The Pen Addict 291/transcript

The Pen Addict Podcast Transcript
Episode:	291
Title:	At Some Point a Pen Has to Get Involved
Release Date:	January 17th, 2018
Hosts:	Brad Dowdy Myke Hurley
Guests:	No guests this episode
Additional Information
Official page:	Episode 291
Audio File:	Audio Episode 291
Podcast page:	The Pen Addict 291
Length:	7676 min <br />1.267 h <br /> minutes
Previous Transcript	Next Transcript

Myke Hurley: From RelayFM, this is The Pen Addict, episode 291. Today's show is brought to you by Squarespace, Pen Chalet, and Blue Apron. My name is Myke Hurley, and I am joined by the wonderful Mr. Brad Dowdy.

Jim Cantore: Brad Dowdy. I don't know who Brad Dowdy is. This is Jim Cantore from The Weather Channel, aka The Storm Chaser. I'm down here in Macon, Georgia, tracking winter storm Hurley. It's whiteout conditions here, Myke. I don't know how any human being can function with this type of weather system in place, Myke. There's at least a quarter inch of snow on the ground. No one should be on the roads, Myke. Please, I implore you.

Myke Hurley: Is that what it takes to bring Macon to a halt?

Jim Cantore: Myke, it's serious down here. I just implore you, stay in, podcast all day. This is, I don't know how we're going to travel back to Atlanta. You know, it is so bad. It's blizzard, whiteout conditions here, Myke. Tropical, oh, winter storm Hurley. Tropical storm. Tropical snow storm. I'm used to being in hurricanes, Myke. This is a new gig for me. These winter storms, trying to come up with these names for these winter storms is brutal. This one's called Hurley because it makes me sick, Myke. Like, I'm sick to death of Macon, Georgia, being in snow. There's no bread. There's no milk on the shelves. People are going nuts down here, Myke. I'm out of here. I got to go find Brad so you can get this show done.

Myke Hurley: Please do. Thank you, person whose name I've forgotten, but they're a weather person.

Jim Cantore: Yeah. Jim Cantore, he's the national weather guru for the US.

Myke Hurley: And it was nice of him to drop in then.

Jim Cantore: Yeah, yeah. He's out in my front yard. Yeah. So, he just left. He's going to go make snow angels right now.

Myke Hurley: Enjoy that, Jim. I hope he has a good day. So, you're having some snow situations.

Jim Cantore: I wouldn't call it a situation. It's more of a stupidity, but yeah, it's a situation.

Myke Hurley: So, I guess Macon is quite like London in that, like, any snow that sticks to the ground brings everything to a halt.

Jim Cantore: Completely done. Yeah. Like, I tweeted out yesterday that my kid's school was canceled, like, 4 o'clock yesterday afternoon. And I looked down at my weather app, and it's, like, 55 degrees. I was like, this is what we're going for, huh? And, I mean, yeah, it snowed, and the roads are fine. You know, it's no big deal. So.

Sailor Pen

Myke Hurley: Brad, I have something that I need to tell you. I have something I need to talk to you about. Okay. I'm in love, Brad.

Jim Cantore: I mean, I knew that, right? I mean, me, you, we go way back.

Myke Hurley: Brad, I'm in love with a sailor.

Myke Hurley: My Bongbox Progear is, like, it's everything. It's just everything. It's everything to me. I love this pen just immensely. The love is so strong. I just, I'm on, I mean, I spoke about being on a bit of a Progear kick, but this is, like, just next level. I absolutely adore this pen. Like, it's serious.

Jim Cantore: So, I'm shocked. Not in a, that it couldn't happen way, but that it's that much of an important pen for you.

Myke Hurley: The design is just wonderful, and I love the feel of the grip section because it's cold. Yeah. And I really, really like that. It is very interesting, right?

Jim Cantore: Like, what is it? It's an abnormally designed pen, to be perfectly honest.

Myke Hurley: Yes. It's weird, and I think that's part of the reason that I love it so much. Is it aluminium?

Jim Cantore: I don't believe so, but I'd have to look. No. I don't think it's aluminium.

Myke Hurley: Because it doesn't feel like it is because it's always cold.

Jim Cantore: Yeah, and it's too dense, I think, for aluminium. It's wonderful. I don't think it is. I think they're just steel.

Myke Hurley: Yeah. Steel would make sense because of the fact that it's cold all the time.

Myke Hurley: I just, I'm absolutely in love with this pen. I'm so, so happy that I was able to get one because it's everything for me right now.

Jim Cantore: Well, this is also what you've wanted for the past year. I love Sailors. I have my orange pro gear. It's my favorite one, but I want that special one that not everyone can get. I want to work to get one. You found one. You got it, and it turns out that you really like it. When's the wedding date? Any day now.

Myke Hurley: Yeah, it's serious. I absolutely adore this pen. It's wonderful. Well, I love to hear that. Yeah, it's serious for me right now.

Jim Cantore: Are you still going with the gold ink?

Myke Hurley: Yeah, yeah. I'm actually planning on buying gold ink for it. I might get the same one unless there is a better recommendation for me. But yeah, I want to keep it gold.

Jim Cantore: I don't know if that was a custom ink for that pen or not.

Myke Hurley: It is available still.

Jim Cantore: Okay. Gotcha. So, yeah. Well, you won't have any trouble finding an ink in this market to match your pen.

Myke Hurley: No, I'm sure I can find a good gold ink from somewhere. But yeah, it is the only pen that I've used for like two weeks. That's awesome. Yeah. It's big time.

Jim Cantore: We should all have the love that Myke has for his sailor.

Myke Hurley: Mm-hmm. If only. The world would be a better place.

Pelican Ink

Jim Cantore: All right. On that ink front, have you seen the new Pelican Ink of the Year? Do you do much with the Pelican Inks of the Year? You're not a big Pelican Ink fan. The Edelstein Ink.

Myke Hurley: I mean, I'm not a Pelican Ink denier, right? Like, I've just never really gone crazy for them. In general, like, the availability of an ink is not what makes me want it. Yeah. Like, I'm all about the color, right? Like, I want a good color. I mean, this looks nice. This is the Pelican Edelstein Olivine. And it's like a nice green color. Yeah. It's a great color. It looks lovely, but I don't want this ink color.

Jim Cantore: Yeah. Like, I'm not going to. I didn't buy last year's Smoky Quartz. I didn't. I won't buy this year's Olivine. Olivine. Olivine. Olivine. So, it's a very nice green. I'm just not much of a green guy unless it's a bright green. You know, the yellow greens, like the Huff Quartier Grosin, number 28 from Ackermann. Mm-hmm. That's my green. This is fantastic looking. It's just not for me. But they do this once a year. And they really, and I didn't notice it this past year, but in previous years, they've allowed users to, like, mix and match a color and do a submission, right, for, like, what color the next year will be. So, I wonder if this was, if this followed that same pattern they've done over the past few years. If they did, I missed it. But, yeah. Okay. Yeah. It is the, yeah. On Joshua's post, it says, over 1,200 suggestions were submitted per the company, but Johannes from Cologne was ultimately declared the winner of that contest with an olive green colored entry. So, yeah. They still do that, but it seems like I've missed it the past few years. I've always submitted some type of purple ink to that contest, but I missed it this past year. But, yeah. It's great.

Myke Hurley: Did they make a matching pen?

Jim Cantore: Usually. I mean, they have for the past few years. So, they had the Smoky Quartz M205 last year to match.

Jim Cantore: I don't remember them doing, did they do Amber? Because I think they did Aquamarine. I can't remember. I don't, they've done some. I don't know if they've done them all. Now that you say that, we can ask Joshua and find out, or if anyone knows. But they, I like the pens. I'll buy the pen more likely than the ink. Like, I think a green, this color green pen, if I can get it with like the silver trim, I might buy that. And then I probably would have to buy the ink to go with it, right? Just because I'm dumb that way.

