The Pen Addict 463/transcript

The Pen Addict Podcast Transcript
Episode:	463
Title:	ABC Generic Pen
Release Date:	May 26th, 2021
Hosts:	Brad Dowdy Myke Hurley
Guests:	No guests this episode
Additional Information
Official page:	Episode 463
Audio File:	Audio Episode 463
Podcast page:	The Pen Addict 463
Length:	7575 min <br />1.25 h <br /> minutes
Previous Transcript	Next Transcript

Myke: From RelayFM, this is The Pen Addict, episode 463, and today's show is brought to you by Hello, Kenro Industries, and Ooni Pizza Ovens. My name is Myke Hurley, and I am joined, as always, by the wonderful Brad Dowdy. Hi, Brad.

Brad: Hey, Myke. How are you doing today?

Myke: I'm good. We've got a lot of stuff going on in today's episode.

Brad: We do, but I'm extremely concerned about this first topic that really just appeared when I wasn't looking. In our show doc, can you tell me what's happening here? This is something you added, and I am concerned.

Cleaning Pens

Myke: The semi-annual pen cleaning has occurred. I did it. Woo-hoo! I went through, cleaned some stuff out. I had some real disasters.

Myke: Who knew? But now they're cleaned. I've re-inked some stuff. I've added some new entries, some new inks. I got a couple of those Pannonia inks. Yeah, me too. I bought some more. I haven't really had enough time to properly try them out yet, but the colours are nice. But yeah, so I had a couple of pens that were... I had one, actually, is a thing I've never had before, where it was just completely jammed to the point that, like, if I was... Say I would fill the converter with water, and I would try and twist the converter, it would just pop off the pen. But, you know, it was a lot of nasal aspirator time and hot water, and I got it taken care of and cleaned, and it's all good.

Myke: Wow.

Brad: I don't know why it jammed up. I don't know how to take this. Try me again on that one. Try me again on that one.

Myke: What? What?

Brad: Can you repeat what you just said? You don't know why it jammed up. When was the last time this pen had been cleaned?

Myke: I don't know. But what I'm saying is it hadn't had a different rotation to any other pen, and no other pen did that. And it wasn't, like, a special ink in it or whatever, you know? It's just the way it went. And I had to do some real tender loving care to one of my Salon 1911s, because Mont Blanc Lucky Orange is one of those inks that gets a bit crusty. Definitely. You know, so I had to give that one a bit of love and care. But yeah, they're all working great. They're all refilled with ink again. I brought a new selection of pens here for the studio to mix that up a little bit. Feeling good.

Brad: Yeah. So we're good for another year, huh? Good for another year, yeah. A year from now, you'll be completely flummoxed as to why you had any difficulty cleaning your pens.

Myke: No, I've never had that before. I've never had a pen completely jam up, like, that no liquid would flow through. I've never had that before. That's a skill. I've just never had it before. It never happened to me. And now, I mean, look, it probably won't be a year. It's, I do it not on a time frame. It is on when most of the pens that I like to use have no ink in them. That's when I then, like, all right, everything's getting cleaned out, refilled, reset.

Brad: Do you have a general number that you cleaned?

Myke: Uh... Maybe, like, 15. Okay. That's less than I thought it would be. That's not terrible. That's like 15 that needed, like, cleaning and the rest just got refilled. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Oh, God.

Brad: Okay.

Myke: Phew.

Brad: Yeah.

Myke: It's all liquid, you know? No problem. It's all just flying through there.

Brad: I'm gonna need a drink after this episode to calm myself down.

Overcleaning vs Undercleaning

Myke: Maybe you're an overcleaner, and I'm an undercleaner, and there's, like, a middle ground.

Brad: I'm not an overcleaner.

Myke: Don't you have an ultrasonic cleaner?

Brad: I do, but I don't use it. It's really not worthwhile for someone in my situation. For you, that would be a different story, I believe. No. But for someone like me...

Myke: I don't need an ultrasonic cleaner. I just cleaned up my pens. With elbow grease and water. Okay.

Brad: There's no problem. Oh, gosh. I actually... I love that this is a topic we can discuss, because it never fails. No, there is no shame. They're my pens. It never fails to inspire me. What can I say? And I'm, like, having a panic attack over here, because I'm creeping... I quickly creep up into, like, the 10 pens inked category, and now I'm like, oh, my gosh. I have other pens that I want to ink. I just got... You know, I just got Pannonia inks in, too. And I haven't inked them up yet, because I have too many pens inked already.

Myke: You see, this is why you should be on my... You know?

Brad: That's not going to happen. I don't think.

Brad: Are you... Okay. Are we ready for the show now? I don't know that I am ready for the show. Is this the show?

Myke: Probably. It is a show.

Brad: All right. It's a show where I'm going to talk confusingly about several different products today. We're going to lead that confusion off with the Uniball One, which is a new Uniball gel ink pen that has been out for several months now. I think this year, beginning of this year, maybe, or very, very late last year. And people have been sending them to me, and people have been wanting to know my feedback and want to know what the deal is with the Uniball One. And I just saw it as, hey, Uniball has made a different barrel for their gel ink pens, and it looks fantastic, right? I love the style and the aesthetic of the Uniball One. But what the Uniball One actually is, is a new ink formulation, right? So, Uni is one of those companies. I'm very happy that they spend time and money and effort and technology time to come up with all these different ink formulations, right? We've talked about super ink over the years. Since, it's probably been around longer than we've been doing this podcast, super ink technology, which is basically just kind of a washproof gel ink, right? They first marketed it as like a, you know, you can write a check back when people were writing checks. And, you know, you couldn't get your check, you know, a counterfeit check. Someone couldn't wash off your ink mic and rewrite the check. And, you know, the ink would stick in there and just be awesome. Security ink. It's like, okay, well, it's just the normal ink that they sell. And the super ink is in most of their pens now, like the DX, which is my favorite, the Signo DX, the Signo RT1. And the Signo 207, it's like, cool, good ink, awesome ink, love it as my standard ink.

