The Pen Addict 653/transcript

The Pen Addict Podcast Transcript
Episode:	653
Title:	Everyone Better Watch Out
Release Date:	February 19th, 2025
Hosts:	Brad Dowdy Myke Hurley
Guests:	No guests this episode
Additional Information
Official page:	Episode 653
Audio File:	Audio Episode 653
Podcast page:	The Pen Addict 653
Length:	5252 min <br />0.867 h <br /> minutes
Previous Transcript	Next Transcript

• From Relay, this is The Pen Addict, episode 653. Today's show is brought to you by Squarespace and Enigma Stationery. My name is Myke Hurley. I'm joined by Brad Dowdy. Hi, Brad. From Relay, this is The Pen Addict. So I gotta start practising, Myke. Start practising. I gotta get on form. I need to step my game up. I don't know. I just, I need to be ready. A last, last temporary week for you and I, recording the show. Gotta get it together. Yep, this is the last one. Gotta get it together. Yeah, so, you know, starting next week, I'll be having some guests on while Myke is, Myke is preparing for Parenthood. Myke and Adina preparing, and it's gonna be great. And I'm looking forward to it. I'm very excited to be a listener of the show for a while. Yeah, yeah. So, were you more excited to be a listener of the show? Or to see new F1 liveries?
• Yeah, we feel the same. I'm glad I brought this up.
• This is not in the topic list, but I had to, I had to, you know, it was proper timing. I feel like I had to say it. A lot of people are upset about the fact that this show even existed. You know, like, so basically, they brought all the teams together, and they showed up how the cars are gonna look. And I kind of watched some of it, and it just kind of wasn't really for me. But it was fine.
• The problem is, as the problem was always gonna be, which was, they're not different enough. Like, the ones that were different, like Racing Balls, which is the name now, hilariously, they've got another new name. That looked, it looked fantastic. And it was fun to see. And also, I mean, I'll say, I like the Ferrari. I know that is pretty contentious, but I think the Ferrari with the white stripes on it looks great, because it matches the suits. I think, I think, I think Ferrari's look is real good. But they're, like, really the only two cars that had any kind of significant difference, and everything else is just an adaptation. And I feel like, considering the fact that F1 told the teams they had to do this, I actually think they should have told them they had to make significant change. Like, but that was never gonna happen, because it's a bit too heavy-handed, I suppose. Yeah, it's one of the most boring liberty reveal years. That is show, you know, whatever. The show is the show, that's fine. But just, like, the 10 teams' cars were, like, super boring besides Racing Balls, which stole the show. This would have been better to do next year, because the cars are different next year. Right, exactly. But they did it for the 75th, but they're gonna do it next year. This is gonna be the new thing. This is just, like, another thing to do. They're just gonna do it. Yeah. Yep, so, anyway, I thought it was a pretty tame design release for the evening. And yeah, like, I'm on the opposite side with the Ferrari stuff, but I'm willing to see it live and on track. I think it might be more to my liking when it gets out there on track, which happens with some of these liveries. But, like, Williams, I don't think Williams was done any favor with the lighting last night. I think that's kind of a complex-looking car that's gonna look good on the track. I mean, honestly, it was, for me, like, I watched a little bit of the show, and then it was like, eh, whatever. And I found it better to just periodically check in on the F1 Instagram account, because they had official photos of all the cars. That's exactly what I did. And then you just got a better sense for what was good and what was different. Yep, yep. So, all right, Pen people, you can turn back in and tune back in now. I can't wait for the season to begin, Brad. I'm so excited now. I know. I do it to Myke pretty frequently. You know, when major things happen, like, I tend to mention them. And honestly, Livery Launcher is a pretty big marker on the calendar of, like, all right, it's about to be go time, so it's good. You know what was go time for me, Myke? Cross-country travel to the California Pen Show. So, I want to preface this.

