The Pen Addict 200/transcript

The Pen Addict Podcast Transcript
Episode:	200
Title:	Episode 200, Live from the Atlanta Pen Show 2016
Release Date:	April 17th, 2016
Hosts:	Brad Dowdy Myke Hurley
Guests:	Ana Reinert
Additional Information
Official page:	Episode 200
Audio File:	Audio Episode 200
Podcast page:	The Pen Addict 200
Length:	7171 min <br />1.183 h <br /> minutes
Previous Transcript	Next Transcript

Pen Chalet

Myke: From RelayFM, this is The Pen Addict, episode number 200, live from the Atlanta Pen Show, brought to you by our friends at The Pen Chalet. My name is Myke Hurley, and I have the pleasure of being joined by Mr. Brad Dowdy. Hello, Michael. And Anna Reinet. I'm very emotional right now. It's hitting me pretty hard. Yep. So we have an audience here, a fantastic audience, who are joining us for this live show in Atlanta. They're all very beautiful, Brad, aren't they? This is an awesome crowd. I'm not going to lie. Very beautiful. Yeah. So, I know this is a pen show, right? And people think that, like, a pen show is crazy. So many people wanted to be here. We had to give out tickets because we had a maximum in the room. We have standing room because we have too many people in the room.

Brad: So this didn't hit us till late. This was a last minute panic. Like, two, three days ago, we realised we might have an issue, which is an awesome issue, it seems to be. So, yeah.

Myke: Yeah. Where Brad was like, I think there's going to be more people than we have space in the room for. And I think my heart fell off. Like, it just went, because this is amazing. And again, for the listeners at home, I'll just tell you something that happened. So we were getting the room set up. So me, Brad and Anna and the guys here, we're setting up the room. And we're like, okay, bathroom break before we start. We open the door and go outside and there's just all these people there. And I have never felt a shudder through my body like that one. And everyone that was there got to see me do this really weird movement. That was that shudder.

Myke: So I want to thank all of you for being here and everyone listening who was a backer of this that has made this happen. I can't believe that we're doing this now every year. And it feels like it's getting bigger and bigger. And it's amazing. So thank you so much. Thank you all so much. We're going to just clap you guys for that. Thank you. Thank you. Now, before we start, there's a couple of like incredible things that have happened in the last couple of days that I wanted to talk about. The first being listeners from afar who are here, which is crazy. So I came from the UK and I'm like, ah, I've come all the way from the UK. I've traveled so far. But we have Julia and Pontus from Sweden who came here today. And I thought, wow, Sweden.

Myke: Like Sweden's even further than me. And then I bumped into a guy and we're going to talk a little bit later about what he showed me. His name is Ed. He came from Australia. Like, yeah. So like that is just amazing. Yeah. So when I found out about Pontus and Julia in the airport, I cried a little bit.

Brad: There's going to be a lot of tears in this episode. We're just starting and I'm feeling it.

Myke: 200. Yeah. 200 episodes. I was wearing my episode 100 t-shirt over the weekend. It's a long time ago, man. Yeah. Also, we had something amazing happen today. So we're at the knock booth. So all weekend, me and Brad and Anna, you've been helping out as well. And Jeff, we've been at the knock booth selling your amazing cases. We're going to talk about that later on. And a family comes up. So like a dad and like three kids. And he comes and says hi. Like we've had loads of amazing people come up and say hi. And we've given out the notebooks and these amazing temporary tattoos that we had made as a little surprise. And so we're giving all of those out. And we're seeing like this family come up to us and they're like they say hi and stuff. And then there's like these kids and they come up and shake their hands. And they have these like faces of like complete excitement. This is Phineas and DW. They're like 10 or 11 years old. Massive fans of The Pen Addict. Like they were telling us about all the pens and inks they had. They were buying knock cases. It was amazing. Yeah.

Brad: DW burned through two bottles of Liberty's Elysium so far. He let us know. Yeah. I mean these kids are hardcore and it's awesome to see that. That's like the best thing that could happen.

Myke: They were like so excited. So I wanted to give them a shout out because I hope they'll listen to this in the car. So I said, do you come into the show later? They said, no, we're going to Legoland. So like these kids are having the best day.

Myke: And there's two more shout outs we want to give people that can't be here today. So one is Joe Lebo and the Lebo family. They're not here because they've just had their first kid. So Nico.

Myke: Baby Pen Addict. Baby Pen Addict. And also Glenn HK. So for people who are watching the video, they can see this stuff here or the people that are here. But basically we have a bunch of things from Hong Kong for us to eat to make our voices sound better. Yeah. And Glenn HK sent all of these and me and Brad have been like munching these lozenges all day. Yeah. And they have helped.

Brad: Yeah. This is last year. I couldn't talk at this time. It was like a struggle to get through the podcast. But Glenn HK hooked us up with the herbal candies straight from Hong Kong. And thank you, buddy. We appreciate it. All right.

Pens

Myke: Let's get into talking about pen stuff. All right. Me and Brad wake up at 5.30 a.m. on Friday morning because we're so excited. And I start looking from my Twitter feed and people were sending me pictures from the UK of some field notes. Right. And I see this belly band and the belly band is talking about a reissue of Butcher Orange and Butcher Blue. And this was like a complete surprise. And they seem to arrive in the UK first. Some must be magical logistics to try and get them all to be on the same day. So they start arriving in Europe. And basically what the field notes guys have done is for their third. Is the 30th edition coming up? No. Or that was the last one. Right. It was the 30th. So they basically just reprinted Orange and Blue and sent one book to every current subscriber. And the belly band has your name on the front. Not the edition.

Brad: Printed. Printed. Like not handwritten. Like they digitally added everyone's name to belly bands on. I can't even imagine how many subscribers they have to do that. And you got yours.

Myke: I got mine. They're not here.

Brad: Yeah.

Myke: But I basically texted Dina and was like, when you get home, there might be a package.

Myke: And I need you to open it. And she did. And I've got a picture. And I'll put it in our show notes. And it says Michael Hurley on the front. And it's amazing. So I have mine waiting for me when I get home. I'm so excited.

Brad: Yeah. So I'm assuming no one here has them. But our Twitter feed blew up. And I'm kind of interested to see what's going to happen. Because y'all know that I'm a field notes junkie. And I have like the first butcher orange. Mark Back has traded me the orange to complete my collection last year. And the butcher blue. So I'm... I think it's awesome. I mean, Jim and Aaron both signed the... Like they have their digital signatures. They're pretty much our president of the United States. Like the presidential stamp. Jim and Aaron on the back of your belly band. But then to take the time and effort to put that out to all the current subscribers. Kind of blows my mind. And I'm interested to see actually what the inside... No one's dared to open these up yet. That's what I've noticed. I'm cracking mine over. I know. But all the pictures we got... Like our Twitter feed was kind of dumb from everyone just saying... They all got them at the same time. When the mail arrived in the UK. All these tweets started coming. Not one person's opened them up yet. So I'm interested to see that later on.

Myke: So you know those... The two craft ones that Jenny made for me from Three Staples. The Myke Was Right one and the Relay FM one. I'm going to take my belly band off and put them on those. Cool. Because it's got my name on it. Yeah. I think that's cool. And that's the kind of person I am.

Myke: I just make everyone cry because I open all the editions up. Yeah. And I'm going to write in them. Yes. For fun.

Brad: Absolutely.

Myke: Bit of follow up. We've played around with the Mont Blanc Rouge Noir.

Brad: Yeah. Okay. So did you get your hands on that, Anna?

Ana Reinert: I got to see it, but I didn't actually...