Signo Pen Review

Brad: And then some point last year, maybe two years ago, they came out with the Signo 307, which the Signo 207 for people who shop on the stationary aisles at stores, you see it there next to the Pilot G2, right? It's the mainline uni gel pen. So the 307, it's like, oh, what's this? I thought, you know, maybe this is like the upgrade of the 207. It's actually a different ink formulation than the 207. So it's like, okay, they have their standard super ink. What is this 307 ink? The 307 ink is cellulose nanofiber ink, Myke. And you ask, I hear you asking, Brad, what does, what benefits do I get from cellulose nanofiber ink? Myke, let me tell you, this actually thins out the ink for a smoother writing experience, which is kind of backwards to me when you say it out loud, but fine. Like it's a smooth writing. It's a smaller, finer pigment in the ink that allows the tip of the pen to glide across the page, right? Okay. So you got that, right? Then uni comes out with the one. I was like, okay. I literally just thought this was just a new, basically like the RT1, which is the great retractable gel ink pen, just in a new design. I would be down with that. But no, Myke, we now have a third uni gel ink that I have to try to wrap my head around and try to explain what's going on with this. The one ink is a highly pigmented ink, large gel ink particles like the super ink. So it attaches to the page. But unlike the super ink, it sits on top of the page where the super ink itself grabs into the fibers. The one ink sits on top of the fibers, quick dries for bright colors, but is also permanent like the super ink. So we have all these inks and we have all these pens and it's starting to become a problem, to be perfectly honest. It's so much confusing in the product lineup. They all perform differently, right? You can get pretty much the Signo 207 style of pen in super ink, cellulose, nanofiber ink, and then the one ink. And which ink am I supposed to tell you to use? I have no idea. Like this is, it's starting to become a little bit of madness. It's on the one hand, I love the fact that Uniball does this, right? That they spend technology time and money to make new inks. But then they're losing the plot by not telling us more about who should use what, what's in what pen, crossing their wires in same pen, different inks, like the 207 lineup. Like the 207 and the 207 Plus are the same looking pen. It says plus on the barrel, but it has two different ink compositions. And so it feels different when you write. All of these literally feel different. Like I can feel the difference between each one of these. Independently, like I don't, like they would all be completely fine and good. But when you put them side by side, I'm like, oh, there is a legitimate difference between all of these inks. So what's the point of this? I really don't know. And that's kind of the point. It's too much confusion in their product lineup. Yeah.

Myke: Like I read in your review on the website, you kind of list in more detail the ink properties. And I swear they all feel like they're the same to me.

Brad: Right. They don't do a good enough job at telling me why I should use these inks. They tell me what these inks were designed for, but that's not enough because there's so much overlap and confusion now. And it's one of the things that I love the most. Obviously, I'm spending a lot of time on this type of stuff. I'd love to talk about this type of stuff as much as I would, you know, any other like high dollar fountain pen or something like that, because I find it fascinating. Right. This is like a big market for these companies like Uni Mitsubishi and Pilot and Pentel and Zebra. And now like Uni Ball has been my favorite and they they I don't see that changing. But my goodness, they are not making it easy for me right now. So, um, strictly for the Uni Ball one, the best thing I can tell you if you're interested in this pen, because it looks really cool and it feels great. The barrel is awesome. It is not as fine of a line as what you get in your regular DXs and RT ones and 207. I still find those far, far better than the one ink. And it's kind of not close. Right. So if you grab the one ink pen and you were just a gel ink pen user, you would think it was nice. The I think if you're a micro tip gel ink pen user, you would enjoy the standard super ink models better. They're better writing pens than than what these ones are. So I'm going to go ahead and try to buy an exact match of tip size and ink color for all of these pens and do a direct comparison on a bunch of different papers. I think that would be a bunch of different things.

Myke: Very useful. My feeling on this is like they make all these pens in their different designs because they're purely just trying to capture people from a design perspective at first. Right. Like people don't care what the ink is. They just buy the pen that looks the nicest to them, which is why I think they've done a real different look with the Uni Ball one. I actually think as you do, it looks really cool and different and like young. It's awesome. It's got like a, you know, and like the old Uni Balls are like, oh, so boring. Right. Like every office is full of these things. They're all over the place and they look just like ABC generic pen now, like the 207 and stuff. And then this has a much different look to it, a more modern style. I think that's kind of where they start. And then I would expect they have these different inks because why not? There are different properties to them. And then it's kind of like we just expect the people that want these properties will find it. Yeah.

Brad: But that's where I have the problem is you go into the store and you say, man, this looks cool. And you get it home and you go, why doesn't this right? Like my other one, I don't like it as much. And Uni Ball has done a poor job at saying that, well, it's different. These two pens are different. And my point in the article that I wrote is no one cares about this stuff at this level. Right. The consumer on the stationary aisle is going, dang, that's a cool Uni Ball gel pen. Oh, I like my other Uni Ball gel pen. And this one's completely different in the way it performs on the page. And it's just going to, it leads to confusion. So I, this is the stuff that I think about and I like to think about it. And I'm just, I'm just confused. I, they've, they've made it more difficult on their consumers.

Myke: Yep.

Brad: So good times, good times. I fully expect there to be like a, a 207 one plus pretty soon.

Myke: Like medium sized pigments.

Brad: It's going to happen. Like before the end of this year, there's going to be some amalgamation of all these things into another Uni Ball pen. And I'm just going to go, well, I guess that's another one. So there you go.

Myke: Yeah. It's confusing, but this does look like a cool pen though. You are happy with it, right? Does it come in a bunch of colors and stuff, this pen?

Brad: Yeah. It's got 10 or 12 colors. They have at least a 10 pack. I know they're really great. The pen feels awesome. Um, it's white. So it, and the, the grip is kind of rubbery. So I imagine it might get dirty. Like if you're throwing it in a bag a lot, but I love the clip and I love the knock. Um, independently it writes fine, but I, I wouldn't, if I have a choice, I would never pick it up.

Myke: Right. Okay. Okay. All right. Let's take a break and thank our first sponsor of this episode. And that is our friends over at Kenro Industries who are introducing and have been, I've got these beautiful range of pens right now. One that we want to talk about today is the SD Gold Rush series from Estabrook. This pen has been over a year in development and they could not be more pleased with the results of their new golden child. Gold Rush is here in the first two colors of this collection. And it's the, all the shimmer to be expected from the premium SD available in dreamer purple and prospect to black gold rush is so artfully designed. It's almost jewelry like the new SD Gold Rush series is perfectly blended from the U S may diamond cast material, which makes a wonderful combination of ship of shimmer and gold. And each pen holds unique characteristics. So no two pens are alike. Like other premium SD pens made from diamond cast. Gold Rush is this season's introduction and is available in limited quantities and will likely be gone just as quickly as the gold boom was itself. The premium Gold Rush SDs will be available as standard and oversized gold trim fountain pens. Plus it's available as a rollerball and for the first time a ballpoint pen as well. So I have one of the, um, the, I said before the diamond cast material in one of the different series. I have the Rocky top one and I absolutely love this Estabrook pen. Like it's, I loved it when I got it and it continues to grow on me. Um, I think that they're doing such a wonderful job with this range of pens right now.

Brad: I think I have the exact same feeling. I have one of the, the first sparkle series diamond cast materials, like in the, I don't know if they called it Colorado blue or, uh, Tanzanite. I think it was, uh, or I don't know, it's a bright blue turquoise and I just love it. And the more I use it, the more I loved it. And I think these gold rush models are the exact same way. I think they look awesome. I love the materials. It would be hard to pick between the two. If you're, you know, like the aesthetic of the pen, like they both have gold trim. They both have a good gold swirl. One's purple based and one's black based.

Myke: I'm into the pub, the dream of purple. Personally, I think that purple and gold is so unique as a color. Like, I feel like I don't see that together a lot.

Brad: I agree. And I think that would, if I was personally picking one, that's the one I would go with, but I think the black is just completely cool. It's like a modern classy look, right? I think it's really good that here's the thing, Myke, I'm so happy to be talking about these after talking about the Uniball one, because I generally love the SD and spoiler alert, not this model because of the diamond cast material, but the standard shape of this pen. And it's, when I redo my top five pens between $100 and $200, the Estabrook SD is going to make it. So if you like the SD already, this is your upgraded version where you get, you know, the diamond cast material upgrade and it just looks awesome.