California Pen Show Overview

• I'm going to call this the California Pen Show and the Los Angeles or LA Pen Show pretty much interchangeably. The official name of this show is the California Pen Show. The old show that used to be in this area of Southern California was the LA Pen Show. Why don't they call it the LA Pen Show, do you think? Probably because of the old ownership. Like, this show is under new ownership, right? So, they can't call it that? I don't know how this works. Well, they didn't. Let's just say it was, like, not an official handing over of things. Does that make sense? Like, this show just decided to be a show, the California Pen Show. Yeah. Regardless of whatever the other show was. Does that make sense? Yeah. I just think LA Pen Show is a better name. Just for location. Yeah. Just for location. Because there are other Pen Shows in California. Yes. Yeah. So, just to say, I am going to make that mistake several times. But this is the California Pen Show. In Torrance, California. You're such a cheer tater, Myke.
• So, this is a little bit south of the city.
• And... But still, like LA. Greater LA area. So, I want to do a little recap of the event. Because this is my first time to the new event. So, they've been doing this for three years. I didn't make it the first year. Last year, I was planning to make it. But I had an emergency at home. Had to cancel. So, this is my first year out at this new, under new ownership event. And it's fantastic. Like, I'm just going to say it's like a... This is like a top event for the U.S. Pen Shows, I think.
• It's up there. You know, San Francisco. Like, this is just my personal rankings, right? Like, it's San Francisco's up top. And then, it's kind of everything else. And then, you try to decide what... Does everything else need to be for you attending a Pen Show? Well, do you need a huge, massive East Coast show? Well, D.C. D.C.'s that show. Do you need a show on the East Coast that's kind of moderate? And, you know, a little bit smaller and self-contained but nice enough? Baltimore. You know, do you need a good, you know, Midwest or central part of the country show? You know, Chicago or Dallas, right? I think this show is worth traveling to. If you have... If you're comfortable with, like, your local show and want to see what else is out there, this is one I would feel very comfortable sending people to, like, as a travel event. The hotel's great. Like, you know, L.A.'s a big city. So, LAX, totally fine. You know, it was monsooning when I landed, which was an oddity.
• But the area needed it, obviously. Like, it was... You know, the rains were much needed out in that area that's seen fires and devastation. And so that was a little bit odd. But after, like, Thursday night, like, the weather was, like, SoCal weather. You know, just beautiful, sunny, cool, breezy. It was great. But the hotel, it almost looked new. So I'm guessing it's probably renovated. Like, this was in an area that was, like, very well established. So it wasn't, like, an all-new area. But it looked like it was properly renovated and really nice. So this is the Torrance Marriott where we stayed. So this is the show hotel. So great, great bar area, great lobby, you know, good bar, good restaurant, in-house Starbucks, like a big, like a big full-size Starbucks type of place. Oh, that's good. Yeah. Not just, like, a little, you know, like a little edge of the bar, make some coffee situations. Like a full counter, full installation there. So it's really cool. So literally right across the street is a gigantic modern mall. I mean, you go out the front door and you walk across the street into the mall kind of thing. So all the food, all the downtime stuff you needed to walk around, take a break, is literally across the street. So it was great. Like, the facilities and the location, I thought, were proper. Probably, you know, like I wrote about my recap. It's either 20 minutes or two hours from the airport, depending on the time of day, right? So it's, I think it's 10 or 11 miles. So with LA traffic math, it could take, you know, random amounts of time to get there, but completely reasonable proximity. So that's the setup for, like, area location. Like, no changes. Like, I'm completely happy with all of that.

First Impressions of the Pen Show

• And so Friday, I went into the show itself, never having been, didn't even know where the show was in the hotel, but I figured it out pretty quickly. And I was like, where is it at? How big is this hotel? Well, it's not that big, but the entrance to, like, their conference area, where, like, the ballrooms would be, is, like, tucked around, like, a side hallway that you would not really go past. Like, it's beyond the escalators and beyond the Starbucks. And, like, you walk to the end of this hall and you see a Hertz rental counter. It's like, oh, it's not past that. And then it turns out, like, it opens up, like, a whole new part of the hotel past that point. So, yeah. But I had to ask. I was like, oh, yeah, just go around the corner. Then it's like, ah. Oh, that's funny. Everything opens up. That's funny. It's hilarious. Nice.
• Good line on Friday morning. So, Friday morning, the early access time was 9 a.m. Friday. There was probably, I don't know, well over 100 people in line.