Myke: Were you scared? Don't pick it up. Like... Because you won't pick it up, you don't buy it. Just don't pick it up. It's terrible.

Ana Reinert: It's just... It's a snake design. It's not really to my taste. No. But I did pick it up and it required a forklift. It's a pretty big pen. Yep. So, but yeah. No, I did get to see it.

Brad: It requires a forklift for the wallet that it takes to make the purchase.

Myke: They have both of them, like the orangey one and the black one. That'd be coral.

Brad: Coral. Like you're going to get shot for like orangey.

Myke: It's orangey. It is orangey.

Brad: It is orangey.

Myke: What did you think of it?

Brad: Good. Not like I'm going to jump all over it good. Like it felt better than I thought it would seeing how skinny it was. Yeah, it is skinny. So, it's a narrow pen. Not pencil thin, but it's narrower than you can tell in pictures without having seen it in person. And that was the first thing everyone started saying when I said, I really love this design. I don't own a Mont Blanc. I'd love to like check this pen out. I think this might be my first one. And it still might, but I'm not like as super jazzed about it as I was before. But the barrel feels better in my hand than I thought it would. It's weighted right. The sections metal. The full barrel's metal. It's got a pretty cool snake on the clip. Snake's killer. Which you can't go wrong with that.

Myke: Yeah, I feel more in trouble having seen it. I don't think I'm going to buy one now, but I might buy one in the future. I like it. I like it a lot. And I like the, they did the old logo on the side. Yeah, that's my favorite part. That looks really nice. That looks really nice.

Brad: So did, and related to that, did you pick up the M, the Mark Newsome one?

Myke: They have that yet?

Brad: Yeah. I haven't seen that. Where have you been? This is a pen show.

Myke: Well, I don't want to see it. Okay. Right. If I find it, I will probably buy it. Yeah. And I don't want to spend that amount of money because I will use it maybe. I'm going to have to go look at it now. That thing.

Ana Reinert: I didn't see that.

Myke: Yeah.

Ana Reinert: And I want to see that one.

Myke: Yeah. Where is it? Is it just you? You go to like one of these, I bet Brad goes like a private room. Like they're like, come on, Brad, you come see the secret stuff. Like the velvet rope is opened and you can be brought in.

Brad: I've seen them in a couple of places. Yeah. I know that Anderson had it on their table, but I saw it somewhere else too.

Myke: That's not good for me. I was, when I was in the airport.

Ana Reinert: Right behind us. We didn't see it. Yeah.

Myke: When I was in the airport, I was going to get some food and I went past a, like a watch shop or whatever. And it had Mont Blancs in there. And I was like, cool, let me go in. And it's like, I'm going to a pen show. Why am I going to go and look at the Mont Blancs in the airport? Like what's wrong with me? And I did go in the, we have like a stationer called WH Smiths and I went in to look at all their notebooks and they had like rodeos and stuff in there. I was like, well done Smiths. Yeah. Stepping it up. Like that was pretty good.

Brad: Yeah. So the pens on the maybe list, it's not on the absolutely must have list. I've definitely slowed my roll on it after seeing it, but I wasn't like overly disappointed. I'm just not like, I have to have it now. So if that makes sense. Could you start it? Yeah. Do you reckon you would have bought OVLC in it?

Brad: There's a fair chance that might've happened. Well, that's good. Knowing me, there's a fair chance that might've happened. Okay.

Brad: We'll see. It's a maybe. It's probably not going to leave the show with me. I'll say that. All right. Cool. Talking about that.

Purchases

Myke: Big buys. Let's talk about big buys.

Brad: All right. So I'm still waiting on that kind of until Sunday to see how, how the budget's looking. I have some things in my head, but I did get one.

Myke: You have some stuff coming too that we don't, you don't have yet.

Brad: I don't have yet. I have a, so one pin I'm waiting for, which I hope to get, um, is the orange vanishing point, the original limited edition one with the silver trim. So I'm waiting on that. Um, I don't know how much that's going to cost me yet. So that's why I haven't blown out the budget on other things because I want to have money for that. Um, but what I did get so far is, um, I got a delivery of a pin I've been waiting for, for a long time. This is a, uh, Jonathan Brooks solar dust, uh, finish. Y'all come by and see me with this. Cause it, it looks awesome, um, up close. But what he does is he put, uh, he took my pilot Falcon section, added that in, uh, built me a pin around that, which he's done for several people. And, um, he did a pretty amazing job and I'm, I'm anxious to, uh, get this into the rotation cause it, it's a real beauty. Um, and, uh, Jonathan does great work. So, and he gave me a little pen stand too. So I have it propped up here so y'all can see. Nanny, nanny, boo, boo.

Myke: He loves that pen stand. He's just like puts it out, puts the pen on it. Yeah.

Brad: It's, it's, it's on the nightstand in our room.

Myke: Yeah.

Brad: Don't tell people about our room. Uh, it's not that kind of podcast. No.

Myke: Anyway, Anna, uh, what were your big buys of the show so far?

Vintage Pens

Ana Reinert: Um, my big buy has been.

Myke: Going to get it?

Ana Reinert: Um, is a friend of mine, like literally like two days before the show, um, pointed out to me a vintage Lady Schaefer scripser. And so I had a, um, something to.

Myke: I had a gasp in the audience when you said that. So. I was like.

Ana Reinert: So, um, I got lucky enough to find a vendor who had about five or six different ones. And so then I had to decide which one I wanted. Clearly not one. Yeah.

Brad: Yeah. That, that's two for those playing. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Ana Reinert: For those playing at home, I got two of them. Um, and one, uh, they are both basically kind of new old stock. This one even still has the thicker, like really like new old stock.

Myke: New old stock has become one of my favorite terms over the last couple of days.

Ana Reinert: So, um, and, uh, this, one of them has an integrated, super integrated nib here. It gets a. Um, and they kind of have these like almost like a little nib, which is kind of cool. Um, they're supposed to be, uh, easier to write kind of at a lot of different angles. Um, and a very kind of integrated texture. And then the other one's kind of just a funky little nib, but I was very excited to be able to find these. So that's awesome.

Myke: Where did you get those?

Ana Reinert: Um, one of the vintage vendors in the big room.

Myke: Okay. Yeah. So the way that the pen show set up is, is kind of interesting is that this time is three rooms. There were two rooms. I wonder why there's three rooms now. What could have happened? That meant they had to open another room. Nobody knows. I don't know anything about that. The room, the room that like that knocks in has got, um, more of kind of like the newer vendors maybe. Like there's us, there's Anderson pens, uh, modern, modern pens for the most part. Yeah. And then there is, uh, the third room this year has a lot of, uh, I guess independent pen makers, I think.

Brad: So I'm going to call the third room, the cool room. Cause that's where all the cool kids are at. And I haven't made it over there that that room is tight, man. Kara's customs, Mark Backus, Sean Newton. Who's in there. But the king of that room is not in this room and that's Michael's soul. So y'all should bow down to him when you walk in that room. He's right in the front. So that room is awesome. That's best room, best room in the show. They win the prize this year.

Myke: And then there's a huge room at the back and that's where a lot of the vintage vendors are. That room terrifies me when I go in there. This is like, there's a lot of expensive things in here and people that maybe don't want to talk to me. I don't know. Yeah. It's very, I get very intimidated going in there, but that's, but Anna, you're more at home there clearly.

Ana Reinert: I have not been intimidated by any of the...

Myke: I get scared really easily.

Ana Reinert: They've, everybody, all of the vintage vendors have been really, really nice and super helpful. I've only, there was only one vendor who was a little like, I don't have time for you. And so I didn't buy anything from him. I'm like, if you're going to snub me, no time. Yeah.