Myke: So head over to Pen Chalet. That's PenChalet.com. As you know, the wonderful Pen Chalet. You can see the new SD Gold Rush series from Estabrook. Our thanks to Kemro Industries for their continued support of this show and RelayFM.

Brad: All right. So another very, very confusing topic, although one I don't have as defined thoughts on is the Tomoe River paper discussion that continues to happen. Our good friends CY and Jacob talked about the latest on episode 32 of the Tokyo Inklings podcast. You should go listen to that because they have more information than I'm going to relay to you today. But the gist of this is, so if we circle back to the original panic, right, that Tomoe River paper, what we know as Tomoe River paper was, I guess, discontinued is the best way to put it. I still don't even know the proper phrase, but basically the manufacturer shut down the machine that made our popular, famous Tomoe River paper that we all came to know and love as fountain pen users. Then they switched it over to a separate machine that produced a different result, which we called new Tomoe River paper. It was a good paper. It was a little different, in my opinion, than the old Tomoe River paper and not as interesting or compelling of a paper. Now, the word is that that machine is getting shut down. And I'm serious, like, don't listen to me. Go listen to CY and Jacob. They put in the time. Jacob called Tomoe Gawa, the printer company. Jacob's like on the hunt to find the answer. Like, what's going to happen? Just trying to figure out. Is it going away for good? What's going to happen? What's going to happen to our beloved Hobonichis, right? You know, who is going to pick up the mantle of this paper that is so ingrained into fountain pen lore these days? You know, are we seeing really, really the end of it? I'm, you know, I've always come at it from the point where I'm not overly concerned, right? There's a lot of manufacturers out there with a lot of technology and a lot of machinery and a lot of know-how that are always, you know, working on the next thing. And I certainly think there will be a next thing. I don't know that if you love, love Tomoe River paper, the original, are you going to ever find a 100% complimentary match? I don't know that you will, but you're going to find something out there that's pretty darn good. And I just continue to follow this story, not because of our community or our show or pen addicts, but because of kind of like Uniball. I kind of watch what Hobonichi does. And their whole business is predicated on this classic Tomoe River paper they use.

Myke: You know, for some reason, I had not considered Hobonichi in this issue. So, like, I knew Tomoe River paper was going away or was, well, I knew it was changing. Then we now found out it's going away. And I've been thinking, like, oh, that's such a shame for, like, you know, Nanami Crossfield and other, like, Kickstarter-based books that use this paper or whatever. But Hobonichi are completely reliant on it.

Brad: Mm-hmm. Luckily, Hobonichi has grown to a point where they're pretty much a lifestyle brand, kind of like how Traveler's Notebook broke out of Midori, right? Yeah. They're just this own institution of their own, and they have Hobonichi fans. And their design elements that they, their just overall aesthetic and design look and appearance, like, that's going to continue. So, they just have to be able to say, here's why we changed and why you're going to love it. And I fully expect them to be able to deliver that. And they probably, I would bet they're covered for this year, but it's after this year. It's like the post-2021, 2022 planner season. So, that's what I'm curious about.

Myke: I'm related to this completely. Yes. Last week, I made a note in Todoist of, like, to start investigating a backup paper option for my products. Yeah, you got to know. Just in the situation where something might change, you know, we use Munk and Lynx right now, and I'm really happy with it. Right. But things can change. Errors can be made. They could stop making it or whatever. And I feel like I want to just start the process again of finding something which would deliver close enough results if I had to switch, you know? That's exactly right. So, it's just, it's one of those things where, like, I was like, oh, I don't have a backup plan. Right. And so, I should probably investigate one. Mm-hmm. And this is, again, another one of those things where, like, I'm imagining what it would be like to be Hobonichi. And that thought is kind of terrifying to me.

Brad: Yeah. So, go listen to the conversation, and they break down some of, you know, the companies involved in, you know, the manufacturing of notebooks post-paper production, like outside of the Tomogawa brand overall, and how this would look. But I just find this stuff super interesting, not from, you know, OMG, I'm losing my favorite paper, but just how it kind of trickles down into our little community.

Myke: I mean, considering, I mean, I'm sure that Hobonichi must be the largest buyer of this paper.

Brad: I mean, who knows, right? This paper was never, this paper wasn't manufactured for this usage, right? Like, Tomogawa didn't go into the stationary business, right? They're basically an industrial printer, right, for, like, magazine pages. So, I'm not willing to say that, but maybe. Who knows?

Myke: But let's imagine they're one of... They're huge.

Brad: I imagine they're huge. It's a publicly traded company. They're sizable.

Myke: It's got to be one of these things where, you know, if you're Hobonichi, you'd be like, can we just buy the machine, please? If you're not going to use it anymore?

Tomoe River Paper Discussion

Brad: They talk about that, like, Jacob and CY talk about that, and it's like, is there a point where the ongoing, the initial cost and the ongoing maintenance is actually worthwhile for someone like Hobonichi to invest in?

Brad: And in their case, maybe. Maybe. Who knows how much those machines are and what the ongoing maintenance cost and running cost of those things are, so. So, who knows? Who knows? I just... We'll continue talking about it just because I find it interesting. It's one of those little stationary niche things that is, like, a little... It's a big deal in our world, but, like, you know, oh, well, kind of, to everyone else. But I just... I find it interesting. All right. I want to flip the switch a little bit and talk about a pen I can't put down, Myke. Our friend Ben Walsh at Gravitas Pens sent me a new pen to test out, a couple of new pens to test out, actually. So, Ben's really good about just emailing me and going, oh, I forgot I sent you this last week. Look for a package. And I'm like, okay, dude. It's like, I have no... He doesn't even tell me what's in it. You know, the packages just show up and it's got cool stuff in it. I'm like, sweet. And a lot of time, it's just, like, the first look at things he's coming out with. So, I opened these packages on stream the other day, and I like to go into these things blind and kind of get my first thoughts out there. So, he sent me a fountain pen called The Entry. We'll talk about that name in a moment, but you can guess, Myke, it would be the entry-level type pen for the fountain pens that Gravitas sells. So, what it is, is kind of a long-ish, skinny-ish barrel, tapered ends, capped aluminum pen. I have the all-black model. There are other colors, which we'll talk about. Tapered end caps on, you know, the top of the pen and the rear of the pen. It's a very cool aesthetic that I like. The grip section has grooves in it. So, it's got, like, a lined grip in there. So, you can have a... It's not too slick on your hand sometimes. You know, those grips can get slick, as we talk about with our spoke. You know, icons, you know, ours are smooth. So, this has a little more tactile feel to it. And the size, shape, feel, and just, like, the overall machining of this, it really is a basic pen that does not... It provides more than a basic type of, you know, feel and use and quality, right? It's more than the name suggests it is. And for that, I love it. Which color do you have? Black. So, he now has teal and olive green were the launch colors, along with black. And now he's got purple and, I want to say, a blue coming soon. Right. Not available yet. What is your initial thought when you see this pen without having held one?