• You know, but that's, honestly, a pretty short line. That just moves in pretty quick. Did you have to wait in line? I did. I did. And people were making fun of me. It was like, go ahead, Brad. Just walk in. I was like, no. You know you're not allowed now because you know I'm going to ask. I know. You can't big time anyone anymore because I'm, like, on big time patrol. That's right. That's right. I paid. I paid for my ticket. I scanned in. I got my ticket badge just like everybody else. Got my little wristband. So, yes. I did not big time anybody. Good boy. Yeah. I avoid that by just buying tickets early. Like, I bought my tickets, like, two months ago. I was like, this is just how it's going to be. Except the one time I did forget to buy a ticket in San Francisco and they did let me in. They let me in and I was pretty embarrassed that I had to say, I forgot to buy tickets. That's pretty incredible. Yeah. I forgot about that. That's very funny to me.
• So, now that's one of the things. Like, when I book my flight and hotel, I will buy the show tickets. If I don't do that, I will forget. And then I think I've bought them, right? So, that has totally happened to me before. So, this show, probably a lot of people that can picture it in their head, the setup. One giant rectangular ballroom. And then two of the hallways around the ballroom. So, like, a short side and a long side, like an L shape. So, that's the entirety of the show floor. If you've been to, you know, a conference in a hotel or been to another pen show, it's very well contained in this one area. And it was full. Like, all the tables were sold out. And everything was good. So, you had the long exterior hallway, which a lot of traffic flowed through. And then into, like, the side doors of the main ballroom room. It was packed. Friday, obviously, wasn't as packed as it was Saturday. It was warm, which, you know, one of our tips we always talk about when you go into a pen show is to plan on it being hot in the room. It just is. It's, they can't manage any of that very well with the heat and cooling in a hotel with the mass amount of people coming in. So, it was pretty stuffy in the big room. These trade shows, they push more people through than if you were having a wedding or, like, a meeting, you know, like a presentation kind of thing. Because it's just, like, that's just, like, static people for a period of time. But it's just, like, shifting people through and through and through the whole day. And that's just going to heat the room up. There's kind of no way around it. So, you know, you would just, I would take breaks, go outside. Like, as soon as you got outside the room, it's, like, you know, 10 degrees cooler. And it's, like, you know, airflow. And, you know, California, beautiful California, you know, in February weather. It's just gorgeous. The hotel area looks really nice. It was super nice. Like, the whole, everything about the setup was nice. And, like, they, you know, they had a nice outside area with fire pits and, like, huge, huge sitting areas outside. And, like, it was just really, really nice. So, I've gotten into the mode of Friday being, like, my shopping day. Now that I'm doing, like, essentially I'm giving myself a two-day show, right? Fly in Thursday night, leave Sunday morning. So, I have all day Friday, all day Saturday. Friday, I knock out what I want to do. If I have a list, I do that. If there's things I want to see, I do that. That frees up the rest of my weekend. And it's just kind of default happened that way. Because I have literally all day Friday from, like, 9 to 5 to see everything. And that's a lot of time. Outside of, like, San Francisco or D.C., like any other show, I've been, like, completely done on Friday with things I needed to do. The bigger shows, I don't get to everything on a Friday. It's just kind of not possible with the crowd. So, we'll cover the hall later. But, yeah, I did all my shopping pretty much on Friday. Take a couple trips up to the room. That's why I like to stay in the show hotel. You know, I can go hand off things into my room and free up my hands. So, the layout had a good amount of space between the tables. And even, like, on Saturday, you know, it filled up. Like, a lot of shows have tighter walkways. Walkways, I thought this was laid out well.