Brad: And then we even have a hallway full of vendors too. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, this is a pretty packed show. It is. It's much larger than the previous years by a large number. I don't know what that number is, but it's really good to see all the people who have, all the vendors who have not attended this show before. I mean, I think I've only been coming here four or five years and you see the same kind of regular faces in the crowd with vendor wise, but to have like an influx of new vendors at the show is, is really, really cool because like I take a lot of pride in the show. This is like my home show. It's my hometown. You know, it's where Knox based out of. So like, I really care a lot about this show and it's really cool to see that kind of thing happen.

Myke: So my big pen. So was it last week or the week before I was talking about the fact that I wanted a Mayu or Murex, right? Mm-hmm. About a few hours after the episode posts, get a DM. Who do you think got a DM from? Thomas Hall. Yeah.

Brad: That was a, that was a short list in my head.

Myke: Just that little thing. That was a short list of one. I've got an M90 for you. New old stock. Do you want it? I'm like, yeah, yeah, I'll take that. Yeah. So we worked out a deal in which I think I've ripped him off a little bit. Yeah. But it was when I was like, Thomas, allow me to give you more money. And he's like, no, no, that's fine. So I have a amazing.

Brad: You had, you already resold it. You got such a good deal. Yeah.

Myke: That's great. Flipped it.

Myke: Back to Thomas. Yeah. For some reason. Yeah.

Ana Reinert: Who turned around and sold it to somebody else, right? Doubled his money.

Myke: So I have a beautiful Pilot M90 now. And I, I'm not going to show it yet. Oh. That'll be in the video. It's for the video people. All right. I'll get it. Yeah. Somewhere around here. So it is fantastic. I love it so much. There was a, on one of the tables behind us, there was a Murex. Yeah. Um, and it was like way more expensive than this. And I don't, I looked at it and I, I much prefer the way that the M90 looks because it's completely clean. The barrel is completely clean. There's no lines on it. And I think that the cap is way nicer and, uh, the clip is way nicer because it flows. Cause the Murex clip kind of like jumps out and goes across. And this one just flows way, way nicer and it's much, much better. So I'm a big fan of this. This is an absolute stunner. So thank you so much, Mr. Hall. And I have purple ink in it. Yeah. Because. Good move. Obviously. Uh, and I absolutely adore this pen. Uh, and the nib is just fantastic. Like I'm in a place where there's some incredible nib workers, right? So I could get some work done on it if I needed it, but it is superb. It's a medium and it just isn't, it is a dream and it has already found its way into my, this is a lookout, right? So I talk about how your case names. Yeah.

Brad: So Myke's, Myke's has a, uh, the three pin holster, but what's special about it? It's in the unicorn barf colorway.

Myke: So that's like bright blue and pink inside from last year. And I love this thing so much. Uh, and I, it's already made its way into there, which is fantastic. So whilst we've, I've mentioned that I am struggling so much to remember the names of your cases and like tomorrow, Brad's leaving me on my own for a couple of hours. I might just put everything for $5. Is that all right? That might be an issue. Okay. It's like, so people come to buy stuff like, and I'm on the table and they're like, can I buy this one? What is this one? And I have to look at this big list and I'm like, that one is this case and it's $35. And I look at me like, don't you like work here?

Phone Cash Register

Brad: Like what's wrong with you? So my phone is the cash register. So Myke has taken our price sheet and put it on my home screen.

Myke: Oh, it's on mine too. And I still can't get it. Like I, yeah, it's, I'm just really struggling. So next year we need to make me a cheat sheet that I can study for like three weeks before I come. We'll do that. That'll be our Tatli for next year. Yeah. Oh yeah. I could just, so we have these amazing Tatli tattoos and I have one on and it's the Pan Addict logo. Yeah. And we had those for people here, which is amazing. All right. Let's take a break. This is a real special one this time. So long time sponsor of the show, the amazing Pen Chalet. I know we're buying pens here, but like you should still go there as well. Like go to the Pen Chalet. We love the Pen Chalet. They sell everything you're looking for. They have great pens. They have great accessories from all of your favorite brands, Pelican, Lamy, Pilot, Namiki, Sailor, Kaweco. They have all of them. They believe so much in fast and reliable customer service. You know all this stuff about them, but the best thing about Pen Chalet is how amazing they are to work with. And Ron was so excited that he got to be part of this episode, our 200th episode. He's worked on something really special, which I'm going to get to in just a second. They do great prices, great shipping on everything. If you're shipping in the United States, it's just $50. They'll do free shipping as long as it's under 50 bucks. They have great rates for shipping overseas. They have great prices everywhere and you kind of benefit when you're getting the exchange rates. So that can be great. They do 100% satisfaction guarantee. That's what they believe in. Go to penchalet.com. Click the podcast link at the top of the website. Enter the password penaddict. You'll get the code that you need to save 10% off anything on your order. And if you're listening live, you get to take part in something that we're also doing here. So in the room today to commemorate our 200th episode, Ron has put together a giveaway package, which is very unique. It includes some pens, some ink, and for the people here, a dudek block, which has been inscribed with penaddict 200. And it's got the Atlanta Pen Show on it and it's got the penchalet logo on it. So that's going to be a raffle for the people here. For everyone listening at home, we're doing the same, but the block isn't inscribed. And so we're going to be giving those away to people. So it's two packs. So we're going to, for everyone here now, we're going to do the raffle after the show is over. So I hope you kept your raffle tickets. We did tell you. But for everybody else, you can go in. You've got until April the 25th to enter online and you can get a whole, this fantastic package. Thank you so much to Ron and Penchalet for sponsoring us. Like they're with us every other week. We just have like, it just will go on forever. We love supporting them. So if you love this show, you've got something that you want to go and buy, go to Penchalet. You get 10% off, but you also help support them in this show. Thank you, Ron.

Brad: Thank you, Ron. It was really cool. I'll be anxious to get some pictures up of this block that he worked with Myke. I haven't seen it yet. You haven't seen it yet? No. I know all about it, but I haven't seen it. It's in this room right now. So we will take a look here momentarily.

Ana Reinert: I've seen it. It's super cool. Excellent. Excellent. And thanks to Ron.

Myke: Thank you.

Ana Reinert: Because he also supports the well-pointed desk.

Myke: He's great like that.

Ana Reinert: He is awesome.

Myke: All right. So I mentioned Ed from Australia earlier. So when Ed came to see us at the booth yesterday, he brought with him the Moleskine Smart Writing Set. Now, I've seen this floating around. I've just seen links to it. I've seen ads for it. And everyone's seen these things before, right? Like these pens that you can write with and you can take the images from the pens and scan them or whatever. It creates JPEGs or something. LiveScribe was a big one. Moleskine have created a very interesting combo. So it's a notebook and a pen that has an app. And we had it on Ed's iPad Pro. And I've never seen anything like this. Like blew me away. So the pen. The pen's okay. It's a bit chunky, right? As these things always are. It has a kind of a camera behind the nib. And it takes standard D1s, right? Right. Because the first thing Brad does when he gets it is like rips the refill out of it. Like it just picks up. It's like just pulls it apart. And everyone's like, ah. And he's like, oh, no, it looked like it would come out. It's like, okay, right.

Myke: So.

Brad: So what is the D1, right? So what's the D1? It's just a standard mini size refill that you can get in all kinds of cool iterations now. Like you can get a Jetstream. You can get these great Zebra Charbo gel refills. So you can fit any D1 refill into this pen, you know, to write with.