Myke: I will preface this by saying, this is not the pen that people are going to the Gravitas store for, right? Correct. Because the Gravitas pens that, you know, we were talking about them a while ago, they have these really wild skittle designs and rainbow designs and these etchings and all that kind of stuff and different shapes of pens and all that kind. And because, and the reason I say that is the entry pen, it just looks very boring to me.

Brad: Related to the, as you scroll down the page.

Myke: Yeah. I mean, but I would even say in general.

Brad: Just in general. In general. Absolutely. Absolutely.

Myke: This is not a pen that if I was to walk by, I would even pick it up.

Myke: Right. But the thing is, it is only 55 euro. And I bet it's, and I'm just going to assume it is a great pen for 55 euro. But just on the face of it, it doesn't particularly excite me, especially when Gravitas offers a bunch of stuff, which is, which is very exciting to me.

Brad: I think that statement's exactly right and completely fair, right?

Brad: In just seeing the image of this, you go, oh, okay, that looks normal and fine. And honestly, when you get it, you know, when I unboxed it, I was like, oh yeah, cool. Another, you know, just kind of basic, you know, aluminum metal barrel pen. But there's something about the way, basically, I think he's gotten like all the machining correct for a size and feel perspective. Right. The balance, the weight, the pointiness of the ends, the ridges on the grip section. It's just all those little things that add up in Ben's head and Gravitas's presentation that, okay, this is our basic pen, right? It's right there in the name. It's called the entry, right? This is the first pen that you buy. And the execution tells me it's greater than that name. So, I mean, I did get this pen for free. Ben's, I just want, you know, to have full disclosure. And I talk to Ben quite frequently. And I would tell him, like, if I didn't like it. But I don't know, for some reason, I've like really latched onto this pen. Also, because I am not a fan of like the bigger, larger size pens, right? We've talked about this a million times over the years. My aesthetic is smaller, skinnier type pens as opposed to larger, wider type pens, which is what a lot of the Skittles and the Skulls and all that stuff is. So, this one just fits me personally as well as any pen I've used in quite some time. And like you said, 55 euros, that's about 67 US dollars. Like, it's right on the money. I love it.

Myke: Should we talk about, there's a couple of pens in this document. There's a couple of links. And you've added them, but also said you don't want to talk about them.

Brad: I'm actually going to read what I typed here.

Myke: Okay.

Brad: So, there's two pens that we're going to mention, that I'm going to mention in this show. The Sailor 1911 Trinity and the Lamy 2055th Anniversary pens. And my note is, I don't want to discuss either of these pens, but I want to read the names. Because if we don't mention them, people will ask. This way we can say, I mentioned them. These make me mad.

Brad: So, I'm done. Anything you would like to say from this point forward about the Sailor 1911 Trinity or the Lamy 2055th Anniversary, the floor is yours.

Myke: So, the Lamy 2000 Anniversary pen is just a brown version of the Lamy 2000. And it comes with a book. I don't care. But that's that. I did just want to mention, so the Sailor 1911 Trinity is all black. It's all black with all black trim. And it's like ion plated, all black. And I saw it and I was like, Trinity, where is that? And it took me a minute. And I realized and then read the description and got it. For some reason, Sailor have decided to model their new 1911 North America edition on Trinity, the character from The Matrix. And I don't know why they have made that decision. So, Trinity, played by Carrie Ann Moss, is the female lead in the show.

Myke: And I'm just not sure what has compelled them to do that right now. That's what I find intriguing. They are making another Matrix movie. I'm not sure exactly when that's coming out. But soon. I think it's 2021. So, I think there is a new movie coming this year in December.

Myke: I'm really confused by it. It's not an official licensed product.

Myke: That's the route that they decided to go for. I do like an all black on black on black 1911. But the, yeah, I don't get it. So, I want you to say something about the Matrix pen.

Brad: So, for the first time in this podcast, I think in the history of the podcast, I sat back in my chair, right? So, when I sit up and talk in the mic, right? You have to have a good microphone technique and microphone posture. I sat back in my chair because I don't want to say a word. I'm not talking about these two pens.

Myke: Okay.

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Brad: I would much rather talk about pillows than those last two items in the show. This is one of those products that should not work, but it does. And those are my favorite kind of products. You know, the issue with those products is you got to get people in the door. And pillows are a frustration point for me. And so when they advertise with us and you had talked about it before, you're like, I'm like, really, does this work? I just went and used the pen addict code just like everyone else. And I'll be dang if it's not perfect for me. So, yeah, I love my hollow.

Myke: We recorded last week a day early because I had some stuff going on and I couldn't do our usual Wednesday recording. I had to do a Tuesday recording. And not too long after we actually published the episode, Field Notes dropped their much awaited 50th edition.

Myke: I would like to do a dramatic reading of the conversation that we had.

Myke: Okay. So this is this is from Slack.

Myke: Apparently Field Notes just dropped, says Brad. And I say, damn it. Come on, guys. Well, it's my fault, to be honest. Whoa. And then paste the link in. Brad says, really damn good. And I say, I'm going to have to sub again. I think I really want all of this. The B words got me. And you said, just finish subbing. And I say, they got us. I couldn't not. Clearly, it was worth the extra time for them. You say, F worders. And I say, LOLOL.

Field Notes Anniversary Issue

Brad: That's accurate. That's accurate. They could not have executed this 50th anniversary issue edition better, in my opinion.

Myke: I struggle to think of a product that I have seen, which is intended to celebrate something that does such an incredible job of achieving just that. So the notebooks themselves, they are red. And they have, like, secondary covers on the inside, right? Which feature three of, they're called flyleaf covers. So the O in Field Notes on the red cover has a hole cut out. You see through, you see the number 50 in its place. And they've chosen Safety Orange from Dime Novel, Night Shift Blue from End Papers, and Gum Drop Green from Grass Stain Green. So, like, three. I assume these are important to them, particularly, right? Which is why they chose those colors. So the notebooks themselves, they're really nice, right? Then they also created a stamp set of actual, like, they're not postage stamps, but they are stamps. They're like sticky stamps, right? They're not valid postage, that have imagery, beautiful iconography of some of the things that they do. So the way that they stitch their notebooks, the way that they choose the paper. Like, it's, you know, little kind of mementos of the ways that they produce their products, right? So that's nice, nice little stickers, basically. Then if you're a subscriber, you get this Bananas desk notebook, which is, they call it a desk ledger. And it has a selection of things. Some of it is just a, like, a desk ledger, and you could just, it's just note pages. But then they also have this whole set of pages dedicated to every single, like, going through, almost like a museum piece. Every single edition with a little bit of text about them and an image of them. It really is just, like, the whole package is just so fantastic and such a celebration. But you only get the desk pad if you're a subscriber. So both me and Brad started a new subscription. Because I really want it. I want this. You know, like, this is a company that I really love the work of and have got a big collection of their products. And this is a thing that celebrates that history of those products. I want to own it. It's like a little collector's item that I want to own. So I did it.