Myke Hurley: If you buy, I mean, well, this is like me buying a gold ink. Like, I don't particularly want a gold ink, right? But I will buy a gold ink if I have a pen that matches it. So, I would, you know, say if I bought a green pen and it had the exact matching color, then I would get that too.

Jim Cantore: Yeah. Yeah. So, I don't know exactly how to spell, to pronounce, Ola-Vine, Ola-Vine, Ola-Vine-A. And our friends at the BYOB podcast did a whole episode, well, a whole half episode. Myke, episode 8.5, our good friends, Jim and Michael, they recorded an entire episode of Michael mispronouncing the Girardin inks and Jim telling them how to pronounce them correctly in French. And it's kind of amazing. Okay. So, if you haven't caught that, yeah. It's like 25 minutes of them just going through the entire product lineup. Michael butchering the names and Jim going through the correct pronunciations and meanings. It was fascinating. It was hilarious. So, I implore y'all to go listen to episode 8.5 of BYOB. And you should listen to the next episode of BYOB because I will be joining, like, the nine other people on their podcast tonight. So, I might get one or two words in. But we'll see. I'm going to be a guest on the BYOB podcast tonight. I look forward to that.

Myke Hurley: So, we should, I think, an interesting programming note. You were talking about wanting to do Instagram live more often, maybe, like, weekly. That was, like, a thing that you were talking about doing. So, I, you know, decided to make you put your money where your mouth is. And next week on January the 25th at 10, noon Eastern, at noon Eastern, which is 5 p.m. London time. You can kind of work it out from there depending on where your time zone is. I am going to be joining Brad for an Instagram live session on the Pen Addict Instagram. My assumption will be that we're going to just, like, sit around and chat and show pens that we have. And maybe I can show you my great IKEA shelf cabinet thing. Yeah, that'd be awesome. Right? So, I can show you what's going on and all of that. So, go to Instagram.com slash Pen Addict. And, I guess, turn on notifications or whatever, right? So, you know that when we go live. Yeah. If they work.

Jim Cantore: Like, none of my notifications work. Well, then, just be there.

Myke Hurley: Be there at noon Eastern on the 25th. Be there or be square, I think is what they say.

Twitter

Jim Cantore: I'll send out a reminder on Twitter. We'll tweet it out. And hopefully it works. Hopefully, you're able to connect. Because when I tried to do this with Brian Goulet, I could never join his feed. But if not, we'll figure it out. So, if not, I'll just create the session and talk about you for, like, a half an hour.

Myke Hurley: That sounds all right to me. And I'll do the same. And then people can just choose your own adventure story.

Jim Cantore: That'd be great. That'd be great. And other programming note while we're at it. For you live listeners, next week, next Wednesday, we are going to record two episodes. And one will start at 9 a.m. Then 10 a.m. So, move the schedule up a little bit next week. And you'll have two live episodes to listen to if you want to tune in to us.

Myke Hurley: All right. Today's show is brought to you by Squarespace. Use the offer code INK at checkout and you'll get 10% of your first purchase. Make your next move with Squarespace. They give you all of the tools that you need to create the website that you want for your next idea or project. With the ability to grab a unique domain name, take advantage of award-winning templates, and have everything backed up with 24-7 customer support, they are the all-in-one platform that will let you put your next site online. You don't have to worry about installing anything or patching anything or looking out for security upgrades because Squarespace have got all of that covered. They do all of this stuff for you. It's super simple. Everything's done in the web browser. You can customize everything, add in pages. You can change the design. You can tweak the templates. Whatever it is you want to do, it's all there. It's very, very simple to do. You can create online stores. You can create portfolios. You can create blogs. You can create sites for events or clubs. You can create sites for businesses. Squarespace has the tools for all of them. Their plans start at just $12 a month, but you can start a trial today with no credit card required by going to squarespace.com. You can get 10% off when you sign up by using the offer code INK. You'll get 10% off your first purchase. And also show your support for the pen addict. We thank Squarespace for the continued support of this show and RelayFM. Squarespace. Make your next move. Make your next website.

Jim Cantore: There's not a lot of topics I avoid on this show, Myke, or talking about on Twitter or on my blog.

Myke Hurley: This was something that we specifically decided that we weren't going to talk about when it happened, right?

Jim Cantore: Yeah. Like I told you, like it was brought up to my attention about a month ago, maybe more than that. It was more than that. And I showed it to you and I said, this is stupid and we're not going to talk about this because I didn't want it to really get out there. But our good friends at Retro 51 sent out a tweet, what, two days ago, Monday maybe, saying, hey, Brad, did you see this on eBay? The pen addict Retro 51. And the first model that you did last year was up for sale. I'm like, yeah, I saw that. And they're like, OMG, essentially. So back when I launched this year's Retro 51 with the aforementioned Michael Jacobs, the isometric, which has been an awesome pen. And right at that time, one of our listeners, Mr. Gary Varner, a lot of y'all will know him from the community, formerly Notegeist. And he sent me a link. He said, hey, did you see this? And it was an eBay link to this Retro 51 from the original pen addict. I was like, no, I haven't seen that. This was like a beginning of December. And I clicked over to it. He didn't tell me anything. He's like, hey, did you see this? I was like, OK, I'll go look. Someone's selling the original pen addict Retro 51 on eBay. I'll go take a look. Should be no big deal.

Jim Cantore: $450 was the list price. And I just was my mouth just, you know, my jaw dropped. And I couldn't believe what I was seeing. And I was like, well, that's dumb. No one's going to buy that.

Jim Cantore: Guess what?

Myke Hurley: I bought it. No, it's not true.

Jim Cantore: And someone did. Unless this person, like, set up, you know, like a proxy and did it themselves kind of thing. Right. To, like, set a market. I don't know, you know, the ins and outs and what you could do. And, like, two or three days later, Gary sent me another text. Hey, it's sold. I was like, you got to be kidding me. So, like, I don't know what to think about this, Myke. It's like, I mean, I guess I think nothing about it. I think it's dumb. I can't believe someone would buy that, I guess. Yeah. I don't know. I mean, who am I to begrudge someone?

Myke Hurley: I guess the person who bought it doesn't know you. Mm-hmm. That would be my assumption. And that they are a collector and saw a rare mint in box, not even seal broken, Retro 51, and bought it. But even then, I mean, I am a collector of these things, and I don't think I would pay £450 for any of them. Like, Retro 51, you know I love you, like, and I will love you forever. But, like, I think even they are aware of the fact that $450 is not worth it, right, which is why they were tweeting it to you. I can't believe somebody paid this. I mean, how many of these do you have? I think it's time for you to make, like, a lucrative side business. You just start selling off all the extras. I think I just have, like, two. There you go. It's $900 in your pocket, so.

Jim Cantore: Like, I don't hoard these things. Like, I have my number one, like the 001, and then I think I have two random ones that I just, you know, stash behind.

Myke Hurley: Oh, boy, 001? You should go for it. I mean, someone paid $450 for $149.

Jim Cantore: No, add a zero to that, right? Yeah.

Myke Hurley: $4,500? Yep. Start in bid. Start in bid $4,500. Buy it now at $15,000. This is wild, Brad. This is really wild.

Jim Cantore: Hey, if someone wants to put my kids through college, I'll give up 001 for $4,500. Just get in touch.