Myke: And the notebook is weird. It's like really weird. So if you imagine like a regular Moleskine, Moleskine. The edge of the paper kind of, it comes out and then it's like rounded at the edges. So there's like a big chunk of paper that goes all the way around the outside. I can't see any reason for this.

Ana Reinert: They beveled the edges out so that it would look more like a tablet. Yeah.

Myke: Yeah.

Ana Reinert: I think to visually differentiate it from their regular notebooks so that you knew it was a digital notebook versus their regular. I don't know if I like it. I know. It's a little weird.

Myke: Yeah. Because I just look at it and be like that edge is just going to get dirty because it's just like sticking out. It's very peculiar, but I can see what they were going for. I just don't think there's a way to do it. It's being passed to the front now. So like we can maybe try and get it in the video at least. So, you know, I'll have it here and it also helps me so I can see it. Yeah. So it's like a weird kind of, if you imagine the front of the notebook, the paper looks just like it's too big, basically.

Brad: And the way they did the finishing on it is not like a normal paper notebook would be cut. But the way they rounded it and they did, there's some kind of coding on it to make it look, they make it look plasticky, to be honest. They make it look like a tablet. But it's what, you know, standard 190 something pages, I'm guessing, of just regular sheets. So this is a really, when it came out, I've never been into the Livescribe stuff. I've never been into that kind of capturing. But when we, when Ed broke it out, we're both like, okay, this is cool. And then we started using it. And it legitimately works well. I mean, like, yeah, it matches your handwriting so quickly. And you can't help but watch the screen because it's going so fast. You're trying to race it. It's like it does it live. Yeah.

Myke: So you have the app open and you're writing with a thing. And it basically is, we have a millisecond or two delay. You're seeing it in the app, right? And inside of the app, you can change the thickness and the color of the ink as well, which is really interesting. So you're still drawing on the page in the standard color because, you know, it's not a scribble pen.

Myke: One day, Brad. One day, baby. One day. And so you can see it's changing the color. So, like, a real interesting application for this would be, like, a digital whiteboard. Like, imagine if you could airplay it to a TV. And you could just be sitting in a room and drawing this thing out and you can change the color of it. I was, like, enthralled by it. I was, like, I just kept changing the color and drawing little happy faces and boxes.

Myke: This is really cool. Now, it looks like it will only work with this notebook. The paper has, like, an interesting, like, dark gradient to it, which I guess maybe helps with the camera, right? Yeah.

Brad: But I'm really impressed. It has, like, some tap zones on it, too, so you can hit it. It has a little envelope. You can tap it and send the image somewhere. It's like I'm going to send Ed an email later that says the Aussie accent is superior to the British accent.

Myke: I'll go straight to spam. So, yeah, I'm impressed by this. And I'm... I'm surprisingly impressed by it. I'm intrigued to get one. So I can give it a go. I don't know if I can go that far yet, but it's definitely interesting. This is what I wanted. Yeah. When I was working on my old job, right? Because scanning field notes didn't really work for me in the long run because it was just a pain to scan them. You know, because we had the Doxy Flip, so it was like I had to take a scan of each page, basically. It took forever. And then you kind of have to put it all together. I mean, I don't know if they're trying to... I don't know if they're doing any OCR stuff. They're doing OCRs on it as well. Oh, man.

Brad: But it's not like you're going to carry that in your back pocket. I mean, you have to make an effort to carry the notebook. I mean, it's like A5-ish size, whatever the Moleskine A5 size is.

Myke: Yeah. I mean, they might do smaller ones, right? There's nothing to stop them.

Ana Reinert: Yeah. They've just introduced it. It's brand new. Yeah, so they've just done the A5. So I wouldn't be surprised if at some point they don't introduce the pocket or reporter size.

Myke: And you don't have to have the device with you. Like, the pen will record it all and you can put it in later. Because it wouldn't help if you were carrying then an iPad and a notebook and a pen. Like, that wouldn't be very useful. But it's really cool. And I was talking to someone about it because I had my... You know, we had an iPad Pro and there was a pencil there. And it was like... The thing is, like, whilst I love the Apple Pencil, it's still not pen and paper, right? And you get no feedback from that screen. And whilst it's amazing... I know you were using it earlier. What did you think of the Apple Pencil, by the way?

Ana Reinert: I really enjoy it. I really do like it. And eventually I think I will upgrade.

Myke: It's the closest representation of your handwriting in digital. That's, you know, that's the underlying thing about this. But it's still not pen and paper, though. And when you're using... Even though I'm not a massive fan of that refill type, it's still superior. Like, it feels... It just feels correct.

Brad: Yeah, I think that's completely accurate. I mean... We'll see how... I'm anxious to see how it does. Because there's been several attempts and they get super hyped right out the gate. And they all just tend to go down in flames. So...

Myke: I don't know if there's a market for it. I think that's the thing. I don't know if people want this. Like, it's really cool, but I don't know if you want it.

Ana Reinert: Yeah. But the point of entry for it is pretty pricey.

Brad: Yeah, it's steep. We're at $200 to get into it with the pen and the notebook.

Ana Reinert: Yeah, it's $199 to get in.

Myke: I mean... Version 1, right? Yeah. This feels like the route Moleskine is going down. Yeah. Like, they've been seeing like they're making apps, like they're dipping their toe in the water. I think they understand where they should be playing. And considering the market that they fall into, which is tech heavy, right? People that are in technology, Moleskine, as we know from your buddy Kevin Rose. Because... Like... That seems to be like they've really got the mindshare. So, products like this really kind of play into the essential market. And I think that it's going to be interesting to see how it goes for them. If anyone can do it, they can do it. Yeah. And what they've executed so far is pretty good. Yeah. That's the other thing. Fundamentally, they've got the right product, which is very surprising. Because I saw it as someone was just like, ah, it's going to be crap. Yeah. But it's not crap at all.

Show Differences

Myke: All right. Let's talk about how this show is different to last year's show. So, Anna, what has been your kind of overall feeling about how, if this show is any different to last year and why you think that is?

Ana Reinert: Well, for me, the biggest thing is this is my second show. So, I have a different... I'm having a different experience. My... Last year was my first show. So, it was really learning sort of how to navigate a show. What I was looking for. And also, different grade of flop sweat for doing the podcast.

Myke: Still quite a lot. Quite a lot.

Ana Reinert: I wasn't... You know, last time it was just camera guys and you guys. This time it's all of you guys. So, it's a whole different grade of... But, no. It was... That experience was just kind of getting a real sense of just the scope of how many vendors there were. Both new shops selling new product as well as the vintage sellers. And kind of figuring out how to navigate buying from a vintage vendor and figuring out like, you know, will... How do... How will, you know, a seller of vintage pens react to someone who is sort of new to vintage pens, a little bit younger consumer? Because there was a lot of talk about, you know, somebody younger buying vintage pens. Like, are they going to kind of give me the cold shoulder? Are they going to be receptive to someone younger being interested in vintage pens? And the reaction ended up being very warm last year. And then coming this year, what ended up happening for me was pretty much every vendor I went to said, I remember you. Last year, you bought a Pelican from me. I remember you. You bought. And which was really cool. I mean, I actually had, you know, a couple of the older guys come up and they passed my hair and, you know, gave me a hug. And, you know, what are you going to buy from me this year? And I'm like, I don't know what kind of deal you're going to give me.