Brad: And they've played a, you know, Field Notes has played a big role in the history of this show. So they're an always important brand to us. It's always a brand we look to for unique, stationary, and cool products. And I imagine trying to create this edition was met with a lot of stress. It's probably been in the works for well over a year, I'm guessing. Just trying to figure out what they're going to do for it. And knowing that the weight of that number is going to be attached to this edition and how do we execute it. You know, my... When we talked about it being late a few weeks ago, I think both of us basically said our dream edition would be extremely basic, right? Like our perfect 50th anniversary edition would harken back to the original days somehow. And I think they just did that perfectly. Like that's all I wanted to see in this notebook. Because they were able to tell the story like in these fun stamps, which are hilarious. And this desk ledger, which has way more content in it than I would have thought outside of the notepad pages, right? I haven't finished reading this book yet. I just opened it this morning. And I was like, oh, I am not going to finish this before the podcast. But they basically take this book and they go through and have like a kind of like a buy the numbers section, you know, where they have all these topics. Like number of butcher orange three packs produced for our first quarterly edition, then known as Field Notes Colors Edition. 500, right? This company started making, they made 500 three packs of notebooks. Think about that. If you're out there and you're a maker of things or you're interested in making things. That's how Field Notes started. They made craft paper notebooks, sold them to their friends, and they did a special edition of 1500 total notebooks. That's it. That's how they started. Then they have, you know, just some funny stuff. One that I enjoyed was number of times Dawson wisely scheduled an overseas vacation for two weeks after launch, then ended up out of town during the launch because it was delayed for two weeks. Nine.

Brad: It's just page after page of this. And then, you know, there's a bunch of, there's a story and an essay from Jim. And there's some top 10 lists, which I thought were pretty cool because we always, in the beginning for probably like the first 20 or 30 editions, we would always have like our top five or top 10. I don't know that I could put one together off the top of my head now. But the top 10 quarterly editions is ranked by current subscribers. Myke, allow me to read these. If you will, this is a survey sent out.

Myke: Oh, wow. Yeah. Okay. Yeah.

Brad: It's a surprising list to me. Number one, national parks. Not a surprise. Not a surprise. Number two, United States of Letterpress. Fantastic. These are all fantastic. Number three, coastal, which I, it didn't get a lot. That's a beautiful one. I love that one. It's a beautiful one. I think there wasn't a lot of flack for it in the beginning, but it's one that like did really well. Then people got it and was like, well, I don't know if I can use these kind of gradiated reticles. And now it's just kind of like one of the favorite issues. Dime novel number four was one of the big, I don't know what the right word is. Not turning point, but it was in field. It wasn't the first oddly sized field notes, but it's the first one where they like really said, hey, this is what we're doing. And if you don't like it, cool. You know, like we get it, but there's probably going to be more stuff like this in the future. And I was like, yeah, I'm in. I'm in. Dime novel's great. Number five is really kind of the one outlier on this list. And I'm so glad. Autumn Trilogy. Like I am a Mackinac Autumn, Shenandoah Autumn Trilogy fan. And to see that, I'm shocked that it's in the top five of ranked by subscribers. And it's actually there's another list I won't go through. The top ten quarterly editions as ranked by folks on the list. So like this is like their email list. Autumn Trilogy, also number five, which is crazy to me. Crazy. I mean, I'm a super fan, but like there's no way I would have seen that in the top ten if top 15. Then you have three missions, Snowy Evening, Workshop Companion, which surprises me, Lunacy, and Night Sky. So yeah, that's the top ten quarterly editions as voted.

Myke: The way that I look at this list, there are some great options in there. I think it kind of maybe shows the overall makeup of the Field Notes audience and subscriber time. Yep. That they have a lot more people that haven't been around as long. because there's stuff back like Drink Local should be on that list.

Brad: Yep. Drink Local. Right.

Myke: National Crops. National Crops should be on that list. Probably number one. Yeah. Fire Spotter, Raven's Wing. Like these are people that have been following them forever. Like they're some of the like real. I'm happy Night Sky's on there actually. It's my personal favorite edition, I think. Yep. But yeah, there's like some stuff like especially National Crop. Yeah. Is Night Sky the oldest?

Brad: I'd have to look. There's actually a one through 50 list in the back.

Myke: I believe of that list that you gave, Night Sky is the oldest. It's the summer of 2013. Everything else is more modern than that.

Brad: Yeah. Yeah. So anyway, it's just like a jam-packed book. And when you go to the back, like after the ledger pages, there's the section called the gallery. And that's where like on each page is like four or five of the editions running from Butcher Orange all the way to number 50. Which it was cool to look back at. I was like, oh yeah, balsam fur. I remember that. This is when they used to ship like really weird stuff with their subscriptions. They actually put a balsam fur twig. Like there was literally a branch in your envelope. I don't know if people remember that. They put a branch of balsam fur in the envelope when they shipped it to you. I was like, this is the dumbest, awesomest thing ever. And like this is the kind of, this is why we love them so much. And still do. I don't want to say that in the past tense. But like they've really, really done a good job over the years. Congratulations to the entire Field Notes team. And I just look at this. I'm very impressed with what they did in this 50th release. I'm going to continue to flip through this book. And, you know, reminisce about my favorites and read all the stories and all the notes they have on each of these. It's just really, really well done. So, yeah.

Myke: I would like to recommend if you have not heard before episode 279 of The Pen Addict. That was when Brad and I were in Chicago. And we interviewed Brian and Jim of Field Notes about the whole kind of history. We were in Chicago. We were on tour then. And we got to stop in. And we were a small audience. We had a wonderful episode of the show, which I really, really recommend that people go and listen to. It's really fantastic. I look back on that very fondly.

Brad: I do too. And that was right around the Dime Novel release. So, there was a lot to talk about with them. Not just in how they got there from here. But just how things were changing and how they're comfortable with doing those projects like Dime Novel, which I think they talk about a little bit in the insert book here. So, yeah. Just very cool. I am interested, Myke, to have a subscription again. And it's been quite a while. I have no subscriptions right now.

Myke: It's been a year for me. My subscription ended at the end of 2019.

Brad: Yeah. So, I can't remember. Mine's probably around the same time within an issue or two. So, you know, it's probably missed like the last six issues or so. And, like, I'm okay with that. Like, I would have bought it if I needed them. But I wanted to get this one. And I'm anxious now. We'll have to talk about the next three because they're coming automatically. So, they're going to be back part of the regular rotation. I'm sure. Not that they ever weren't. But we're back on the sub train now. So, they got us, Myke. Those F-worders.

Brad: All right. This has been, you know, this is probably every other episode. It's a classic, typical Pen Addict episode. So, we've already, you've talked about Sailor. We've both talked about Field Notes. Now, I get to talk about Retro 51s, Myke. Because they came out with an update to the Metalsmith standard lineup pens. Did you have a chance to catch these? They kind of caught me off guard. I didn't see them until someone sent me a link.

Myke: I saw them on your stream yesterday. The one that you got. Yeah.

