's, you know, the office supply cabinet would be stocked with dozens and dozens of these pens because, you know, there's no e-signatures or electronic signatures or things like that. And this was the chosen pen to sign documents with.

Myke Hurley: Why?

Brad Dowdy: I think because it was a bold, black, rich ink.

Brad Dowdy: You know, that's the only thing I can think of is that it was, you know, it was wider than, you know, wider than a ballpoint.

Brad Dowdy: And it would stand out a little bit more. I don't know the whole lineage and why they became so popular. But I think, I mean, even like presidents were using them and things like that. And this, they're hard to find now, honestly, this style of pen. You know, you're not going to go to OfficeMax or Staples and have any luck in finding a porous tip pen like this. Once in a blue moon, I've talked about one called the Big Z4 porous tip that I found on the store shelf before, but I haven't seen them in years being available. So I was excited to get this one. And actually, when it came in at JetPens, I missed it because it sold out immediately. And then I put it on my notification list. It emailed me when I came in. I ordered two of them in this last order, and now they're already sold out again. So people like this style of pen. I mean, it's cheap. It writes well. It looks good. It's just one of those classics that's kind of been remade a little bit here by Uni.

Myke Hurley: Yeah, I really like the look of this. It's kind of on my list now. I have a list in clear, which has my, the pens that I want. Oh, that's a good idea. They have it in other colors. And it's available. It's available in blue at the moment and red.

Brad Dowdy: Yes. I bought two of the extra fine blacks and then a fine blue, which I have a fine, the fine blue review. I have ready to go pretty soon on the pen attic. So since we talked about it, I'll be sure to post that here in the near future. The black's even better because I like the finer tip.

Myke Hurley: Yeah, the black looks really sweet. I mean, even though they're fine, they don't look fine.

Brad Dowdy: No, no, no, not at all. It's probably, like the fine is probably a 0.5 millimeter line, which, you know, most people would consider fine. But it's not some type of, you know, micro, you know, drafting art pen or something like that, like a Secura Pigma Micron. You know, these pens are a writing pen, really.

Myke Hurley: If you're going to buy one of these, you want to make sure you get the one with the metal clip. Because with what I put in the show notes, and again, if you search JetPens for Uni Live Pigment Sign, it also gives one with the same name, but it's a felt tip pen.

Brad Dowdy: Let me see.

Brad Dowdy: Clicky, clicky.

Myke Hurley: It's more thumpy than clicky.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah, more thumpy.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah, so the fine, is that the one you're talking about?

Myke Hurley: Yeah.

Brad Dowdy: If you click on it, look at that, that's almost, that's getting into more of a brush tip.

Myke Hurley: Yeah.

Brad Dowdy: It's not really there, but it's getting closer to that.

Myke Hurley: The extra fine ones are the one that we're talking about. But when you get to fine, it is more like a felt tip pen. Yep. Exactly. Amend that. Exactly.

Brad Dowdy: So that's kind of the polar opposite of the vanishing point, and that's why I like, that's why I've always liked pens so much. You can find something really cool for really, really cheap. Yeah, that's great. Gives you that little bit of pleasure, and I think that's why people, you know, are into pens, right? I mean, it can be a cheap, happy fix.

Myke Hurley: Yeah, you can find, I mean, we both have in the past and spoken about it on the show, you can find some real treasures. You know, like a couple of weeks ago, let me see, what was it like? Yeah, a couple of weeks ago when I got the Hitech Point V5 RT, the pilot, and I loved that. You know, I've used that pen for weeks at home for show notes and stuff.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah, and that's the very good Moleskine pen.

Myke Hurley: Oh, for sure.

Moleskine Notebooks

Myke Hurley: Going back to the vanishing point, I've had a weird thing. I want to see if you can help me with it. Some Moleskines, not all of them, but the smaller Moleskines that I've been using, the pen gets a bit squeaky.

Brad Dowdy: Like when you're writing the nib on the page? Is that what you mean?