Ana Reinert: So, which has been really fun. And it's, I think, you know, and I've had some people tell me that, you know, like the DC show is a much bigger show with a lot more people. Atlanta show is a bit smaller. So, vendors do have an opportunity to remember the people that purchased last year. So, you do have an opportunity to have that experience with a lot of the sellers, both, you know, shops and, you know, resellers in a way that maybe you wouldn't necessarily get in a big show like LA or DC, which has been really nice because then you can have sort of a relationship with people and go back. If you have a particular type of brand or pen that you really like, if you really like Parker 51s, you can kind of go back to somebody who frequently buys and sells Parker 51s and kind of work with them. What have you got this year? Kind of a thing. So, in my case, it's the couple guys who sell Estabrooks and I spend a lot of time with them.

Brad: Goof balls. Any Estabrooks? No Estabrooks yet this year?

Ana Reinert: I did. I bought, well, I bought two. Shocking. Shocking. I know. One I bought for a friend of mine who is the reason I have an Estabrook problem. He asked me, he wanted a pink purse pen for his daughter. So, I found one. And if he does not like the one that I got, I will just swap out and give him the pink purse pen that I have. And I'll keep the one that I bought.

Brad: Cool.

Myke: So, you bought 10 is what you're saying? No, just 10. Okay. All right. All right. Brad, obviously, part of why you're here is to sell stuff. Yeah. So, from a not-co perspective, how has 2016 differed to 2015?

Brad: It's been really good both years. Like, just the volume is bigger. Last year, we prepared more. Last year, we definitely had some deer in the headlight stuff going on.

Myke: Like, when we got and realized we didn't have any way to set up the table. Yeah. It was like, oh, we probably should have worked something out.

Brad: Like, we packed stuff in boxes, threw it in a truck. We arrived, threw our hands up going, I don't know what to do now.

Myke: I guess we just put stuff on the table. Yeah. Did we put the boxes on the table? Yeah.

Nock Business

Brad: So, it was our first show ever for Nock. It went, I mean, of course, it ended up going super last year. This year, it was, from a business perspective, like, obviously better just because there's more people. We were better prepared inventory-wise. We were able to set up and not be nervous wrecks in a shorter time frame because we've done it before. Just the same thing as anyone going to their first pin show. People here, I know a bunch of y'all have been, this is your first pin show. It's super stressful not going to know who's the right person to talk to, who's the right person to buy from. And it's like the same thing with us setting up is like, I don't know exactly what to do. I told Jimmy Dole of the show promoter last year that you should put me next to the Andersons because when I panic and have questions, I know them already. And I can get help quickly. Luckily, I didn't require any help and it came out fine. So, this year is definitely calmer from a personal standpoint. I feel like, you know, the ship ran very smoothly this year. Not that it didn't last year, but we made our own lives easier this year and business is booming.

Myke: Not overall. Yeah. Because we did this this year. Yeah.

Brad: Very different. We did this thing with all the eyeballs looking at us. Yeah.

Myke: But you talk about the Blue Label stuff.

Brad: Yeah. So, we try, we like to mess around. I mean, we like to create things and try to do innovative things or try something new that hasn't been done. And Jeff's the pro at that. Like, I get emails or text or Slack images. What about this? What about that? Just like all of his brain is constantly going on like design stuff. Um, and it's like all really good. Like, Jeff doesn't have a lot of misses, which is what impresses me the most out of him. Um, so he just comes up with these ideas and we're at a point as a company where we're hitting this growth spurt that we can't quite handle. Like with standard inventory. Yep. But we still have to scratch that creative itch a little bit or we'd go insane. Right. So, we're able to fit in something like limited edition, limited colors. And we decided to give it a name. We always kind of did this thing. We call it small batch and we release it online, which would be just a case we make already in just a different color or something a little bit different. So, we decided to give it like an official name. And it's kind of like our playground. So, the Blue Label is like our playground. We're going to try new products there. We're going to try new designs. We never made a case with a snap before. So, we wanted to see how that would work and what people think about it. So, um.

Myke: So, this case that you made, because you've been teasing it, it's a snap open. Mm-hmm. It's blue and red. Blue and red. Like a royal blue and a bright red. The flap which you open up has got a place where you can pop your pen in. Yeah. It's got a pen slot. You need a clipped pen, preferably. Yep. Or just slide right out of there. Or, and then it's basically just like a big pocket. Yeah. Yeah. It's like a, it's like an envelope carry type case. Envelope case.

Ana Reinert: I have one with me. Anyone? You want to see it? Yeah.

Myke: So, this is what, you know, this is something that you did. And how did we sell them? Because this is, this is pretty funny. Yeah.

Brad: So, I mean, you know, we want to try to be good to all our customers and make sure everyone gets what they want. So, we kind of, we knew we were only going to make a limited amount. So, we made 40 of them. We bought enough material, you know, to, to manage doing something extra in our workflow is a challenge as it is. So, we had to pick a number that was good enough to give everyone a taste if they wanted, but not 200 to where we can't make regular stuff. So, we did that and we teased a little bit online and we set it up. We just made 40 of them. We broke them out at noon on Friday. We let everyone know ahead of time. So, we had a, we had a pretty good crowd.

Myke: People were coming up, right? This is at like 9 a.m. on Friday morning. The show is not even open, right? There are still people that haven't even arrived to set up. You got the label stuff? Like, you got the special case? It's like 12 o'clock. Come back at 12. 11.45 is probably about eight or nine people just like waiting.

Myke: And they're just waiting. And then, and then, so basically 12 o'clock rolls around and the thing starts standing. And Jeff had some policy that he set up, which I saw in action that he was very strict about. So, it was one per person and you had to be there. Like, you had a couple of people send him text messages saying like, can you hold one for me? And I saw him say, no, I cannot hold one for you. Yeah. I stole the first one and just rung it through the Square Reader. Yeah, Myke didn't even get any advanced special treatment. No, I basically put them on the table and I just picked one up and just ran my card through the Square Reader. So, I got one. And then, I think we sold like half in about two minutes. And then, the rest kind of staggered out over like an hour or so.

Brad: Yeah, yeah.

Myke: Like, I went away to get a drink. It's like, it's died down. I was like, oh, okay. We have these for a while. Went away to get a drink. Came back and they're all gone. So, I don't know. It's like a second wave of people. But you're pretty happy with that, right? Yeah, super happy with it.

Brad: And, you know, this is something like we want to continue to do. We love getting feedback on our cases, how they're functioning. You know, especially when we try something new and getting those out there in people's hands. And letting them play with it and do things that we wouldn't normally do with it. And see how they hold up and how they function and what we can do better. Like, it's great. Like, all of our customers are like really good at giving us feedback on our products. Like, you know, I'll have people walking up to me today saying, you know, what do you, you know, can we talk about this case? And here's how I use it. And here's the things that I'm thinking about when I'm using it. And is that something, you know, you might think about integrating? And, you know, we don't know. But just having that conversation is super helpful as a business.

Myke: So, for me, I think the biggest change this year is the vibe. The vibe of the show has been really different. Tons of new faces.

Myke: Lots of listeners of the show have been coming up to me. Like, a ton of people that I didn't meet last time have been coming up. And I think one, like, personally, something that's been really interesting is how many people have been telling me about the other real AFM shows they listen to. Yeah.

Brad: Like CGP Grey woke me up in the bed the other morning.