Brad: So, that was, I went and ordered them after I saw what they released. They released four in the Metalsmith lineup. I think these are all considered to be in the Metalsmith lineup. So, Brutus, which is, I don't understand the name. I haven't looked at these that much. The Barberpole Stripe Pen. Very cool. But, you know, the traditional red, white, and blue, like Barberpole Stripe. So, that's a pen. The raw brass pen, which we will circle back to that in a moment.

Myke: The barbersmith is probably referring to the popular 80s and 90s wrestler Brutus the Barber Beefcake.

Brad: That's the only Brutus the Barber I know.

Myke: Yeah. So, I'm assuming that that's what that's for.

Brad: I mean, that's about the only time I remember wrestling. And that's the only thing I can think of.

Myke: Now, I want this because of that reference. Because I just love that they did that.

Brad: What is the finial? Is the finial just like a mustache? Or does it relate to any wrestling thing at all? I don't know.

Myke: If they, if I, the imagery on the Pan Chalet website doesn't have the finials. So, I'm going to have to try and find this now.

Brad: Now, if there was like a Hacksaw Jim Duggan or a Junkyard Dog edition, I might have to go there. So, we'll have to pay attention. Raw brass, which I, like I said, I want to circle back to that one. Patriot, I think, is the name of the patchwork flag, you know, American flag one, which they tend to do once every few years. They'll do some kind of take. So, scissors and a comb. It's not really.

Myke: I would have wanted to see shears if it was going to be where it was the barbecue cake. Yeah.

Brad: And then Frederick Douglass, which, this is a weird group. There's not a lot of consistency here. There's not like a running theme. I don't think through here.

Myke: It's like we had four good ideas. I'm just going to do all of them.

Brad: I keep trying to make these all work together, but they don't. They don't. They just happen to release. When they release these metalsmiths, they usually release them in a group of three or four or five. And they don't generally relate, but I keep trying to make them relate. They just don't.

Myke: I think the first ones were all like presidents, right? Yeah. Jeff Jefferson.

Brad: But then they did like Franklin. I think, didn't they do a Ben Franklin one too? So, I don't know. I've never been a huge metalsmith fan, right? That's never been in my jam. I've always liked the lacquered editions. And am I going to like the metal pens? It turns out, Myke, they're not that heavy. I measured them yesterday.

Myke: I have one. I have a couple, actually. I have Lincoln, which I adore Lincoln. Lincoln is fantastic. That was one of the great ones. The raw brass one, I'm not sure about.

Brad: Really? That's going to be easily the bestseller by a long time.

Myke: But it's like going to make your hands smell, right? It's going to be that kind of. Yeah. Because what I like about Lincoln is it doesn't do that so much. Yeah. I don't know. But I bet. Yeah. It looks fantastic, though. I would be super intrigued to see what that looks like, but I wouldn't be able to use it.

Brad: Me neither. Like, I have no interest in owning it. But I think it's going to be the bestselling one. I went with Frederick Douglass, one, because he's a great human being, was a great abolitionist in the 1800s in the U.S. And the design of the pen is just kind of this wavy pattern in the barrel. I don't know how to describe it. It has a slight tactile feel in it, but it's not very much. I need to get some close-ups because it's got some depth to it. And I couldn't. I should have bought a metalsmith pen before now. I am really, really happy with this one. This one's, the one I bought is probably the most metalsmithy, traditional metalsmith design, right? I mean, raw brass is obviously full, like, you know, classic metal. But this is what, you know, the ones like Lincoln and some of the other ones in the past have always, I've had that picture in my head of what a metalsmith pen looks like. So I'm glad I have my own, this Frederick Douglass one. This is going to stay on the desk. Like, this is a really, really good one that I'm a little bit late to the party on and I'm very, very happy with. So it's good. So, yeah, there you go. That's, that release surprised me. This is, again, like their standard releases. This is something that they do every year. They're usually, um, during normal times is have, like, a grouping of metalsmith pens to release. Then they might release some one-offs, you know, throughout the year. But there's usually, like, some type of group together and they're great. Oh, uh, correction in the, uh, I, I couldn't find the real name of the flag one. It's actually called Bennington, not Patriot. So there you go. Just a little correction. Thank you, Chad. But it was weird that I, I could not, it was hard to find the name of that particular model because they've done, like, uh, Betsy in the past for Betsy Roth. Um, Betsy Ross, excuse me. Um, so, uh, it was weird that I couldn't find the name. But, yeah, check them out. They're all pretty good.

Myke: Yeah. Aren't they bringing some of the old colors? They're bringing some colors just to the lacquered line I saw, too. They were adding two or three colors. Yes. And they're bringing orange back or something, I think. There was.

Brad: I thought it was an olive. I don't know. I saw the post and then I didn't save it.

Myke: Yeah, I'm trying to find it myself now.

Brad: It was on Instagram.

Myke: Yeah, I saw it as well. Let me see. Uh, yeah. Orange and Kiwi are coming back to the classic lacquers line in mid-June. Gotcha.

Brad: Yeah, I never, I gave away my original classic lacquers orange way back in the day because that's, that's what you do with retro 51s, right? Like, when, like, the, the tornado classic lacquers that are, like, low $20, you just, you kind of get fascinated by them. And then you know someone in, in your life who's not really a pin person but would appreciate, but appreciates, like, a good pin. And then you give them a retro 51 like that. Yeah. And then they go, oh, oh, that's what a good pin feels like. Yeah. And you know, they're like, wait, how much is this? Like, $21, something like that. And it's like, oh, really? Okay. Yeah, that's, that's how we got into retro 51s ourselves.

Myke: All right. This episode is also brought to you by our friends over at Uni Pizza Ovens. They are the world's number one pizza oven company because they make surprisingly small ovens that are powered by your choice of either wood, charcoal, or gas, letting you make restaurant quality pizza in your own backyard. Uni Pizza Ovens are super easy to use and incredibly portable. They're going to fit into any outside space and can reach temperatures of up to 900 degrees Fahrenheit, 500 degrees Celsius. This enables you to cook restaurant quality pizza in as little as 60 seconds. That high temperature is what separates these ovens and the pizzas that they'll make from what you would make in a home oven. One of their most popular models is the Unicoda 16. This is a gas powered oven that can cook up to 16 inch pizzas and has an innovative L-shaped burner at the back that gives you even heat distribution throughout. Uni Pizza Ovens start from just $299 for free shipping to the US, UK, and EU. With two of their coolest models being the multi-fueled Uni Karu, which can use wood, charcoal, or gas, or the Unicoda 16. Brad, can you tell our listeners how much you love your Uni Pizza Oven?

Brad: It's funny. I kind of wanted to relate back to the hollow pillow anecdote, right? This shouldn't work necessarily. But it does.

Uni Pizza Ovens Promotion

Myke: You should be able to cook restaurant quality pizza in your own backyard.

Brad: It not only does, it's spectacular, right? Like it doesn't, okay, it kind of works. It's like life-changing. That's too big of a word. But it's like, oh my gosh, this is awesome, right? It is easy to use. It's portable. I literally take mine out of a storage closet, walk it outside, pop down the legs, hook up the tank, fire it up, and I'm cooking pizzas in like a few minutes after it heats up in the L-shaped burner on the pizza stone. Our pizza stone is now lovingly flavored with lots of good pizza on there. And you fire that thing up to a billion degrees, you know, give or take a billion. And you throw a pizza in there and you cook it in like 30 seconds, and it's awesome. And it's like, this really works. It's such a cool, cool thing. So it's full-on pizza season here. We're going to break the uni out maybe this weekend and get to cooking. I just, I adore the thing.