Myke Hurley: Yeah, so it's like, I can't really explain it, but the vanishing point has had like an audible squeak to it.

Brad Dowdy: Mm-hmm. It's, my guess is, you know, like on the Moleskines that I have, just little small ones, to me, have a more, not as smooth page. That's just, you know, I don't know if that's a fact. That's just kind of an anecdotal evidence on my part, just looking at it. But those pages have a little bit more of a tooth to them. So that the nib just might be, just might be the feedback that you're getting across the page. And then like when I compare that Kaye to like the, the gridded Moleskine, it's, it's a smoother page. So it may just be the quality of the paper. That's the only thing I can think of. It's got a, that page has a little more tooth. And so there's going to be a little more feedback on the nib when it's touching the page.

Myke Hurley: So it's just for the...

Brad Dowdy: I'll look at that because I have a bunch of different papers I haven't tested it on. I'll see if I notice the same thing.

Myke Hurley: Because it's not happening on the field notes.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah, that's a much smoother page.

Myke Hurley: That explains it then.

Brad Dowdy: That's my guess without trying it out. But I know, was it, which, which type of Moleskine was it?

Myke Hurley: The small, small Kaye here. Kaye, Kaye, Kaye.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah, I know. I hate saying, I hate, I hate saying Moleskine as it is. Because I know that's not the traditional pronunciation. And I have to drop a Kaye on top of it. It's, it's hard.

Myke Hurley: Well, something I picked up this, this week was one of the Lego Moleskine. Oh, cool. That's right. Yeah, I picked, I got one of those. Very, very happy to get that. I found it in a bookstore.

Myke Hurley: Waterstones. Do you have Waterstones bookstores?

Brad Dowdy: No, no. But I've heard you talking about that before.

Myke Hurley: Yeah, and I got one out there. I was, I was very pleased.

Brad Dowdy: So they have, they have snap-on bricks on the cover, right? Is that the deal?

Myke Hurley: The cover is embedded with one of the flat bricks, which you can then place things on. It's really cool. And then it has loads of stickers, loads of Lego stickers.

Brad Dowdy: Cool.

Myke Hurley: It's expensive.

Brad Dowdy: I know. I know. They are, they are, can be cost prohibitive if you burn through them a lot, so. But I do, I do enjoy them.

Myke Hurley: So, have you got anything else that you wanted to talk about today?

Web Notebooks

Brad Dowdy: I do, but let's cover our second sponsor. Now I'll drop a little bit, one more quick item after that, if you want to do that.

Myke Hurley: Awesome. Last week we spoke a little bit about the features of PairNote by Useful Fruit. This is the app that remembers what you type and when you typed it. By recording video or audio of whatever you're taking notes of, you get the ability to add context to your notes, which allows you to jump straight to the part of your media just by clicking on any word written. There is an awesome demo of PairNote, which you can find at usefulfruit.com. This demo shows off all of the awesome features of PairNote, including the ability to go into any part of the media that's recorded.

Myke Hurley: So you get to see all of that. So you're watching, basically, the demo is recorded by Chad, who's the developer. And it's a little video of Chad. And as he's talking, there are things happening. So he starts saying, oh, and now the text will start to highlight. And you start to see the text highlighting. There's a slide deck in the bottom right-hand corner, which is flipping through the slides. And it's an interactive demo. It's really cool. And you can see that by going to usefulfruit.com. And it shows off all the great features that are in PairNote. But what's really cool about this is in PairNote 3, which has recently been released, you can create these web versions of your own notes so you can share them with other people. So if me and Brad had just, if I'd been in a meeting, I need Brad to see my notes. And I've been recording the audio of that meeting. I can create a web version of that note and share it with Brad so he can see it too. PairNote for Mac has recently been upgraded to version 3, as I mentioned. This includes the ability to sync to Dropbox so you can share your notes with the iPad version of PairNote, which is a very cool application. You can do most of the things you can do in the Mac version. You can record audio, video, and take your notes. And it does all the highlighting and everything as you would have come to expect from PairNote. You can get PairNote from the Mac App Store, the iOS App Store, or directly from UsefulFruit.com, which is where you can go to see the demo I mentioned, to get a 30-day free trial, and for any more information you may need. Thank you very much to UsefulFruit and PairNote for sponsoring this episode of the PairNote and 70 Dispels Network.