Vendor Feedback and Event Highlights

• The vendors all felt like, you know, Friday was good and Saturday was just banging. You know, I haven't really talked to anyone from Sunday. But, on Sunday specifically. But they said it was actually pretty busy. I did take that back. I did talk to, like, Jonathan Brooks and others. Said it, like, it started off slow. Then I actually kind of picked up Sunday afternoon. Which Sundays can be quiet at a show. So, that was great. Given the mall area, you know, we just walked over there to dinner after the show ended at 5. Walked over to dinner about 5.30, 6 o'clock. And had dinner and came back Friday night. And I wanted to go to... Lisa Van Ness had a meetup. That was supposed to be, like, the mixer concept. I don't think you ever did this. But we've done this before. Where we'd get a room with, like, six tables. And each table would have a captain, essentially. I've done this at other conferences. But I've never done it at a pen show. Yeah. So, where that captain or whatever table lead would have their one specialty. Right? Various specialties. And then people, you know, every 10 minutes or so, 15 minutes, would move and learn from the person sitting at the table. The person holding the table. Well, this room wasn't laid out that way. So, we all just sat in the room. And Lisa actually just brought people up front. So, you know, Anna Reinert and Kimberly, who all the hobbies and writes for the pen addict. And Cheryl, who works for Rickshaw Bags. And they each talked about their topic. And Lisa as well. And it actually worked out pretty well. It was just like a little, you know, like a lunch and learn type of thing. Basically, where you stayed at your location. And they just brought the speakers up to the front. And then after they were done, we just, you know, all just kind of stayed in the room and hung out. Like our own little meetup afterwards. It ended up being like a two or three hour thing that was supposed to be an hour. Because we were all just having a good time. Hanging out with friends. Sharing inks. We were, you know, passing around nibs and inks. So, if you have like these kind of free events in the evenings, like go to them. They're like a really good hang. Had a lot of new people in there that were, you know, interested to like learn about nib grinds. Or learn about fountain pen inks. And there were a lot of experienced people that were bringing like handouts. Like tons of like ink samples. Where you could just get some ink samples that you wanted to try. So, it was just an awesome, really, really good vibe. And it was actually a good way to end the day. Because it was a pretty long day. And, you know, like by 9, 30, 10 o'clock, I was just done. And went up to the room. And it was a pretty good hang. So, Saturdays are anything I didn't get to on Friday days. And this Saturday, there wasn't anything specific I needed. So, went to breakfast with some friends. So, shout out Diane and Kim who took me to King's Hawaiian. Their bakery restaurant. Are you familiar with King's Hawaiian? The Rolls people. But they have a full bakery and restaurant. Probably not even 10 minutes from the hotel. And holy cow. It was so good. That place was amazing. You know, I saw that on your, I think you posted it on Instagram. Like it looked like a French toast thing. And it looked real good. It's ridiculous. It was ridiculously good. I was like, yep, this is going to happen. So, Saturday, since I didn't have like a full personal schedule of, oh, I have to do this. And I have to nib grind that. And I have to see this person and that person.
• I only had a class at 11.30, which I'll get to in a second. I didn't get into the show until probably like 10, 10.30 on Saturday morning. And it was interesting. I got into the show and I was like, hmm, it's kind of quiet. This is kind of like an early Friday on a Saturday. What's going on? And I didn't realize it. Even a lot of the vendors didn't realize it. That the public time wasn't until 11, which is completely fine. Like they had from 11 to 5 or 6. I forget when it closed. So, like, you know, you go out and peek around the corners. Like, oh, yeah, there's a huge line. And from like 11 o'clock on, it was just packed. Like zoo packed the entire day. Which was great. Great for vendors. You know, if you only have two hours to kill at a pin show or your availability is only like two hours at a pin show. And you show up at, you know, one o'clock on Saturday afternoon. You're going to have a tough time. Like, I'm just going to admit that. Like, you may not. If you're trying to be quick and fast and see everything you want to see. It's going to be a little crowded. And, you know, you got to have to have a good game plan if you have a short period of time. But for someone like myself and a lot of people who were there for like either a full day or multiple days, you can take it a little bit easier. Again, that's why I get things done on Friday. And then just pick up anything that I needed to on Saturday, which was honestly very little for me. So that's why I booked a class at 1130. And this is my thing now. I at least want one class per show. Maybe two. I don't know. For me, that starts eating away at time like pretty significantly. If I was there for three days, I would take more classes. But by the time I got to the show on Saturday late-ish after a wonderful breakfast, going to class from 1130 to 1 didn't really put me back in a show until like 130. So, but again, I was good. I had, you know, everything done on Friday. But I took Anna Reinhart's sigils class, Myke. And people may not, people of, you know, were wondering what this is and asked about it. So I'll put a link in the show notes we'll have to the zine that she gives out during the class to help explain this. Now, this is something you could pick up and learn from yourself. But the value I got from Anna, like walking us through these processes, it's basically like an intention exercise, right? Like what intention do you have or what intention do you want to make like with your life or your personal life, your professional life? And then you narrow it down into like a statement. And then you turn this statement basically into a design. And then that design, your sigil ends up, you know, you end up putting that out into the world. And that is your like your, you know, it's like your theme, right? It's like your guiding symbol. You can write this symbol down. And that is, you know, making, you know, an intentional statement about, you know, what you're trying to accomplish. So it was really cool. Highly recommend that class.