Myke Hurley: I can't. I really, I can't believe that somebody purchased that. Like, that is a wild price. Like, Field Notes editions don't go for that amount of money, right? Like, this is not a thing. Very, very strange. I would. Okay, so here's the thing. If you are out there and you were the person that bought this, just tell us. We won't reference you on the show if you don't want to be spoken about. But, like, I just want to know, one, if somebody actually did buy it, right? And, like, there wasn't some weirdness going on here. And, two, like, why? Why did you buy it? Like, no judgment. I've spent obscene amounts of money, right? We all have. I just want to know. Like, I'm just interested. Like, what is it specifically about this edition that made you want to spend that amount of money on it? I'm just interested.

Jim Cantore: So, on that note, still have some isometric Bomb Pop Retro 51s available in the Pen Addict shop.

Myke Hurley: Buy them now. Keep them in the box. Flip them.

Jim Cantore: Flip them. The original one was an edition of $300. This one's an edition of $600. So, there's still a few left. You know, hold on to them for about a year. And, you, too, can be an eBay superstar.

Myke Hurley: They're only $38. You can really make some serious margins on this.

Jim Cantore: Yeah. Yeah. Oh, and total side note, Stacey just reminded me in the chat room about the mission to Mars. I got your pen in. So, you were covered. I'll just hold it to the pen show.

Myke Hurley: I saw your Instagram photo of the two. And, I felt a warmness in my heart knowing that one of them was for me. So, thank you very much, as always. Sure, sure, sure.

Jim Cantore: So, your very first, your intro, your I'm in love intro. I had no idea what it was going to be. I thought it might have a shot of being the new Sailor 1911 Royal Tangerine that was announced. What do you think about this pen? Once it wasn't that, I was like, okay, well, that's a little bit deep to go. I'm going to say I'm that hardcore in love with a pen I don't own yet. But, what do you think about the new Royal Tangerine? This is going to be the U.S. limited edition for this year, or at least the early part of this year. They did that turquoise one last year. I did not purchase that one. But, I'm kind of tempted here.

Myke Hurley: Now, you know, like I'm not big on the 1911 design. Like, I much prefer the Pro Gear design. Right. But, I have put my name in for a pre-order for one of these. The pen chalet. I'll say, I'll just give a caveat here. This will be the third time that I put my name in for a pre-order on the pen chalet. Do you remember? Keen listeners will remember that I have put my name in for pre-orders for both of the Platinum 3776s. And, I didn't buy either of them.

Jim Cantore: Okay.

Myke Hurley: Like, the time came around and I thought about it. And, like, if they were available to purchase then, I would have just bought them. Right. But, like, with just a little bit of time passed, I'm like, ah, I'll get it later. And, the reason I did it with the last one is that the first one, I think, was the Nice Lelas. Like, you could still buy that. So, whilst it was limited, it's not, like, Gang Rush limited. So, I kind of... Well, no.

Jim Cantore: They did something weird with that one.

Myke Hurley: Okay.

Jim Cantore: They did 3,776 numbered editions and then unlimited unnumbered editions. Well, there you go.

Myke Hurley: So, that's... There you go. So, they're a stock pen. So, my thought was, I'm going to wait until I run into one of these, try it out, and then decide if I'm going to buy it. Mm-hmm. But, I feel very confident that I will buy this pen for two reasons. One, like, just my obscene affection for Sailor pens right now. Mm-hmm. And, it looks like it's a great color. And, I put my name in for a Zoom nib. Oh, nice. Which I... And, I don't have any of these. And, I have tried a Zoom Sailor and loved it. And, I know that Sailor make good ones of these. And, I know that this option doesn't come along very often. So, if I'm able to get one, then I'm pretty confident I'm going to get one. More than anything, I'm very intrigued to see what this color looks like. Because, the pictures look wild.

Jim Cantore: Yeah. I really want to see this in person. I hope there's going to be one at the LA Pen Show. That should be around the same timing as the launch of this pen sometime in February. Mm-hmm. And, yeah. I want to see this pen in person to see how the color really comes out. Because, it's very bright and very orange, but not necessarily... I don't know. It's a... I don't want to say it's like a different orange. But, yeah. It's something I kind of need to see in person. Which size did you pre-order? So, it comes in the standard and it comes in the full size, the large one.

Myke Hurley: I went standard. Mm-hmm. Just because it's standard. I don't really know if I need large. I mean, I looked at the dimensions and there isn't like a huge difference. So...

Jim Cantore: Well, it's the same as the Pro Gear and the Pro Gear Slim. Okay. The Pro Gear is considered large. The Slim is considered standard.

Myke Hurley: Then, I'm kind of happy that I went with the standard. Because the 1911 is bigger than the Pro Gear anyway, right?

Jim Cantore: Just lengthwise.

Myke Hurley: Yeah.

Jim Cantore: Because of the rounded ends.

Myke Hurley: So, that's... So, I'm... Yeah. So, standard works for me. Because the thickness isn't so much of a thing for me as it is the overall length. And I don't think I would want it to be much longer than a Pro Gear, really. Yeah. So, because I think one of the reasons that I love these pens is I love the form factor. I love the size. So, yeah. I'm happy with my option for a standard.

Jim Cantore: So, when I saw this picture, I retweeted it, I think, from Anderson pens. And I was just like, sold. Yeah. Like, I'm going to buy it. And like you, it's like, well, that initial, like, you know, FOMO thing happens. And it's like, oh, I got to have this. It's orange. It's rhodium trim. It's kind of perfect. It's like everything I would want in a pen. And then you, like, you know, get away from it for a day or two. And you're like, well, do I need this pen? And it's come up. I've made a couple of comments in various places where I'm going to try, attempt, plan on not spending, like, a lot of high-end dollars on pens. And I got a tweet from my friend Twitless Dan. He said, would this count as high-end for you, Brad? And I've actually had that question come up a couple of times based on my comment. And I'm never given, like, a full answer to that because it's too long to put into a tweet. But, and this is one of those questions that it's different. Everyone's answer is different, right? This is, like, just for me specifically. And, you know, some people, you know, $5 might be a high-end pen. And that's cool. And there's a lot of awesome pens in that price range. Some people, it might be $2,000, you know, and that's cool, too. There's lots of crazy pens you can get in that range. So, to put a number on it for me, what do I consider high-end? Or what is my limit? Or where am I comfortable, like, just buying a pen without necessarily crazy amounts of thought or insane budgeting or things like that? And I think it's right in the $300 range. I think that's, like, I start to get uncomfortable over $300. And that's a lot of dang money as it is. But I don't need more, like, $500 pens or $800 pens. Like, I haven't seen the value in those pens for me personally, like, from a writing perspective. The only one is my Nakaya Portable, which was worth every penny that I spent on that pen. But I've started to become uncomfortable in the higher-end range because I don't think I'm getting that much difference in enjoyment spending $800 on a pen than spending $250 on a pen, right? So, that's just for me personally. That's kind of where I'm at right now. I see so many great pens, like, in the $200 to $300 range or the $150 range or the $100 range. Lots of custom materials. Lots of good stuff from big manufacturers. That's a really good quality, sweet spot type of range where companies you'll see, like, Sailor, like we just talked about, will do something special right around that range. I don't want to spend $600, you know, but I would consider spending $300. And, you know, that's just my personal take right now. I look at my pen collection as it currently stands and I don't use my most expensive pens as much as I use some pens that are, you know, more in the $100 to $300 range. Those are, like, my favorite pens, so I should focus on that. So, that's kind of what my mental math looks like for me personally. So, you know, we'll see. I think the only thing this year that could break me from this comment is seeing what Pilot does with their anniversary. Like, I'm a hardcore Pilot fan. They could do some crazy stuff for their anniversary year and I might, you know, we'll see. If anyone can break me, it would be Pilot, so otherwise I'm not sure.

Myke Hurley: I'm trying to keep my hype in check on that one.

Jim Cantore: Mm-hmm.