Myke: Well, that was a whole different thing. I was watching a video. He had a video come out. You woke me up at, like, 5 a.m. I was, you know, I was relaxing. And, yeah, there's been a couple of Cortex t-shirts. I'm looking at one on Doug right now. And, yeah, it's been really cool, actually. Yeah. It feels like one of two things are happening, which is either, like, Pan Addict listeners are going out and finding other shows. And the other one, which I've heard, is, like, people are hearing about this show from other shows on Real AFM and tuning in, which is great. And I'm happy that we're finding people like that. I've heard from a bunch of people who have done the all the way from the beginning in, like, I think it's almost like 30 days. Chuck, was it 30 days? Yeah, 30 days, 200 episodes. Like, doesn't sleep, I don't think. Yeah. And there's a bunch of people who have done a thing that I think is really interesting that I don't think I could do, which is, like, coming in at, like, 180 and listening to the new episode every week, but also going back. Like, so hearing, like, these two separate timelines of us. I don't know how you keep that straight. Yeah. And a ton of comments about, like, you guys hated fountain pens. Yeah. Never lived that one down. Yeah. But I'm really excited for next year now because looking at how much this has grown is incredible. And, like, doing this, it's going quite well, I think, with all these people in the room feeling all right about it now. I'm very excited to do it all over again. So this has been great, and I can't wait to do it next year. I'm not even done yet.

Brad: Yeah. No, we've got a long way to go.

Ana Reinert: Do you guys want to do this again next year?

Brad: Yeah.

Myke: Yeah. I like that. Team club time. Yeah. All right. So I've come to the end of our planned topic, so I think it's time for some questions. So if anybody has any questions, please, if you could go and line up at the microphone.

Brad: Yeah. So while we're waiting, I'm going to go with the first question, okay? While we're going to get someone up there. So y'all don't listen to me. Y'all go get in line. So my first question is, do you remember episode 194 when we talked about a certain pen that a certain long worldwide traveler bought? Maybe had a skull or two on it. She may have arrived today. She might be sitting right over there. So we talked about a particular Nakaya we had, and we made a particular comment about this. And she stopped by earlier and brought something that I think you're going to like. So this is from Miss Lee Reyes, and we got a shirt that uses a quote from our show that seems to have lived on. So why don't you tell everyone what it says?

Myke: So on the shirt pocket of this shirt, it says, forged by pure evil. And then it has our logo and says, the pen addict podcast episode 194. Thank you, Leigh. That is amazing.

Myke: All right. Someone, come on. Come on. Come to the microphone. Don't be shy. Someone's going to have a question. All right, Dan. You go. Come on. You give me a face. Come and ask me a question.

Audience member: Who's your favorite Arizona pen manufacturer? I was just curious about that.

Brad: Are there any? Yeah. I got my phone. Let me look some up. There's a map on all things stationary. You can check out. Oh, okay. So if we need someone, but I'm going to go with Karas Customs because they're legitimately awesome.

Myke: Karas has a really interesting thing this year, which is a teal ink, right?

Audience member: Yeah.

Myke: And Dan was telling us at breakfast that this one's slightly different to the rest because they all had to be painted, right? Right. So tell me about that. Talk into the microphone. Tell me about it.

Audience member: So, yeah, we wanted something different for Atlanta. So we originally wanted to do an anodized teal, and everyone knows all the problems we have with anodized. So we came up with a solution where, well, they came up with a solution where I have to airbrush every single one, and then we put them in an oven, and then we bake them. Yeah. And, you know, the cookies come out, and then they're teal pens.

Brad: So y'all have heard me tell the story about the Kaweco Fire Blue Lilliput, where the theory is that Michael Gubrele, the CEO, president of Kaweco, takes the blowtorch to these pens himself. That's all I can see Dan in the Karas Customs office painting these things himself. There's a video of it. Yeah.

Audience member: It's on the, I think, the Karas Penco, and someone got mad at me because I didn't have a dust mask on. I kept telling Paul, I was like, don't show my face.

Brad: Yeah. You have a beard, so you're covered, I think. Yeah, yeah.

Audience member: It's filtration. I think that overrides OSHA regulations. I didn't get a flu shot because I just grew the beard, so. Is there any left? You still selling any? We sold all of the inks, but I think we have some EDKs, and then we did some faux patina on brass EDKs. I've seen that. So we're going to do some other ones. I think it's going to be fun. So it's something that if I don't want to do any office work, I can go out and make the shop guys mad because there's this huge dust cloud and fumes going towards the areas.

Ana Reinert: Isn't there something interesting about that material that you're using for the teal?

Audience member: It was primarily developed, I think, originally in the 60s for coating steel for firearms. So you can do, like they did like black and camouflage and stuff. And so it's like a ceramic-based coating, I guess. You bake it for a couple hours at 350 degrees, and it hardens it. So I don't know, it's kind of cool. Like I worked in the automotive paint industry for a long time, and so I mess with all kinds of paints, but this is the first time it's something that was oven cured like that.

Brad: So I'm going to brag on Karis Customs for a second because something cool happened today. Like I told Myke when we showed up Friday, we have these yellow knock notebooks that don't have our best paper in it, admittedly. That was version one. Version one. We've improved on it then. So I said any kids that come up to our table, hand them the pack of notebooks because we just want to promote that. We believe in that. We want the kids to be part of this. Give the pens, give the kids the paper, right? Yeah, right. Hey, DJ, DW and Phineas earmuffs, buddies. So yeah, we've been passing that out. And earlier this afternoon, our friend Chris from Alabama, he had his wife and his daughter, and they'd come and seen us. And they just had a few hours to spend at the show. And they came back, and I was walking somewhere, and they stopped me in the hallway like, you're not going to believe what just happened. And Dan or Paul, I don't know who it was, but they gave their daughter one of the copper EDKs, and they were just freaking ecstatic. I was so excited. Did she be able to lift that? How strong is this kid?

Audience member: She had to arm wrestle one of us first. I think that was Paul, yeah.

Brad: I thought that was super cool, and that's what this show's about. And I just wanted to say that was really, really cool. Yeah, I mean, the children are our future. Or was it Paul? Paul's got the heart, right? Yeah. Yeah, sing for us, Dan.

Myke: Nobody needs that. Thank you. So come on. Someone's got another question for us. Sorry, Anthony.

Brad: Anthony's got a question. Oh, he's going in front of the microphone and in front of the camera. This is probably going to be trouble.

Anthony: Hi. So this is a question for Myke. Okay. You've come a really long way to Atlanta for the pen show. This is your second show. So what did you do personally differently to prepare for this? And since it's almost two-thirds of the way through now, what do you want to do next year differently from this year?

Myke: I think the biggest thing was just trying to think through how we would have a show with an audience. Because it's a very different experience. Because if I do something stupid, there's people that are watching it happen. So that I can't hide from. One of the things that I learned from last year that I did differently this year was think about the fact that I was doing a show in two days and actually write some stuff down. Because last year, it was like 10 minutes before we were recording. And Brad said, what are we talking about? And I said, I don't know. So I've been writing stuff down as I usually do. But usually I'm not surrounded by pens for a few days. So I've been taking some notes and prepping. Next time, I want to see if we can get a bigger audience. Nice. So. Yeah, look at you. Look, everyone. There are people standing up right now. I would like everyone to be sitting down. And then maybe some more standing.

Pen Show Shopping

Brad: Yeah, yeah. So I'm going to brag on just your pen show shopping for a second. So we talked last year when you came. What are your pen show 101? How you should handle yourself when you show up? And you blew that completely out the water within the five minutes of the pen show opening. You ran around like, ah, I got a new pen. Just running around. Sorry. Sorry. Yeah. So he's like, Myke would vanish. Then we'd come back and go, look what I got. And then he'd vanish again. He'd go, look what I got. You've been very like paced this year.

Myke: I've bought two things. Yeah. So. Well, one of them was pretty quick, but I'd arranged it beforehand. Yeah. So I think that gives me an out. Yeah. I did buy a retro 51 within like 15 minutes of being there. That's true.