• I'm going to share my sigil this week once I get it, get it redone and reworked. But it was funny just sitting in class. You think, you know, I can't do this. I can't do this. And then you just like work through the process. And Anna said in the beginning, like you'll just work through it, you know, just making all these notes and drawings and sketches. And you don't have to be, it's not an artistic thing necessarily. And you make all these doodles and you'll just know when you found something, when you find something meaningful based on all this, you know, prep work and all these things that you've done. And I've like after, I don't know, dozens and dozens of doodles, I hit one and then I just put my pen down. Like I, that was it. And I couldn't, I didn't touch the paper again. Like once I found the one that I, that meant something to me. So it was pretty cool. So I enjoyed that. We'll be talking about that more for sure.

Stationery Shopping at the Pen Show

• Rest of the afternoon, Saturday, I did stationery shopping, right? So there were several stationery vendors. California is a great area for a lot of these types of vendors, you know, sticker stamps, washi, you know, fun designs, unique items to come and have a table at. And at a pen shows like San Francisco, you know, it was the same way in California, a little bit on a smaller scale.
• But, you know, like that was it. That was the kind of stuff that, that I did. And then, you know, I was pretty wiped out by Saturday afternoon, just from travel, getting in Thursday night, like to Saturday afternoon. Like I went at it like pretty solid and I was just kind of done and, you know, went up to the room, chilled for about an hour, went out to dinner. And then it was back at the bar, you know, probably about like seven o'clock, 730. And there was just the coolest bar scene. Like we were all just had like ink and paper and, you know, pens strewn everywhere and people just, you know, showing off what they got at the show. And, you know, people getting to try other things. That's a huge aspect of these shows. I've talked about it a hundred times every time I do a show, a recap, talking about like the bar scene or the people scene or the sitting around scene. It's such a valuable experience, right? You can do a lot during the show as far as like, you know, testing products and figuring things out. But getting to talk to other people who, you know, have pros and cons about a lot of different products or just like, you know, learning about people. It was really cool. Like it's a huge benefit if you have the opportunity to stay a night at the show just to sit around, meet new people.
• It's just really fun. So I met a lot of new people at this show, which was great. And that was it. Like Sunday, you know, West Coast back to East is a full day of travel just with the time zone and the flight lengths and stuff like that. But it was easy, easy travel in and out, thankfully.
• Things are kind of a mess over here. As I'm sure many of you have heard, if you're not living in the U.S. right now, the travel travel is a little bit more sketchy than normal. But I had an easy, easy travel time. And that was that was it. I, you know, no pen show is perfect. I don't think I've ever been to a perfect pen show. But, man, this is up there, like in just like a unique event. I, you know, since I've never been to this one, it's always a goal of mine to go to these different shows. And it had so many vendors and so much quality of people. It was great. Like I cannot recommend this show highly enough. So I thought it was really, really well done. And just it checked all the boxes for me. So, yeah, I would not hesitate to recommend this if you have the availability to get to the California Pen Show next year. This episode is brought to you by Squarespace, the all in one website platform for entrepreneurs to stand out and succeed online. Whether you're just getting started or managing a growing brand, you can stand out with a beautiful website, engage with your audience and sell your products, services, content you create, anything. Squarespace has everything you need all in one place, all on your terms. It's so easy to get started with Squarespace. They have these beautiful website templates that you can choose from. But they've made it even better with design intelligence. By combining their two decades of industry-leading design expertise of cutting-edge AI technology, you can unlock your strongest creative potential easier than ever before. Design intelligence empowers anyone to build a more personalized, beautiful website tailored to their unique needs, crafting a bespoke digital identity to use across the entire web. I mean, they really do make it so easy. It's so easy to get started from one of the templates that they have. And they have these wonderful tools that can help put things together the way that you want and customize it the way that you want. You can also use their fantastic drag and drop tools so you can do everything visually. They make it so easy to design. You don't need to have any existing knowledge or skills. You just need to know how to use a mouse, which is, like, not very hard. But what I love about Squarespace is that exact idea that you just do the part that you want and it's nice and easy. And they take care of all of the difficult stuff in the background, like SEO. Every website is optimized to be indexed of meta descriptions and auto-generated sitemap and more. You don't really need to know what that means because the result is you will show up more often to more people in global search engine results, which is exactly what you want.