High-End Pens

Myke Hurley: I, my high-end value, I think, is $400 is what I consider to be, like, high-end. I start questioning, like, severely questioning at $200. That's where I'm, like, you know, like, that mid-range between, like, $2 and $4. What am I really getting? That's where I really start to think about it, but I'm still likely to make purchases in that range. $400 is where it's, like, maybe once every year or two, right? Right. But I buy, like, a single pen for that for more than that amount of money. Like, I really have not purchased many pens over, like, $300. Mm-hmm. Um, so, yeah, I have to really sit and think. I feel like in the last year or two, kind of my typical average purchase is, like, $250. Yeah. Because that's just what I'm buying now. It's fewer, but, but grander. Yeah. So, like, the $250 to $300 range is kind of where most of my purchases seem to be falling these days.

Jim Cantore: Yeah, I think I hit the peak dollar amount towards the end of last year. I was, like, spending too much on pens that, you know, may not get as much use as some other pens I enjoy that are, you know, a third of the price, things like that. So, I've really tried to kind of think about those types of things more this year. But then you walk into a pen show and you're like, ah, so that's what I'm trying to avoid.

Myke Hurley: Yeah, it's very easy to get that feeling when you walk into a show. You know, like, two days ago, I was just poking around on a couple of websites and I was looking at some inks and stuff. And then I just went, I just started looking at King of Pen again. Yeah. I think I'm going to buy one of those this year.

Jim Cantore: That one's been absolutely worth it for me. Yeah. That was, yeah, that was a very expensive pen.

Myke Hurley: I think that is going to be my, I think that's going to be my big purchase pen-wise this year. I think we'll be a Sailor King of Pen. I'm going to put off the Nakaya again. And I'm totally cool with doing that. I really, like, I have just this feeling of, like, reaching the logical end, right? Like, of, like, the maximum, like, the furthest I can go. And it feels like a Nakaya. So, I'm totally cool with putting it off, right? Because it is, like, the logical maximum of where I'm willing to go value-wise and also just, like, quality-wise. Right? Like, just reaching that level is, like, that is an end point. Not that I'm saying I'm stopped buying pens at that stage. But, like, it feels like the end of how far I'll go down the line. And then it's kind of just bouncing back and forward. So, I'm cool with putting it off again. But purely because, like, I love Nakaya's. They're beautiful. They're wonderful things to use. I can't remember the last time I was so excited when I actually tried a pen than I was with the King of Pen at DC. Like, I had, I mean, this is wild. I don't know if anybody can sympathize with this, but I had, like, goosebumps when I was using it. Because it was just so perfect. It was just so perfect. Like, I couldn't believe how well that pen fit me. Like, in every sense. So, that's probably going to be my big purchase this year. And I'm going to wait for a pen show. Because there's no way I'm buying a pen like that online. Like, just no way. No way. Right.

Jim Cantore: Good move. So, yeah. You know, this is something we'll talk about throughout the year. And, you know, it's a good place to be. I mean, shoot. I would like to spend less on fountain pens. I've kind of hit that peak where, like, I've got, like, all the things I've wanted that I've found very, very enjoyable. And I think buying something in that higher end right now would just be to buy it. Not to, like, totally love it. So, I want to see what happens. So, yeah. I think I'm pretty confident in, you know, how I feel about making these purchases.

Sailor Pens

Myke Hurley: All right. So, going back to those Sailor 1911s for a moment. There is a place you can pre-order them right now and get a great price on them. And that is Pen Chalet, who is sponsoring this week's show. Pen Chalet have great pens from all of the companies that you're used to dealing with. Right? Like Pelican, Lamy, Pilot, Namiki, of course, Sailor, Kaweco, Monteverde. And they're an authorized dealer of all of them. Pen Chalet believe in customer satisfaction, which is why they offer fast and reliable customer service. It's why they have free shipping and all those of the $50 in the United States. And also, great rates for shipping overseas. They have a 100% satisfaction guarantee. This is what Pen Chalet is all about. They only offer the highest quality products. And not only do they have every type of writing instrument you could conceive of, they also have a bunch of different accessories as well. They're always running special discounts and sales. There's always new stuff going on to Pen Chalet. And you can always get yourself a good deal because you listen to this show. So, if you go to PenChalet.com, that's P-E-N-C-H-A-L-E-T.com, and click the podcast link at the top of the website, you want to enter the password Pen Addict. That is where you will get your hands on a 10% code that you can use on absolutely anything at the Pen Chalet. And also, this week's offer. So, again, can't talk about prices on this one, but there are some Lamy gift packs available. So, Safari or AL Star fountain pens. And they will come with either notebooks or ink and converters. So, Ron has some, like, packs that he's selling right now. Some Lamy's. You should go take a look at them because the deals are good. Yeah, I don't know that you'd call it selling.

Jim Cantore: I think he's pretty much giving them away. Okay. You should go look at this. The prices, as Ron is wont to do, these are ridiculous prices on actually some limited edition colors that are not part of the regular lineup. So, this is really good. So, this is some good dressing, some good sets.

Myke Hurley: Yep. There's some absolutely great deals there right now. So, you can go and get it. It's great for starting a new year, getting yourself a nice little kit, or maybe for somebody else in your life. So, that's penshalet.com. Click the podcast link at the top of the website. Enter the password, penaddict, to get your hands on all of those offers. Our thanks to Penshalet for their continued support of this show and RelayFM.

Jim Cantore: All right. So, I'm pretty sure we've talked about this at least once in the past, but it might be like all the way back in the double digits of the show because I kind of remember this. The topic came up again. I think it was an email from a listener. It said, would you make your own handwriting font? And they were talking about my handwriting and they would love to see a font in my handwriting. And I've gone through trying to make a font from my handwriting. And as far as I've gotten a big pad of paper, sat down, really focused on what I wanted my letters to look like, sent them, you know, I forget who I even sent them to. And then never did anything with it. I'm like, I'm kind of like, okay, this is cool. And it's also very awkward and uncomfortable at the same time that like my handwriting would be what someone types with for various reasons.

Jim Cantore: Do you think about, I mean, would you ever do this? Like, do you have any reason to want this?

Myke Hurley: No one wants my handwriting. Like, I know it's like an off joke of the show that I don't have good handwriting, but I don't. Like, I don't even want it.

Jim Cantore: Right. Right. But like, could you see like someone doing this? Like our friend Myke Rohde did, like had a really good use for his, right? He's wrote the sketchnote handbook and then he created a sketchnote typeface from his handwriting to use in the book. That's a cool use of digitizing your handwriting. I would feel like really awkward unless I had some kind of use for that. Especially to let other people use my handwriting. That's interesting to me. Like, I can't quite put my head around it. I get that, you know, it can kind of look cool from time to time. And sometimes my handwriting looks really awesome. I think most of the time now it needs a lot of work. But I just find the concept of it a little bit weird. And I don't know if I could ever get past that to ever do that for myself. So, or much less like share it out with the world. So, I get the idea. I know that it's a thing. But I'm not sure I want to go there with my own handwriting.

Myke Hurley: Yours would be a contender though. Because you do have an interesting and kind of unique style, I think.

Jim Cantore: Yeah, I'd have to work a month or two to kind of clean it up. But, yeah, like I could see it. I just don't know that I'm comfortable, like, making that happen. I don't know. It's a weird thing. You know, then, you know, next week I'll have my own digitized handwriting. So, you never know. You never know. An article that got shared around a lot this week in the stationary world was from a site that I follow regularly, Creative Boom. They do some really cool stuff. 22 awesome online shops for stationary addicts. When you clicked over to this link, Myke, what were your initial thoughts?