Myke: Listeners of this show can get 10% off their purchase of an uni pizza oven, which could be up to $50 off of the uni code of 16. Just go to uni.com and use the code unipenaddict21 at checkout. When you're there, you'll also find a great range of accessories from peels to cutters to oven tables. So you can really get kitted out of everything that you're going to want to make that pizza at home. Like so many people are, especially as they're getting towards the warmer summer months. And so that is why uni pizza ovens are in such high demand right now. So go check that out for yourself and get it fast. Go to uni.com, O-O-N-I.com and use the code unipenaddict21 for 10% off. A thanks to uni pizza ovens for their support of this show and Relay FM. All right. Should we do some RSTPA to finish out today? Let's do it. All right. First comes from Miles. Miles asks, what pocket pen is the best gel pocket pen? I've been trying to use a fountain pen for years. It just doesn't work for me. And I keep coming back to my Fisher Space pocket pen, which works, but doesn't write as well as my favorite non-fountain pen, which is the Uni Ball Signo Micro 207. Is there something similar to that in a Fisher Space pen style?

Brad: So I replied back to Miles and said, do you know how hard this question is to answer? And he's like, yes, that's why I emailed you. This should not be, you know, like what Miles is looking for should not be a completely difficult thing to answer. And there's a few kind of sort of answers, but there's no, I don't know that there's a perfect answer for this. So I obviously use the Spoke Rody a lot and we ship it with the Uni Ball Jetstream refill. That is not a gel refill, but it is a, what I think is the best like Parker style pocket pen refill. Now there is the Odo Flash Dry refill, which is, it fits that. And I use those in my Retro 51 sometimes, but it's a needle tip, right? So there's an aesthetic thing that sometimes I personally can't get, get past with conical shape nose cones on pens that aren't designed for the appearance of a needle. Sometimes it just doesn't look right. Like it doesn't look great in the Retro 51, but it's, it's workable. So you can buy that refill as an option, but understand that it's a needle. It's 0.5 and really, really good gel ink. Like I love the refill, but I generally don't carry it in a smaller pen because of the needle. It's just a me thing. The Kaweco Sport and the Kaweco AL Sport have a gel refill option. It's like a 0.7 Kaweco gel. I'm assuming it's some kind of Schmidt refill, but it's really, really good. It's not going to write as fine as the Micro 207, which is 0.38, right? But this is the challenge with this. It's this weird like give and take of imperfections that you're going to have to decide. Is the format of the pen the most important thing that I like? Is it the writing experience the most important thing that I like? Because you can get into a pen like the Monteverde Poquito, which I've very, very much praised. But it takes a D1 refill. And while I like D1 refills, D1 gel ink refills, they vanish as soon as you start writing with them. Like you just literally burn through gel ink in a D1 refill. Like that's not a match that should happen. It does. Zebra sells them. They're very, very expensive. But you can get, you know, Jetstream D1 refills that are a little better or other ballpoint. But finding the best gel ink refill for the best small pocket pen, like a classic Fisher Space Pen bullet, is a really tough, tough solution to try to find. It just is. And like there's options out there. Or, you know, the chat's mentioning the Big Eye Design is a TI mini pen, but it also takes the D1 refill. Like the Poquito. Anything you can get a D1 refill. You can get a D1 gel refill. You're just not going to like the expense of a D1 gel refill. Because you will write them. You could write those out. If you're a heavy writer, you could write those out in the span of a couple of days. Because they're that, you burn through them that fast. And they're like $3 a pop. So it's not a cost effective thing. So it's just a tough, it's a really, really tough answer. So I like the Kaweco for the wider, it's a little bit wider than the Fisher Space Pen, a little bit wider gel ink refill. But I like the pocketable. Otherwise, I go with things that fit the Jetstream refill, which is good enough for me for getting that gel style of performance. Even though it's not technically a gel ink pen. It's a hybrid.

Myke: Seb asks, is Maiora pens on your radar? And what do we need to know about this Italian pen maker? I'm intrigued.

Brad: They are. As a matter of fact, I just received one yesterday that I ordered and unboxed on stream, twitch.tv slash pen addict. So yes, they intrigued me. Because at first, I was like, eh, this looks like a little bit wide. And they have this very deep concave grip section, right? That's kind of a standout feature. But you got to be sure that you like it, right? And I wasn't sure that I was going to like that until I picked up my Kusama pen, which has a similar, very deep concave grip section. I was like, oh, wow. It really goes for it, this pen. Yeah. Yeah, it definitely does. Combined with just the barrel diameter itself, it's a real standout feature. And I was like, oh, turns out that I do like that and I can work with this. So I ordered a Maiora. I have not inked it up yet. But what I learned as we were unboxing them, that Maiora was founded from employees of the former Delta company in Italy, which also shared employees with Leonardo. So people say that the Maiora pens and the Leonardo pens, you know, favor each other. Well, it's because both of those new companies were formed out of the closing of Delta. So I don't know that that's a big surprise.

Brad: The pen looks great. The price is right. And now I just need to ink it up and see what's so funny.

Myke: Come on down, Brad. Come on down and check out the Maiora.

Brad: You have to guess the price now. Price is right, rules.

Myke: $75.

Brad: Oh, no. I mean. I don't know. That was terrible. You would probably win because someone else would go $250. Yeah. No, they're like $170, $180, something like that. So they're in that $150 to $200 range that I like so much. So they're just right in there. Right in there. So, yeah, really good. So, yes, you will hear more from me on the Maiora pens. I just need to test it. So give me a little bit of time. Another pen I need to ink up, Myke.

Myke: Oh, no. How are you going to do it? Oh, imagine having more than five pens inked up. Oh. Shawnee asks, can you recommend some pencils of erasers that resist drying out and hardening? I use the Field Notes pencils that have an eraser that does well, but I'd like to mix it up.

Brad: I cannot. All erasers suck.

Myke: I actually don't agree with you. Yeah. I have one. I don't disagree with you is what I wanted to say. That's what I meant to say. Erasers on the end of pencils never do a good job. You need like a real eraser, I think, to do a good job.

Brad: Yeah. I looked through some of my reviews to see of pencils I've gone through. Like, I generally prefer, you know, like, I don't mind pencils without erasers, right? Mm-hmm. So, and when I use a standalone eraser, I'll use, you know, like a Tombow eraser. And then I went back and looked and I found my Tombow 2558 pencil review and really enjoyed that eraser. That it did a good job, which is, I don't guess, is a shock knowing Tombow make great erasers, as is. That their on-pencil eraser is pretty good, too. And that's, like, the entry-level Tombow. And it performs, like, way above and beyond, like, what an entry pencil should perform like. So, that's one I could recommend. And I think that's about the only one that I'm familiar with that I was like, oh, this is actually a good eraser, right? Generally, like, black wing erasers are terrible. And I don't even know what some of these other ones are like. And that's why I generally just scratch out. I never erase pencil. Just like pen. I'll just scratch through it and keep going. Just out of habit because it's never a good experience. But 2558 Tombow, give that a shot.