• Both Brad and I have been using Squarespace for, like, 15 years or something, both of us. Yeah, pretty close. For so many different projects, they make it so easy to get started and really, like, just to get what you want online with no fuss. But don't just take my word for it. Go to squarespace.com. You can sign up for a free trial. You can build your entire website and see how it's going to work for you. And then when you're ready to launch it to the world, just go to squarespace.com slash penaddict to save 10% of your first purchase of a website or domain. That is squarespace.com slash penaddict when you decide to sign up and you'll get 10% of your first purchase and show your support for the show. Our thanks to Squarespace for the support of this show and all of Relay. All right. We got a shout out of the week, Myke.
• Shout out of the week.
• Rob's pen works. So shout out, Rob, for taking the time to talk with Caroline for this month's Meet Your Maker post. Rob, I got to meet Rob at San Francisco last year for the first time. I would obviously have seen his work online for years. Fascinating, wonderful, colorful, amazing work. And I don't always do this, but the timing worked that I have a giveaway up of one of Rob's pen works dip nib handles that he sent me. So we'll have a link in the show notes. Go over to the pen addict blog to enter to win some of Rob's beautiful glitterati handiwork, which I thought that was a great name for some of the more sparkly pens that a lot of makers are making these days, which are beautiful. So go check out that article. They did a great job on that. And go check out the giveaway, which is a beautiful, beautiful dip nib pen. So check that out. So you want to talk about what I picked up at the California Pen Show? I really do. Okay, interesting. So I've had one specific pen on my list for years.

Nagasawa and Special Edition Pens

• Just as not I'm going to go out and find this immediately. But if I come across it and it's perfectly set up, I would like to buy it. And this is the Nagasawa original mini. So the Sailor Sapporo mini that they make. And this one's called the Moet, I believe. It's basically it was made for the ninth anniversary of the Nagasawa Bungu store in Kobe Harbor. So it's got seagulls. The name means seagull. I call it the dove pen because it's kind of grayish tote. But I'll start calling it the seagull pen because that's actually what's on the finial is a little seagull on there. And it's really pretty. So this pen has actually been around for years, probably like two or three years. And I've seen it a lot. It's not exactly hard to get. But why I didn't ever buy it before is because I only wanted a stock extra fine nib in it. And that's probably like the least common or like the least sold nib that this pen comes in.
• And Nagasawa themselves were there at the California Pen Show bringing like all the Kobe inks and a lot of their pens. They make tons of special edition pens with Sailor and Platinum.
• Do they have any pilot? I can't remember. I'm very reminded of this because I have a Nagasawa steel pen, I think. And the reason I want to talk about it is I wanted you to remind me how did I do this? Like the Sailor is not on the product at all, right? And again, I just don't understand what's going on here. It might be on the cat band. I'd have to look. No, it says Nagasawa. Looking at the imagery on the cat band's link, I can't see it on the cat band. Yeah.
• So, yeah, it's just, I think, a long-term working relationship. They do this constantly. It's weird. It's one of the few stores that has this level of tie-in with both Sailor and Platinum. They do a lot of Platinum. They're essentially white labeling these very popular products, which I just find it's just odd. It's just like an odd relationship that they have. Yeah. I think even my box, let me grab this. I think even the box doesn't have the Sailor logo on it. Hold on. It's wild. Wild. Like it's not on the nib. They have a custom nib. Yeah. So, you know, the traditional Sailor blue box that all these pens come in, it's very basic. And it usually has a gold Sailor on the top. It has like an on-color Nagasawa logo. Literally no Sailor on here at all.