Myke Hurley: There are some cool ones on here. Like, there's some people that we frequent and know. And I'm happy to see that, right? So, like the Stationer and Present and Correct, which is awesome. And CW Pencils. So, there are some great ones on there. But there's some weird inclusions. So, again, another one that I like, the Journal Shop. I've shopped from them. I actually got a bunch of field notes from them. Like, rare field notes. Like, they were holding on to a couple. But then they've got stuff like Paper Chase on here, which is like a really big, like, just like a huge high street brand. Like, to the point where I'm like, I'm not 100% sure why you're including them on this list when you're, like, you've got CW Pencil on here. It's like, you've picked these really interesting ones from across the world, but then include, like, a high street brand. It's like a peculiar mix here. It almost feels like somebody will, like, you have to find this amount. And then they went and found that amount.

Jim Cantore: Yeah, I was looking for the word. I'm with you. I think peculiar is the right word, right? So, you know, I haven't heard of, you know, 80% of these shops, which is fine. But it's because there's a wider definition of stationary than what we normally dabble in, right? So, this has, like, greeting cards, right? Which is totally fine. Like, that's cool. But, like, it's got a lot of stores on there for that type of, you know, get your invitations printed type of stores. Like, Present Incorrect is one of my favorite shops to, like, go look at cool stuff. They do some really neat stuff.

Jim Cantore: How CW Pencils isn't, like, second on this list, I don't know, if not first. But it's just, like, it's kind of a weird list. It's definitely UK-based, which is cool.

Jim Cantore: I don't know. It's, like, throw cult. This isn't online shops, right? This isn't a physical shop. 22 awesome online shops. Why isn't cult pens, like, number three? You know? Or jet pens, you know, for, like, crazy, unique stuff. So, but, I mean, it's just a perspective thing. Like, I know our perspective is jaded to all the brands and companies we love. But I thought it could be better. But I did learn and remind myself of some companies, like, Mark and Fold. Like, I want to, I've, they've always been on my list to order something from. They make really neat notebooks. This is a good list to go check out. It's a, it's peculiar. Yeah, it's good.

Myke Hurley: This is a good list. It's good to exist because there are some bigger and smaller companies that deserve this attention. But it's, I just find it strange to see some inclusions on here that it kind of colors the list in a weird way. But it is great. And I'm happy, I'm always happy to see this stuff because.

Jim Cantore: Yeah, I love seeing Caroline and I love seeing Tessa on there. It was awesome. So, so now I'll make myself a note. I'm going to do 23 awesome online shops for Stationery Myke.

Jim Cantore: Stick it to the creative boom, people. What do you think?

Myke Hurley: You show them.

Jim Cantore: You show them, Brad.

Jim Cantore: Yeah, that's not going to happen.

Jim Cantore: I had a weird listen to a podcast that I love. A weird thought from a podcast that I love. That probably out of all of our listeners, I'd say probably one other person might listen to this podcast. So, it's actually called The PauseCast, which I'm sure drives you absolutely insane. The naming.

Myke Hurley: But it's for a reason. No. It's for a reason. Because there's a clear reason. There's a joke.

Jim Cantore: Yeah. Yeah. So, it's with Joe Posnanski. So, that's where the PauseCast come from. And Joe is a sports writer I've followed for years for his baseball writing. And with a gentleman named Michael Schur. Are you familiar with Michael Schur, Michael? Before I linked it. I'm not sure about Michael Schur. Not sure. So, he is well known. He first got his break writing for The Office, the US version of The Office. And then he is the creator, the writer of Parks and Rec. Oh, okay. Interesting. And The Good Place, which is a new show. So, he's a big writer in the Hollywoods. So, he's a behind-the-scenes guy. But he's created a bunch of big... My gosh. It's tragic.

Myke Hurley: There's like no way to link to the specific episode.

Jim Cantore: I tried so hard. My gosh. It's horrible. And they don't care. Like, they don't care. They just want to get online and talk. So, they're two guys that, you know, have a lot of similar interests. And it's mostly about sports. And then, like, Michael's writing. So, but I listen to it because I love it. They have a lot of baseball. They have some baseball players on that are as regular guests that I enjoy. So, it's just a fun listen for me. And then every episode, they do a draft of something. You know, one of the most recent ones was something you're familiar with. They did a draft of Christmas songs. Okay. And they just had me rolling. You know, I was crying. They had other guests on. And it's just hilarious. So, this week's episode, they did a draft of the top office supplies. They did an office supply draft. I immediately, once I got to that part of the episode, I turned it off. I was like, we're doing this. Okay. Like, I didn't want to listen. I still have not listened to what they said because I didn't want to jade this because we're going to have an office supply draft. What do you think about this?

Myke Hurley: I love a draft. Me and Jason on Upgrade, we draft multiple things every single year now because Jason is a big draft guy. Gotcha. Draft rules are always important to me. And I have created a rule set here. We're going to do five total picks. So, one of us is going to get three. One of us is going to get two. So, we end up with a list of five. And we're going to do a coin flip for who gets to go first. Therefore, the person who gets the three picks.

Jim Cantore: And as a point of clarification, we're talking like office supply cabinet. You're in the cubicle farm in corporate America type office supplies. We're not talking about like Sailor Pro Gear on Myke's desk. We're talking about like... He's like categories is what I was thinking of, right?

Myke Hurley: Not even specific products as such.

Jim Cantore: Right. It'd be the category of product in your big corporate job that you're trying to protect on your desk from other people stealing is the way I kind of looked at it, right?

Jim Cantore: So, yeah. And I guarantee you out of the listeners to this podcast, I bet Jason Snell is highly likely to listen to this podcast because he is actually a sports ball guy like I am. Yep. So... All right. I'm going to let you pick. Do you have said coin to flip?

Myke Hurley: I am using Google to flip this coin. Okay. So, heads or tails? I'm going heads. Heads. All right. Heads. Flipping. Heads. So, you get to go first. All right. So, that means I get three picks.

Office Supplies

Jim Cantore: Yep. So, for my number one pick in the office supply draft, Brad Dowdy chooses the stapler.

Myke Hurley: Oh, nice pick. That's a good pick.

Jim Cantore: So, my reasoning behind stapler at number one is everyone is always looking for a stapler in your office. They're very expensive. You know, it's a more pricey item in the office. It's more personal to people. Like, if people steal that or try to make off with it, you're going to... It's going to be a big deal if your stapler goes missing.

Myke Hurley: Because it's harder to get a new one.

Jim Cantore: Yeah. Because they're pricey. Pens are everywhere. Papers everywhere. I think the stapler is the most important office supply in, like, your general office environment. Just from a value perspective. I think it's, you know, there's some cost to it. I even... When I had my corporate job, I brought my own stapler. That's how important that item was to me. I had a personal stapler. And, like, I would have to hide it in my desk. Like, that's not one of those things you keep out on the desk. Because it was a nice stapler. And, you know, you're always copying things and printing things off. And, you know, you need some way to bind them. So, I just... I think stapler is the clear number one choice in the draft of office supplies.

Myke Hurley: Stapler is very good. Stapler was on my list. It didn't rank as highly, but I didn't think of it in the way that you did. So, I'm rearranging my personal list. And I'm going to... My pick, my number... So, the number two pick, is something that is not rare because of the cost. It's just rare because people don't tend to have them. But everybody wants them when they're around. And that is highlighters.

Jim Cantore: Ah. That's a great pick. Like, I mean, for an office, yeah. You got to, right?

Myke Hurley: Like, oh, man. I just burned through highlighters in the marketing job. Because I don't know why this is. But the only effective way to, like, read long-form copy is to print it. You got to print it. And then you can highlight it up. And what I do today is if I have long-form copy, I turn it into a PDF. And I bring it into a notes app. And I sit with my Apple Pencil. And I highlight stuff. There is just something about that idea of, like, sitting with it and marking on it that you're more able to kind of, like, pick things out. So, when I was, before I'd send an email communication or whatever, or I was looking over copy from the advertising agency, I'd print it out. I'd highlight it up. I'd scribble all over it. So, highlighters, number two.