Myke: While we're talking about pencils, I will take a moment here to pimp Brad's new pencil collaboration with Musgrave. The Pencil Addict Pencil. It's available on the Pen Addict shop. I'll put a link in the show notes to it. It's a really, really good color. And the design of it's really fun. I think you did a great job here.

Brad: It came out so good. I'm very happy with it. I have not tested the eraser. So, let me do that right now. Hang on. Live testing. Let's see if it's crap. So, this is Musgrave Harvest number one. It's a reasonably dark pencil.

Myke: This is when you know you can trust Brad. He's doing it live to tell you if it's bad or not.

Brad: It's not bad. It's not great. It's average. Like, it's soft enough. But it does not, like, you can still see the graphite on the page. Because this is a dark soft lead. So, that doesn't surprise me.

Myke: I just had a similar experience using something for uninteresting reasons. But it's funny for us. I have been using a stone paper pad today. Oh, Michael. I know. I don't want to use it. But it's a format that I wanted to check out for a future idea that I have. And just, I needed some pads in a specific type of format. And Adina found one. I don't remember the name of the company. It begins with a K. And their marketing is super good. Because this was what the other thing that we were looking at is, like, the marketing of notebooks and stuff. Because I'm approaching K.A.R.S.T. Adina has provided in the chat. And their company, because their website, K.A.R.S.T. Stone Paper, is absolutely beautiful. The only problem is, they make stone paper products. Which, stone paper, if you've never used it, is absolutely horrible. I do not know what it's made for.

Brad: That's why the marketing has to be good, Myke.

Myke: Yeah. So, I was just looking it up, and then we got a couple of their products. Because I wanted to check out their overall branding and stuff like that. Because of, like, lifestyle notebook brands, they actually have one of the nicer overall branding kind of themes that I've seen. And, yeah, you're probably right. Because otherwise, what are you going to buy it for? But, like, I was using it today. And everything I tried on it, like, nothing was really that nice. Like, the Mark I was pretty good on it. But it's because the ink was, like, sitting on top of the page, which I've never seen before with the Schmidt refill. And then I was using a pencil. Like, and a pencil also did fine. I think, really, this paper is probably best of pencils. But, like... Yeah, pencil and ballpoint, that's it. But, like, I just... I don't get it. I don't really know what it provides. And it's so thick. And, like, I tear off one of the pages. And, like, you're screwing it up, and it's, like, plastic. I hate it. But I needed something in the format, and I wanted to check out their overall branding. Very nice branding.

Myke: Stone paper, though. I mean, I'm sure some people like it, right? I'm sure they do. But I cannot get on board with stone paper.

Brad: Yeah, yeah. If you're listening, just don't do it. Like, you're going to get marketed to, and it's going to look beautiful. And in the end, you will be disappointed. Like, that's the kicker.

Myke: Because it's like, I remember when we first tried it years ago, right? Years ago. Like, a long time ago. Maybe the first year of the show. We both got stone paper notebooks and tried them out. Because we're suckered into the idea that everybody else is. Paper made of stone? That sounds so interesting. Yeah, here's the thing. No, it's a bad idea. Don't make paper out of stone. Don't do it. Exactly so.

Brad: Yeah, that's rough.

Myke: And a final question today comes from Arden Burrell, who says, I got the spoke icon, and I can't get a reasonable amount of ink in it when I fill it. Am I bad at filling? I get my Safari filled up about half the time, and the only pen that I ever get every time is the Cafeco AL Sport. What am I doing wrong?

Brad: You're not doing anything wrong. It's the converters that are doing things wrong.

Myke: Yeah, I mean, there are ways to do it to get the best results. So what I'll say is the best way that I've found to fill a converter to as much as you can fill it is dunk it, fill it, empty it, and fill it without ever taking the pen, nib, or the converter end out of the ink. Because what you're doing is you're expelling the air that's trapped inside by you fill it and empty it and then fill it again. And you'll get as much as you can possibly get in that way. Because there's air in the converter. You have to get that out. And you'll hear the bubbles when you kind of empty it again. But just never remove it from the ink bottle. You still never fill it up. Like a typical converter, you'll never fill it up. And there are ways that you can syringe fill pens as a way to try and do that. But that's more hassle than it's worth, I think, for most instances, in my opinion. And then there are other filling systems that don't use converters that will let you draw more ink. But yeah, just do what I suggest. I'm sure Brad would agree with me. And you'll get as much as you can get in. And then just don't worry about it.

Brad: Myke is 100% right in that. So you put the nib in the bottle. You fill it. You do not take the pen out of the bottle. You empty it right back in. And then you fill it again. That way you're going to get like a 7-8 fill instead of like a half fill. Like trust me, when I fill up converters in pens, I'm not getting more than like a half or 5-8 fill. Right? It's just how it works. They're not good at doing the job that we expect them to do. So you have to do that double take with the converter. Just don't take the nib back out. Just, you know, draw it in. Expel it out. Draw it back in. All kind of in one move without removing it from the bottle. And you're at least going to get a better than expected fill from what you've been seeing. So there you go.

Myke: All right. That's it for this week's episode. If you'd like to send in a question for us to answer in a future episode, just send out a tweet with the hashtag RSTPA or use question mark RSTPA in the RelayFM members Discord. You can also email Brad if it's a longer question at hello at penaddict.com. Penaddict.com is where you can go to find Brad's wonderful work along with many other fine contributors who write wonderful reviews of stationary products. I've been noticing more keyboard content sneaking in there, which I appreciate greatly. That's Mr. Jeff. Yeah, I don't recommend a plank, by the way, Brad. They look really nice, but then you also have to learn a new typing system.

Brad: Yeah, it's a whole new format.

Myke: Yeah, they're very beautiful and you can get them looking real good. Or muscle memory.

Brad: It's a whole new muscle memory, I guess I should say.

Myke: Yeah, I wouldn't necessarily recommend it unless you want to go all in on the author typing layouts. Anyway, if you want to find Brad streaming, twitch.tv slash penaddict. Brad streams at least on Tuesdays and Thursdays at 10 a.m. Eastern and recently a lot more as well. Help Brad get a partner. That's what we're doing here. We're helping Brad get a partner. You can also go to knock.co and spokedesign.com as well. You can find Brad online on Twitter. He is dowdyism, D-O-W-D-Y-I-S-M and penaddict on Instagram. I am imike, I-M-Y-K-E. And hey, go pick up a subtle notebook. Go to cortexbrand.com. You can also get a journal there too. In stock. Hopefully, always in stock, forever. Reliable.

Brad: And not made from stone paper.

Myke: Not made from stone paper. Made from good, real paper. Thanks so much to our sponsors of this episode, Uni Pizza Ovens, Hello and Camera Industries. And most of all, thank you for listening. And we'll be back next time. Until then, say goodbye, Brad.

Brad: Goodbye, Brad.