• Incredible. So, yeah, I think it's just a long-term working relationship. You know, they have a lot of stores. They have a lot of stores in Japan. Like it's not like a single small shop. Not that Bungu box is small, but Bungu box is like a one store operation. I think they have several stores, you know, a bigger chain. So, yeah, it's like I said, it's a pen that's been around a while, but I've just never been able to pick up one with an extra fine nib. And lo and behold, there it was. And I was like, well, yeah, this is the exact pen I've been wanting for ages because I just wanted a stock extra fine pocket pen. And these nibs are like crazy fine. It's like writing with, I don't know, like a 0.2 millimeter pencil. Like it's, you can hear it. It's beautiful. Like it's, it's for, this pen is not for everyone, especially in this nib. The pen is, the pen's beautiful. If you like the shorter pens, this pen's old enough to where it doesn't have the screw on threading on the back. So they've started to put that on the more modern Sailor Mini Sapporo's to where you can, this pen, the cap posts, but it doesn't thread. So like the new models thread. I don't like that. So this was right before that. I would prefer the non-threaded ones. Yeah. I think it makes the pen look ugly. Like it's, it takes the beauty away and just makes it purely utilitarian, but like not in a way that I find to be good looking. Like it, yeah, it doesn't make sense to me. It's also, it's not needed. Like, yeah, it's not needed. Which is, which seems like a weird, it seems just like a weird choice to me because you don't need to do it. And so you're, you're kind of, I think it's sacrificing some of the looks of the pen. Yeah. And I have one of each now, one that, that threads on the, on the posting and always worry about lining up the clip with the nib too. Right. Because it can, you can adjust it to be a little bit off and that stuff drives me crazy. So I'd rather just like physically post it and not have to think about where I'm threading it. So yeah, I'm very happy with this pen. And my idea was probably just use like standard black sailor ink cartridges, right? This is going to be a very utilitarian pen for me.
• You know, throw it in the pocket and go. And I immediately popped in the sailor black cartridge at the show and carried it the rest of the weekend. Like this, I bought this first thing Friday morning. This is a good, this is a good tale for shopping. You know, we always say make a lap and kind of get a lay of the land and check out what you want. But when you see something that say been on a list for a while and then there's not many of them, don't leave it behind if you really want it. Right. And this was one of those opportunities for me to where they only had three of these pens and only one of them was an extra fine nib. Um, so this was my first purchase Friday morning. Yes, I will have this pen. Right. Yeah. So I was not, if I left the tip, like before I was done with my transaction, the other two pens were sold. I know the exact pen for me that was the same, which was the 1911 King of Pen Tangerine. Yeah. Like I saw one first thing, like first thing on a pen, I was like, well, I'm going to buy this because I know I want it. And if I, I know it will go and I will regret it. Yeah. So like this decision was made before I ever showed up to the show. Like they just already happened to have them. They happen to have them. And if I would have left that table, it would not have been there when I returned. Um, so I'm glad I, I'm glad I got that. Um, the second and really the only other pen I bought for myself was a Skogsy low volume eyedropper. So we'll have a link in the show notes for you can, so people can go kind of get a visual of what I'm going to talk about here. But, um, Skogsy pens. So Zach, uh, Skogsberg made an acrylic, like a beautifully clear, insanely well-polished acrylic barrel where the ink capacity for an eyedropper is thinned out. Right. So a lot of times you think of an eyedropper. The reason people buy eyedropper is for maximum ink capacity. Right. So this is like already maybe not a pen for someone who really needs that full, you know, three to sometimes four or five milliliters of ink in a pen barrel. And this is also an eyedropper is also not your first pen. You're usually going to buy because it requires a little bit of extra setup, right? This is something, you know, you want to look at these when you have a little bit of experience, um, to manage what you're being asked to do with a pen like this. So one of the issues with eyedroppers and a reason why I have stopped eyedroppering even some of my very easy to eyedropper pens is because between the air capacity and the temperatures,