Jim Cantore: I think very highly of the highlighter. In my own personal top five, I had highlighter listed. So, this is a good pick. And, you know, you actually stole one from me there. So, pick number three in the office supply draft. Brad Dowdy selects the post-it note.

Myke Hurley: Ooh. You took it from me.

Jim Cantore: I think it's an absolute mandatory office stationary item to have.

Myke Hurley: It's the only way anything gets done. It's post-it notes.

Jim Cantore: They're all over your desk. They're all over your monitor. You scratch a note. You take it over to your friend's desk. You know, you leave your manager a note when he's on his three-hour martini lunch. When he comes back, hey, come see me. You know, it's not an email or a text. It's a post-it on his keyboard, right?

Myke Hurley: Mm-hmm.

Jim Cantore: Um, I think, you know, post-its and secondary to that, you know, it's yellow post-it. But I think, like, pink post-it, I mean, that's very highly sought after in the office environment. If you have pink post-its, you know when the office supply cabinet's getting filled or you know the person making the purchases. So, you can get something besides standard basic yellow post-its. So, I think that's a mandatory must-have item in the office.

Myke Hurley: So, let me just say at this point, speech bubble post-its, thought balloon post-its, no place for me. I have no desire. All I want is a square, maybe the big rectangle ones. But, like, I just want a post-it note that has straight sides and four corners. Like, that's all I ever want from a post-it note.

Jim Cantore: Yeah. We don't need the Japanese scenery laser cut post-it that's been making the rounds on Twitter. And, like, on Reddit, I saw on Reddit this thing had, like, 80,000 upvotes. It's amazing, not at the office.

Myke Hurley: Let me tell you, I looked at this, right? You know what I'm talking about. And all I could see, yeah, all I could see was the impracticalness of it all. Because as some of these post-it note things are, I mean, how am I going to find this? I mean, it's got to be in my mention somewhere. I need to find it.

Jim Cantore: Yeah.

Myke Hurley: So, I can put it in the show notes.

Jim Cantore: We'll link it in the show notes.

Myke Hurley: But as I was, like, looking over it, it's, like, all I can see the whole time is, like, every time you get further down, you have less of a post-it note. Because, like, the building that is being, like, chunked out of the post-it note block is just taking away from the post-it note that you have. They're very beautiful, but not usable.

Jim Cantore: Plus, how much does that thing cost? Like, I have no idea. I never looked that far.

Myke Hurley: I mean, I looked at it.

Jim Cantore: It's got to be, like, $20 or something like that, right?

Myke Hurley: I figured, I think I would quite like one, but purely as just a thing to just pull all the post-it notes off. Like, not to actually use, but just, like, to... Oh, I would empty it out immediately. Yeah. Like, because I don't want to wait.

Jim Cantore: I would just flick... Yeah, no. I would just flip through the whole thing with my thumb and then rip it all out to make the scene, then have a stack of paper.

Myke Hurley: Mm-hmm.

Pen Selection

Jim Cantore: Yeah. Yeah. So, to recap, we're three picks into our top five office supply list draft. We have stapler at number one, highlighter at number two, post-it at number three. What do you have for number four, Myke?

Myke Hurley: Well, I'm going to have to go for a pick that I'm scared that if I don't make it, we won't pick it, and then we may as well just quit. Pens. Yeah.

Jim Cantore: I didn't know what I was going to do if I had to pick pen last. Like, it was definitely going to pick pen. Like, it has to be there. Mm-hmm. And, yeah.

Myke Hurley: Why don't you talk about why? You need them. Like, everything else that we're talking about, you know, post-it notes and staples and highlighting, at some point, a pen has to be involved, right? Because you're writing down things that get stapled, you're writing down things on a post-it note, and you need to write down things that get highlighted. Like, the humble pen, it sits atop of the most important thing for all stationery, right? It's part... All other stationery requires the pen to exist. So, it is obviously the most important. But I think we both entered this draft with the opinion that whilst it was obviously going to be on the list, we wanted to try and steal some of the most interesting ones first.

Jim Cantore: Right. So, the pen is way more ubiquitous than these other things. You're going to find that left in drawers behind you from the people that got fired next to you. When you go raid their drawers, you're going to come up with a handful of pens. Like, it's not that big a deal. It's clearly a top-five item, right? But it's never going to be number one in this situation, I don't think. So, yeah. The pen is important. It has to be on the list. But I definitely did not think pen was anywhere near the number one draft pick in the office supply draft.

Myke Hurley: It's just too ubiquitous. Yep. As I was saying, it's so easy. There's always a box of pens somewhere.

Jim Cantore: Mm-hmm. Always. Always. And you could even, I mean, you can even substitute a pencil in there. Even though you don't see many wooden or mechanical pencils in offices these days, you're going to find, you can acquire writing instruments somehow in there. But it needs to be in the top five list. All right. Last pick of this draft. It's not an easy one, Myke. And I put a lot of thought into this. And I think related to our other items, I think the answer is pretty clear that it's binder clip. I think binder clip is the number five office supply. That's good. Because, like we talked about earlier, you're printing things. Sometimes you print too much stuff for a stapler. And you're running around the office saying, hey, I have a meeting. I need to collect all these papers together. Does anyone have a binder clip? It's a rare item in most offices. You have to hunt one down. You hoard them if you get them. And there's all different sizes you can use. But mostly, I'm talking about the big ones. Like anything you can't staple through size, I think is binder clip area. You know, I think it's more important than the paper clip. The staple can substitute for the paper clip. The staple cannot substitute for the binder clip in many situations. And, you know, the binder clip helps facilitate using your Post-it through the document, your highlighter, your pen. I think it has to be on the top five list, Myke.

Myke Hurley: I 100% agree. I didn't even think about it, but I used to use these constantly, right? Like something's got to keep those sheets of paper together.

Myke Hurley: Yep. That was a good idea, Brad. I like that.

Jim Cantore: Good. That was a fun list. Now I got to go listen to the episode to see what they really said. Because I really didn't listen to it because I didn't want to ruin this for us. I mean, no. To see what they said.

Myke Hurley: Let's be real. Straight up. We just did the definitive list, right? Like anything else is wrong. That is the definitive list.

Jim Cantore: I'm very happy with our list. Yep. Or top five. Stapler, highlighter, Post-it, pen, binder clip. I mean, if you're walking into an office for the first time and it's your first day, you would be pretty happy with all those things at your desk.

Myke Hurley: I think you'd be set. And then when you get home in the evening after that day of great office supplies, you want to cook yourself a hearty meal. Something that's going to warm your belly. And that's why I want to tell you about our final sponsor for this week. And that is Blue Apron. Nice. The number one recipe delivery service with the freshest ingredients. You can get $30 off your first delivery and free shipping by going to blueapron.com slash penaddict. Blue Apron's mission is to make incredible home cooking accessible to everyone. That includes you, whilst also supporting a more sustainable food system in the process. This is why they set the highest standards for their ingredients while they're building their community of home chefs. For less than $10 a meal, Blue Apron delivers seasonal recipes with their fresh, high-quality ingredients to help you make delicious home-cooked meals in 40 minutes or less. And they've got something special, something cool going on right now. Until February 26th, Blue Apron is teaming with Whole30 to bring you delicious recipes. Their menu will feature two Whole30-approved recipes each week, so you can eat meals like seared steaks and warm lemon salsa verde with roasted broccoli and sweet potato, or maybe even chicken and kale orange salad with spicy tahini dressing. Each meal comes with a step-by-step, easy-to-follow recipe card with pre-portioned ingredients. Blue Apron's shipped to you the exact amount of each ingredient required for a recipe, meaning that they're reducing food waste, but also doing my favorite thing, meaning that you get all the ingredients you need, so when you're cooking a recipe, you're not halfway through and you're like, gosh darn it, I don't have any garlic. And then you have to either forget the garlic or run to the store and get the garlic. But then you only need one bulb of garlic, so the rest, like one little, what is it called? Not bulb. Clove? Clove. One clove. Clove. Thank you, Brad. You only need one clove of garlic, so then you have like six other cloves of garlic sitting in a bulb in your cupboard for like six months. You don't have to worry about any of that with Blue Apron, because they send everything to you just as you need, and their freshness guarantee promises that every ingredient in your delivery arrives ready to cook, or they will make it right. You can choose from a variety of new recipes each week, including those whole 30 recipes, or let Blue Apron's culinary team surprise you. There's no weekly commitment. You get those deliveries when you want them. Blue Apron is treating the pen addict listeners to something very special. If you go to blueapron.com slash pen addict, you can get $30 off your first order with free shipping just by going to blueapron.com slash pen addict. Kickstart your new year with Blue Apron in a whole 30. We'd like to thank Blue Apron for their support of this show. Blue Apron, a better way to cook.