Myke Hurley: Excellent. So what else did you want to talk about today?

Brad Dowdy: Yeah, so we kind of had a buildup of a theme which kind of started with the digital versus analog episode, and we talked about our friend Stephen Hackett, how he would scan in his field notes right into Evernote and had the OCR recognition, and so we'd have all his notes available. So then I got an email after that, and I'm pretty sure I copied you on it, about the gentleman, I forget his name, right off the top of my head, from Spain. It might have been Antonio, about his moleskin. He does the same thing, but the inks and the paper he was using, it didn't lend well to scanning because there was so much bleed through on the back. And I think we talked about this last episode or two episodes ago. I can't remember. It might have been a couple episodes ago. We've kind of given him recommendations for pens and other paper, and we talked about getting a Rodeo web notebook.

Myke Hurley: Yeah.

Brad Dowdy: Well, he emailed me a couple of days ago. His Rodeo web notebook came in, and that knocked it out of the park for him. He did an ink test with about 12 different lines of different inks and colors, and I think only one super strong ink you could even see on the back of the Rodeo web notebook. So he was real happy for that recommendation. So Rodeo web notebooks, people, they're the real deal.

Myke Hurley: There you go.

Brad Dowdy: Yep. So his scans were, I was like, is this a blank page or what? You couldn't see the ink going through at all. So if anyone's into scanning for long-term storage of your notebooks, that's one to look at. It'll look a lot cleaner when you're scanning them in. So anyway, it was a success story, if you will.

Myke Hurley: Cool. So that's a big thumbs up from you then.

Brad Dowdy: Yes, very much. And I have got a web notebook here at the house that I have not even cracked the paper, excuse me, the plastic on the cover yet. So I've never used it. It looks cool. I just got to get time to use it. Maybe I'll take it to work or something like that and use it around the office. Because I'm dying to crack the plastic on that.

Myke Hurley: I've not had one. I've not been able to find one. But I want to.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. Yeah. It's good stuff. It's good stuff. I like the smoothest of the paper.

Brad Dowdy: If you use, the only kind of catch, and we've talked about it plenty of times, is the paper's not designed to soak up the ink, right? So if you're using a heavy ink like a fountain pen ink, liquid ink, there's a little bit of a dry time that you have to be aware of.

Myke Hurley: Right.

Brad Dowdy: So if you're using heavy inks and turning the pages, or in your case, if you're a lefty, if you're dragging your hand across the page, there might be. It's something you need to consider.

Myke Hurley: Interesting.

Brad Dowdy: But almost, and for me, almost everything else positive about that trumps any of the dryness, drying time issues that there are. It's not extreme. It's just noticeable. And especially if you use, like I said, you know, if you're one of those guys that uses medium nib fountain pens.

Myke Hurley: Like me.

Brad Dowdy: It's something to think about.

Myke Hurley: Okay. So anyway, that's about it. Excellent stuff.

Pen Addict Website

Myke Hurley: Right. So Mr. Pen Addict, where can people find you online if they would like to do so?

Brad Dowdy: Yes, sir. You can find me at penaddict.com. That's the blog with all the pen reviews and the pen talk. And if you have any questions, you can find me on Twitter at dowdyism, D-O-W-D-Y-I-S-M. Or you can email me, thepenaddict, at gmail.com.

Myke Hurley: Awesome. I am on Twitter. I am iMike. I am Y-K-E. Follow me to hear me complain about pens that don't arrive at my home in a time that I would like them to.

Myke Hurley: Exactly. Who knows what we're going to have to talk about next week. I'm excited already, though. Thank you very much for listening, as always. Thank you, Brad, for being here. Absolutely. And until next week, bye-bye. Bye-bye.

Brad Dowdy: Talk to you later.