Brad: That's a given, I guess. Yeah.

Myke: There was one that I like to look off the Anderson table and I was like, ah, I'll take that one. Yeah. But yeah. So great question. So thank you very much.

Myke: Oh, now look. There's like a line forming now. Congratulations. Line up. Just line up.

Matt: So you get a space. My name is Matt. So I've recently found your podcast. I'm one of the guys who found the Apple podcast and then came to pen addict. And one thing interesting for me is I've used pens all my life. Never really thought about them. They're just tools. Then I got a fountain pen after listening to you guys. Then I went back to the beginning of your, not all of them, probably like 10. The first 10. Something interesting for me is now I'm actually paying attention to the normal pens that I use. Like, you know, Brad, you often refer to the jet streams and stuff. And it's, it's, it is interesting. It's sort of, you know, this little world that's opening up like, oh, I actually enjoy writing with this pen. So what I was thinking about for you guys, you referenced at the beginning of the podcast, you guys either didn't use or didn't like fountain pens. So how has, how has your view of, you started the pen addict when you didn't even like fountain pens. So how does, how has y'all's view of pens changed since 2012?

Brad: It's mind boggling how little I still know about pens. And I think that's what's changed the most is I've learned so much and then only come to realize I know very little still. So having people around us that are more experienced and do these things and can answer questions that you can lean on these people in this community to help you out when you have the most absolutely simple, basic question. And learn so much from each individual person's different perspective than what I have. Like, you know, I have a particular set of things that I look for in a pen. Well, that doesn't necessarily make it a good pen for you or for anyone else in the room. So being able to leverage like the group knowledge of everyone has been like really important for me in like just growing myself and learning and then be able to talk to someone else who's like brand new. Hey, I just started this. Here's how I write. Here's what I'm looking for. And then like to just appreciate every little thing, you know, about stationary. You don't have to buy $300 pens to have a great experience. You know, you buy a $3 pen and write on any any piece of paper that you can find and you're just set. So, you know, it's seeing kind of that. Community being so available and so approachable that. Change kind of how I think about things and change. How about how I think about doing things in the future, too.

Ana Reinert: So I completely agree. And I think that the opportunity that that everything from a roller rollerball or gel pen can create just as great an experience for what you need to do. If you're just taking notes at work or anything like that to a fountain pen, that's $100, $200, $500. And having all of those opportunities to have a great writing experience and having people here that can tell you I was listening to somebody today talk about, you know, this was the original ballpoint pen, you know. And, you know, here's they're telling the story about how that came to be. And, you know, no, these didn't work great. But this is where it started. This was how they were trying to figure out how you could have something that you could put in your pocket and not worry about leaking. Okay, well, this one did leak. But they were working on it. But, you know, and having that great history and, you know, how they tried to figure this stuff out and eventually figure out how to make these inks that actually didn't leak. And, you know, the balls in the rollers that kept the ink in there and flowed properly and all this kind of stuff. It's really cool. It's just, you know, and these people have all that knowledge and all that history and being able to sort of learn from other people.

Myke: So, fun. I think getting into fountain pens ended up giving me a greater understanding and appreciation of what I enjoy in pens. So, like, the thing that I use the most these days is a rotary mechanical pencil. Like, that is the thing that I use to write the most. And there are reasons for that. Like, because it's better for me to use something that I'm not clicking or uncapping when I'm recording. Because, like, you'll see me doing it. Like, I'm taking notes as we go. It's the quietest way for me to do it. Because the pencil can just remain uncapped all the time. It's easier for me to do that. And it's quieter when I use it. It doesn't really make as many sounds because it can be picked up in the microphone. But I've found a mechanical pencil that I adore. Like, I used my Rotaring Lava one because I love the design of it. Fountain pens taught me more about the design in pens that I enjoy. They taught me more about weight and balance. Because they tend to be on a higher scale. So, when I then started to understand what I liked about that, I could apply it to things that are more simple. But that I could still appreciate. Like, I used Rotarings before I got really big into fountain pens and didn't like them so much. And I have a regular Rotaring 500 at home as well that I really love to use and was using a bit last week. So, getting into fountain pens seemed to give me just a better understanding of what I like and don't like. And what I then can appreciate when looking at other things. And I like that stuff more now than I did four years ago.

Brad: I still get really excited about an awesome gel ink pen. I mean, like, I smile. I mean, I'm sitting there looking silly at my desk. No one else around. And I'll be using just whatever random fountain pens I'm using at the time. And I break out a gel ink pen. I was like, oh, man. I missed you, buddy. And this is, like, a really cool. This is, like, a really great experience. It happens all the time. Yep. Great question.

Myke: Another question?

Myke Hurley: Dave. All right. Sure. Hi. It's Dave. So, I'm curious. You know, Myke talked a little bit about wanting to grow the audience next year and have more people in here sitting and more people standing. And so, for everybody who might be listening at home and might be on the fence about buying that plane ticket or getting in the car and driving a few hours next year, like, what is each of your number one reason to come to the pen show? Anna?

Ana Reinert: Actually, the opportunity to get to hang out with my friends, meet new friends, meet vendors who can make me more knowledgeable about new products and older vintage products, the opportunity to actually hold in my hands things that I only ever get to see online, the Van Ness ink testing station, where I got to actually sit for a half an hour and try out, like, 20 different bung box inks. I mean, these are things that you can't really do online that can either, that can inform whether or not you spend the money on something that's very, either very expensive or very inexpensive. Getting to see all of these things, hold them in your hand, talk to the people who sell them, get a nib tuned, get a custom grind. These are all things that you can do in person that, yes, you can do them online, and you can do them through email, and you can mail, you know, something to someone and have a nib tuned, but it's not the same experience as actually sitting with someone and handing them the pen, have them tune the nib, try it, nope, not quite right, hand it back, let's try it again, you know, and work, really work with somebody. I mean, these are opportunities that are so, so, so great, and then just getting to meet people and talk pens and sit around and kind of nerd out with other people who get really excited about this stuff. This is like, you know, my husband's teased me for weeks. This is the three days in which I'm probably the most extroverted I am compared with the other 362 days out of the year. The rest of the time I stay in my house, in my room, on my computer, and then for three days I talk to people and hang out and stay up until two in the morning. We love Godot!

Matt: Wait.

Brad: So, for someone who's never been to a pen show, you don't come for the pens or the purchases or the inks. You come for the smiles and hugs, and everyone knows me, I'm a hugger, and it's just like Ana was talking about. Getting to meet these people that you talk to online, even if you've never talked to them at all before, just being able to see these people, hang out with everyone, you know, hang out at the bar afterwards, sharing stories and pens and paper and being able to talk to everyone. I mean, it's really all about the people. I don't even care, like, much about the business stuff. Like, you know, I'm actually here to work, but that, I'm just, I want to get through the day so I can go hang out with everyone when I'm done, because everyone's rolling by me. They can come see by me. Look what I got, Brad. I'm like, I haven't seen any tables yet. Thanks.

Brad: But it's good that I can get to live through everybody and everyone going through the show. So that's pretty cool. It's, I mean, it's 100% about the people. I know a bunch of people traveled to this show. I know it's a bunch of people's first show. And even if they just come for the people and for the hanging out, it's going to be so fulfilling and so rewarding. I can't recommend it highly enough to anyone who's even remotely interested in what we're doing to just come and hang out. I mean, that's seriously all you got to do. And you'll have a wonderful time. And the next year, you will be dying to come back, I hope.