Bags

Jim Cantore: So one of these days, and maybe the Ask TPA section will be named Ask TPA About Bags, because that's what we got this week, Myke. And I like it. Like, we're gonna... We keep talking about bags all the time, and I keep saying I'm gonna write more about bags and do things about... Do reviews about bags. And for now, we'll have to settle with some Ask TPA questions and see if I can help a few people out. But I enjoy your bag questions, so bring them on. I just don't know that I have all the answers in this area, but we're gonna give it a shot. So this is from our good friend Dave Ray, who has definitely been to the Atlanta Pen Show a few times to come see us, and one of the nicest guys on the planet. So he gets to go first this week. He says, Hi Brad, hope all is well. Got an EDC-related Ask TPA question for you that's just a bit longer than a tweet. I'm realizing that my daily carry pretty much falls into two categories, Business Dave mode and Dad Dave mode. In Business Dave mode, I usually stick to a Topo Mountain briefcase, Daypack, or Knock Lanier with my laptop and an A4 NemoSign pad. For Dad Dave mode, my Tom Ben co-pilot stays loaded up with wet wipes, extra kid clothes, a water bottle, and snacks. Then there's the overlapping part of the Venn diagram. I'm constantly moving my live field notes, books, pens, phone, mints, USB drive, and flashlight back and forth between those two bags. Need a recommendation for a small well-made pouch with pockets that can hold these common items. I'd like to be able to swap it between two main bags or just carry it solo when the bigger bags stay home. Keep up the great podcasting. Thanks, Dave. So Dave needs a bag and a bag. Favorite topic.

Myke Hurley: Bag and bag time.

Jim Cantore: So that was literally the first thing I thought of, right? The Lit Lab Teffa bag and bag in the A5 size, not the A4 big boy size. The A5 size has a nice middle pouch. It's got like a phone holder. It can hold a few pens. It'll hold your field notes. It'll hold your flashlight. It's kind of everything. And it's reasonably cheap. It's like 13 bucks. I mean, that's kind of where I went with this. But there are a couple of other options. Actually, Lit Lab makes a few other options. We'll put a link in the show notes to them. I haven't used those. But the bag in the bag is really good quality. You know, the A4 kind of gave us the idea for the Lanier. Kind of made our own bag. So the A5 smaller size is your good portable move it from bag to bag bag. So I really like that. The Tom Ben travel cubelet seems like it's a pretty good idea. It's more built out than a standard packing cube. It even has a shoulder strap if you need. I think it's a little bit overkill for a bag that's small. But it has all the internal pockets and storage plus the size to be able to move from the Topo Mountain briefcase into your other bags. The only other one I thought of, which you probably don't need. It's too big. But this would not be a bag in a bag. But the Tom Ben medium cafe bag would hold all those things. But it's a standalone bag with a bigger strap. But I think your options are the Lit Lab A5 Teffa or maybe the Tom Ben travel cubelet. Since you're already a Tom Ben fan, Dave, that might be a good option. So that's my question or my answer there. So we'll keep going. That's an accessory category, small bag, that there's a billion different answers for. So if you have any other answers, definitely let us know. So Twitless Dan from earlier in the show. You know Twitless Dan. Are you still using the Scapix mixture? So I, for a while, was doing a mix of Roaring Klingner Salix and Roaring Klingner Scabiosa. A one-to-one mixture using it in my pens. I haven't been using it recently. But it's only because the sample vial I made, like my four milliliters, I used it all up. And I just haven't mixed up any more of it. It was an awesome color. Something I really, really like to use. But it's not anything I've used recently. But I totally recommend doing it if you have those two inks. They behave wonderfully and the color comes out perfectly. I think it's an awesome color.

Jim Cantore: So Chiroho wants to know, I love my 823 as it's so phenomenal to write with. But when filling it, I feel as though I have to really push hard on the plunger. Much harder than it appears you do in your video. Is that normal? So I did just one of those quick little Instagram videos where I put the 823 in an ink bottle. And dropped the plunger to fill it up. You have to use some force. Like I had to, before I started videoing that, I had to make sure my hands were in the right place to apply the right amount of force to the pen. And to be able to fill it. But it makes a big snap at the end. So you know I'm pushing it pretty hard. But I don't know if it's harder or softer than yours. You know, I don't know. Any other 823 people, you know, have any issue with that. Maybe if you filled it a bunch, it could be that the vac filling, the plunger part of it might need to be lubricated with silicone grease. I've had to do that with a Twisby before. On a vac filler, on the vac mini. Or on, just really on the piston filler mini. At a certain point, it starts grabbing a lot more. So, you know, I don't know what to say. You have to push mine pretty hard. And I had to, I had to gear up to do that. All right, next up, we have I, Eric. What are some good inks for absorbent paper? I'd like to use fountain pens at work. But some of the extra fines are still a bit too wet, causing bleed through. So this is the traditional copy paper at work question. I want to use fountain pens. There's no perfect answer. You know, even that cheap paper, it varies. You can look at the Noodler's Bernanke series, the quick drying stuff, the Noodler's X Feather, which kind of is made to work around these things. But you're kind of stuck with blue and black. You know, there's no great colors necessarily to have for that. I find that basic company inks, like the Lamy basic colors or the Pilot basic colors, tend to work okay. They're not the best. But, oh, and Pelican is another one. The drier standard colors tend to work best. So if you don't want to buy a specific fast drying or non-feathering ink that only comes in black or blue, you can try like your basic Lamy or Pelican and maybe even Pilot inks for that type of paper. And you still might have some issues. It's just not a great setup. But keep playing around. You'll find something that works.

Jim Cantore: So Dilly wants to know, he's heading back to D.C. in March. Want to make it a yearly tradition to pick up a Farnes exclusive pen. Last year it was Stealth Gray Retro 51. What shall it be this year? I have no idea. But theirs is always a good one. They did a Cherry Blossom one about two years ago that was different from the flower one that you bought, Myke. I wish I should have bought it. It was around Cherry Blossom time in D.C. It was a Farnes exclusive. It was super pretty. I have no idea what they are up to for this year. But their exclusive is always extremely well done. It's always one of the best looking ones of the year. And I've never bought one.

Myke Hurley: Good ideas and good executions is the typical way that the Farnes ones work.

Jim Cantore: So it's good all around. So Oscar in the chat room says Farnes does a Cherry Blossom one every year. So I'll have to take a look and see. So they may do multiple ones per year. But they're always really, really beautiful. Really well done. So they remind me of how nice that NYC one is for Gold Spot that they just did recently. They're wonderful. So Ed DeBille wants to know, Is there such a thing as water-resistant turquoise ink? And there is. So KWZ makes an iron gall turquoise that is absolutely fabulous. I actually have some I need to ink it up. And use it again because it's a really great color. Now you're not going to get like the pure turquoise brightness. But you're going to get a really cool color. And you're going to get water resistance. There might be some other things out there that I'm not thinking of. But that's immediately what came to mind. And it's such a good ink. It cleans well. It looks great. And I'm a huge fan. So Donut Jimmy, back to the backpacks, Myke. What's the best backpack for commuting with a 15-inch Windows laptop? Needs to be as waterproof as possible. Thanks. So this is a hard question because you can go nuts. And in the go nuts category, I always look at chrome bags for what they do. They just relaunched or added a, I should say updated their weatherproof collection, which has tons of bags. They're very expensive. So you have some trade-offs depending on how waterproof you want to go. So one is price. And the second one is weight. So waterproof, if you want like one of the big boy chrome bags that is waterproof, they are really heavy and really expensive. But they're at the bomb-proof type level of bag, right? I mean, it's a high-end bag. It's very expensive. It's very heavy. But it will meet your goals. Now, if you need a bag that can take getting wet but not necessarily sit out in the rain for hours, you know, the regular Tom Ben stuff, they use waterproof zippers on a lot of their bags. You'll just have to check and see which ones. The nylon they use for the exterior, the rain will roll off, you know, as long as you're not going to let it soak for an hour. It'll be fine. And the zippers have the waterproof zipper tape for it to not allow the water to get in there. So that's your more moderate level of weatherproofness. But if you want something like ultra-serious, intense, chrome is made for that. Their weatherproof collection. I actually had one of their weatherproof bags years and years and years ago. I had to get rid of it because it was so heavy. But it was a big, awesome, bomb-proof type bag. And it was fantastic. And I think their designs are really great.

Jim Cantore: So this next question I really wanted to tackle. And I thought about holding it for a topic for another time. But maybe we can just expand on it. So Mountain of Ink, Kelly does a wonderful job on her blog doing ink reviews. She says, as a blogger, how do you deal with internet trolls without getting discouraged? It's hard to answer that question directly other than saying, you know, you can't let it get to you. But that's like too easy to say, right? So I've found that just embracing the positivity of the community and brushing those people off is kind of the best way to go. So, you know, I'm fortunate to be in the situation that I'm in where I'm a white male and I don't have to deal with some of the crap that, you know, the females or the people of color or the LGBT have to deal with.

Myke Hurley: Yeah, being a white man and having a creative work, you're typically just criticized for the quality of the work that you do, right? Like that is the criticism that tends to be levied your way. If you're anything other than a white man, then people are effectively criticizing every single aspect of your life. So we do come from a privileged position in that people tend to be just criticizing what we do or like anything about us tends to be very limited to either like, I don't like you or, you know, like not so much just like horrific threats and no one's ever threatened me, right? Like I don't get anything like that. And I'm pretty sure it's the same for you. So just wanted to say that like we can talk about this, but like understand that we are coming from a position where the kind of criticisms and trolling that we get is extremely light compared to some other people in the world. Yeah.

Jim Cantore: Yeah. So, I mean, I try my best. I almost never respond to any of that. You know, I'll get called names from time to time and I like literally just scroll on or delete the email and just be done with it. And just understand that the community as a whole has your back, right? Like we're all in this together. We all want to see like the beauty and awesomeness of the community. And Kelly is one of my favorite bloggers right now. If you can tell by some of the things I write about her work and refill on the weekends, like I'm always fawning over her reviews. So, you know, I'm happy to talk about this and, you know, we can talk about it individually, talk about it offline. And just know that the community is really here for everyone in a very supportive, helpful way. And that anyone who's only interested in causing trouble, they'll be gone before you know it. And hopefully, you know, it doesn't get too serious. But yeah, this is a, it's a tough topic for sure. And we should put in, we talked about it a little bit with Aziza on the greatest titled podcast in the history of our show, Tahitian Black Lip Oyster. I will never forget that. I don't remember the episode number. I'm thinking 194. But if I got all that right, it'd be amazing. Go listen to that episode with Aziza. Because we, oh, it was close. It was close. So listen to that episode. We covered this a little bit with her because I know she gets a lot of hate thrown her way. And it's just unfair. And it's ridiculous that people don't have a better life than to be annoying on the internet.

Myke Hurley: So just know that we're there for you. For me personally, it mostly doesn't affect me for longer than the period of time that I think about it. This stuff tends not to stick in my craw for too long. And the ones that do, like when there's like that nugget of truth, right? They're the ones that kind of keep stuck in your brain.

Myke Hurley: It comes with a territory, basically. If you're going to attempt to do something which is in public, this is just part of what comes along with it. This is just how it is. And then just the way that you decide to deal with it is whatever works for you. Some people want to fight. Some people don't want to fight. Some people are like me where I kind of sit in the middle where sometimes I'll fight, but most of the time I won't. It's kind of how it tends to be.

Jim Cantore: Sometimes I'll mock. That's not healthy either. I tend to avoid now like zero confrontation. That's my 28. I understand that.

Myke Hurley: I totally understand that. But I don't necessarily subscribe to it myself because there are times where it's too difficult not to say something.

Jim Cantore: Yeah.

Myke Hurley: Individual cases. But basically every single time they never work out the way you want them to. Every time. Yeah. You rise to it. It just never goes the way you want.

Jim Cantore: No. And then you have to think about it more. So I try to get past it. But yeah, it's a great topic and something we could explore more for sure. All right. Last one. Sister T says the first pin show of the year is in the books and everyone is ready for more. If you could organize your own pin show, what would you do differently? What is missing that you'd have in yours? So I kind of replied. This came in the Slack channel. I kind of replied a little bit that the BYOB podcast talked about this an episode or two ago where they basically relayed what they would like to see as a pin con more than a pin show. And that's something we've always talked about. Like what would be the perfect setup and it would be more convention style with a show aspect to it, right? Where you'd go and you would have like official schedule like seminars about different things. You know, not just necessarily repairs and calligraphy, the things that are already done, but, you know, different topics and, you know, more creative topics. And then from like a show floor perspective, I always wanted more local creators at these shows, even if they're not in the pin industry. Like, you know, leather makers or bag makers or, you know, arts and crafts type stuff more than just the pin show from the local environment. Not necessarily people that travel from show to show like the fountain pen people do, but more like if you're in Atlanta, you grab some local, like we know some bag makers, we know some artists. I would love to see a more local spin in each of these shows to show off, you know, the art and creativity and the makers of that particular area. So, you know, I think those are the kind of things I'd look at. It's super hard to get all that stuff off the ground. You know, I've looked at it for years and, you know, I'd love to have to make like the dream show one day and, you know, maybe it'll happen. You know, maybe it'll maybe it'll come through. But yeah, I think we could do something a little bit different. But I generally, you know, like the shows that we have now in the fact that we can go to someplace and hang out with some of our friends and kind of make it our own. That's my favorite part of the current shows. And, you know, maybe we can work on the dream show setting as the years go on.

Myke Hurley: All right. If you want to find show notes for this week, go to relay.fm slash pen addict slash 291. Thanks again to our fine sponsors, the great people at Squarespace, Pen Chalet and Blue Apron for their support of this week's episode. If you want to find Brad online, go and follow him on Instagram. He's pen addict on Instagram. So you can play along with us next week. Brad is over at pen addict dot com and knock dot co. This show is part of Relay FM. If you only listen to the pen addict, go to relay.fm slash shows and take a look at some of the other shows that we have, because I bet there might be something in there that would still be of interest to you. We have lots and lots of varied, wonderful content at Relay FM. So I recommend all the great shows is what they say. We'll be back next week. Until then, thanks so much for listening. Goodbye. Say goodbye, Brad. Goodbye, Brad. you