Myke: Yeah. For me, obviously everything they said, but also the ability to try pens. Like, one of the best things here is that ever, like, it's not even a question. Like, you say, what pen did you buy? Oh, this one. And they just give it to you. And then you just get a pad. You just start writing with it because everyone trusts each other that they're not just going to go and just stab it in the desk. So that's one of my very favorite things is that sense of camaraderie of everyone. So I think we have three people waiting for questions. So we'll do these three and then we're going to cut it off because it's really hot in this room. Yeah. It's escalated quickly.

Dave: And here I was going to ask if I could have an extra question per layover on the way here. Because you were talking about different. I feel like this. Somebody needs to check their tall privilege on this microphone. So you were talking about different ways that people find the podcast and different ways that people come to it. And it got me thinking because I was sort of forced into it. I didn't get to choose which was my first episode.

Dave: So I was just thinking if you were going to recommend one episode for listeners to get someone else into it, like the first one is free episode to make someone understand why they should listen and why they should care about pens, which episode would you pick?

Myke: Probably this one, right? Like I'm being serious. Like it's not, I think.

Dave: So this one's full of inside jokes and high temperatures.

Myke: Well, that's what we're best known for. Well, the problem is getting into this show, and this is something we've been talking about a bunch, right? About how do we give a new starting point. And we're working on that for some point next. That's going to be mine and Brad's next kind of little mini project. It's working on a new starting point for people because we realized that there's 200 of these now. The issue coming into this show at any point is even if it's not inside jokes, it's just the accumulated knowledge of 200 episodes. So me and Brad refer to terms now like they're second nature that people might not know. And that's always an issue with anything that has lasted for as long as this has. Is jumping in anywhere is always going to be difficult. So I think why I think this one might be a fun one to start off with is because it's kind of different and it's got a different vibe to it. And we're having a bit more fun with it and it's a bit more lighthearted than usual, I think. But going forward, I think it's an important thing for us that we need to recreate and create something that becomes that and work better at trying to make the Panatic podcast a better resource for people.

Brad: And for me, it might be kind of a cliched answer, but I honestly think number one would be the best. And I never thought I would say that until Myke forced me to listen to it. About three or four weeks ago.

Myke: It's only the best if you're going to then listen to the whole thing, which is a good thing to do because you get all of the knowledge that we've got over the last four years. But it's a daunting task.

Brad: Yeah. But I thought like as nervous as I sounded and as, you know, sketchy as the whole thing was that we're doing a podcast about pins. Massively different. Yeah. For someone that's coming from like zero and has like a Bic or a Jetstream or all of a sudden they found a gel pen that they want. They can go, oh, there's more stuff to like learn out there. And then maybe I'll pick up some of these other episodes later. But I was episode one still holds up in a very strange kind of way, which I didn't think I would say until you made me listen to it again.

Myke: That's a good question.

Dave: And I can recommend the method. Get someone in a car, drive all the way up the West Coast, control the phone and explain all the in-jokes to you. Yeah. I like that. Just like hypothetically recommendations.

Myke: We can get that as a service, right? We can find people. We'll hire someone. Doug, you'll do that, right? Oh, yeah. Okay. Doug, what's your question? So what's your most exotic nib grind and what do you like about it? Anna?

Ana Reinert: I actually don't have any exotic nib grinds yet. I would at some point like to get an architect grind, but I haven't done it yet. Only thing I've had done so far was last year I had Myke Masayamo do two tunings for me. Just because I'm left-handed, I wanted to have some edges just touched up a little bit. I had an italic and I had him round the edges just a little bit and a fine that I just had him buff out a little bit. That's it.

Brad: For me, it's a recent one. I think architect type grinds would probably be a lot of our common theme, but I actually bought a pen recently with Zoom nib, which is a sailor nib, and it ended up, I didn't know if I would like it or not. It turns out I really disliked it because it writes like a marker.

Myke: I'd really like that. Yeah.

Brad: So my friend Mark Bacchus, I gave it to him. I said, just do something with this. Because it's just like a huge block of tipping on there. So I'm pretty sure someone who knows how to work on nibs could do something cool with this just massive workspace. So he did an architect grind, but the tipping on the pen is so big, the back end of the architect grind looks like a fish hook. So it's like the biggest, baddest architect grind you've ever seen in your life. And I brought it with me. So anyone who wants to see that, it's like you hold it up and you can see like you could tie it to a fishing line and go fishing with this thing. It's pretty, it's stupid in all the right ways.

Myke: Brad showed me this and whilst he wasn't looking, I turned a page of a notebook with it. Yeah.

Myke: Yeah. I hooked it right in under there and turned it over. Yeah. I don't have anything really. Mine is just like a cursive italic, which is like, everyone's like, that's, that's the most I have. Uh, cause I'm still a little bit scared of, of getting these things done. Cause as well, like most of the pens that I would want to have something like that done to, I already really like. So I've only ever had these grinds done on pens that I don't like. Right. Like, so like I know they need to be changed in some way. So I have the work done. Um, I should probably just buy something and have it for that purpose, but I haven't done that yet. Thank you, Doug.

Brad: Thanks, Doug.

Pencils

Myke: Father Kyle, you had the last question. The most important question. Yeah. What pencils did you bring to the show? I'm using one right now. Uh, I'm using my Rotring Lava. I think it's a 600. I don't know what they call it. They call that model or something different, but yeah. But I love this thing and I'm using it right now. And I'm, I just, this is like, if not most, it's in the, I think top two or three writing utensils. I love this thing to death because it's real heavy and it looks so good. Uh, and it does a great job. I also brought the Mickey Mouse Kuro Toga as well. You didn't think I had this many, right? And I also brought a Koh-i-Noor magic pencil. Ooh, how is that? It's magic.

Ana Reinert: Oh, and the Apple pencil.

Myke: But it kind of counts.

Ana Reinert: Um, well, I brought two boxes of Koh-i-Noor magic pencils and I have a few left. So, come see me if you want a Koh-i-Noor magic pencil. Uh, thank you, CW Pencil Enterprises. Yes. So, I ordered them from them and they included a handwritten pencil note on my invoice saying, what are you up to? Um, to which I put an Instagram picture up saying, uh, because I thought the pen show needed some pencils. Um, so I brought those. But I also, um, included in my regular kit, um, some of my watercolor pencils and I have a whole bunch. So, I got a problem.

Brad: So, um, living up to Brad Dowdy hates pencils. As I've recently heard on my good friends, the Erasable Podcast, who we have so much fun with, I brought zero pencils to this show.

Brad: Because I didn't want to besmirch the good nature of the fountain pen show. So, but I, I will say I'm leaving with one pencil because I got the magic from Anna as well.

Myke: So. That brings us to the end of the episode. Brad Dowdy, where can people find you online? I'm giving you the honor this week. Find me online at penaddict.com.

Brad: You can find me on Twitter at Dowdyism and on Instagram at penaddict. Anna?

Ana Reinert: Uh, you can find me at wellappointeddesk.com. You can find me on Instagram at wellappt. Desk? Oh, Jesus.

Myke: That was why I asked Brad because I couldn't say Anna. Like, I can barely say it when I'm looking at it on the screen.

Ana Reinert: Same on, same on Twitter. Please don't make me do that again.

Myke: Ha ha ha ha. I'm at iMike. I am YKE. If you want to find our show notes for this week, head over to relay.fm slash penaddict slash two zero zero for the episode two hundred. Thanks again to Pench L.A. But most of all, thank you all for joining us. We'll be back next week. Like in a few days. Yeah, like three days.

Myke: Thank you for listening, everyone. Oh, come on. I've got to take a picture of this from my stupid iPad. All right.

Myke Hurley: All right. All right.