• the ink tends to burp out the nib. Um, it's not as regulated as if the ink was in a cartridge or a converter, um, or even like a piston or a vac filler. Right. Um, the ink is not metered as well. So when it's going well, it's fantastic. But sometimes you'll sit down the pen after writing cap it and then come back and there'll be a couple of drops that have like kind of come out the nib. And it's just for lack of a better term, a feature of an eyedropper. Like you just learn to live with it. If you have to have an eyedropper, you know, keep a paper towel handy. And, you know, I've had it, you know, burp out onto my page while I'm writing. I was like, it's annoying. So Zach's concept here is to still allow this eyedropper, this cool eyedropper look, right? It's very aesthetically pleasing and made thicker walls and a narrower space for the ink. Yes, it eliminates some of the capacity for an eyedropper. So, you know, maybe, you know, you don't want it because of that. So this holds 1.5 milliliters of ink. That's more than enough ink for me, um, to, to write with for a quite a long time. And it's hopefully to prevent some of the burping, it's going to manage the air and temperatures a little bit better in the pen. So I've obviously just got it. We'll see. Um, yeah, it feels like a long-term testing kind of. Yeah, but I, I inked it up this morning. So one of the things with an eyedropper, like, um, Zach, when you buy the pen gives you a little, little, uh, tub of silicone grease. You have to, like, you have to put this grease around the threads just to seal off the, the pen. This goes for most eyedroppers. Like, Shown Design has one with O-rings that's designed to where you don't have to have, um, silicone grease. But most eyedroppers, uh, you do use with silicone grease on the threading just to, you know, prevent any extra leakage. So far, it's great. Like, I love it. Um, I bought a green ebonite. Mine has a green ebonite cap and section. Um, it's a Boya ebonite. It's got little black specks in it. It's gorgeous. Um, he had one of several colors. So, like, one of maybe six different ebonite colors. And it had some different acrylics, uh, on there. But I, I'm a huge ebonite fan, especially of Boya ebonite. And this was really, really easy for me to, uh, grab and test out, uh, at the show. So, I'm looking forward to that. I inked it up this morning with Teranishi Guitar Nostalgic Honey. So, I've gone for kind of a, uh, not a matchy-matchy, but a complimentary setup. And I got a nib grind on this, uh, from Gina at Custom Nib Studio. They did their perspective grind on here, which is like a Naginata Togi or, you know, Matthew Chen's Kodachi is a popular one. So, really, really fun pen so far. That's what I've been using for show notes today. And, um, I, I am, a great thing about pen shows is I can see this pen all I want online. Um, but it may not fit, like, the size of the pen might not fit my hand. The section of a fountain pen may not be my favorite type of section. And I only bought this because the barrel fits my hand well and the grip section has a nice concave, right? If it was too big or too, you know, the section wasn't right. I wouldn't have bought it because I wouldn't have been able to write with it very comfortably. But this one's like rock solid right in my hand. So, um, those are my two pens. I did come home with three inks from Kobe back when I was buying my Sailor, uh, Sailor Seagull. Um, and I'll, I don't know if I'll review all these, but I'll use them. You know, they, Kobe, again, like with the pens you were mentioning, Myke, these are all Sailor inks with no Sailor markings on them. They're in the little Sailor ink pots. Um, I bought Ginza gold sepia, Kobe university, Romanesque blue and 150th purple sepia. So just some weird colors they make for different events and anniversaries and things like that. And, uh, that are nice, nice to pick up on the show. So outside of that, everything else was just kind of, um, you know, the smaller stick, stick, stick, stickers, stationery. I was going to say stickernary. I don't think that's a word. It is now. Uh, washy. Yeah. Washi, uh, pens, not pens.
• Um, and you know, things like that. I also got, uh, a few pens for review and giveaway. Like I got a pen from, uh, Brooks. I bought the show pen from Brooks. Um, I have to put a link in the show notes. I grabbed that link. I must not have put it in here. I'll, um, I'll send that to you. Cause it looks like a U pen. Uh, I will put, get that for the show notes. Uh, beautiful blue, um, blue pen with a abalone, uh, finial. And then I got, uh, a pen from Zodiac pens and a pen from brute force designs to review. So lots of stuff like that. So I picked up a lot of stuff, but like the stuff I bought for like my personal usage, um, those, it was those two pens. So really successful, expensive show. So I'm glad I'm not going, I'm glad I have a break from shows now. That was two that were pretty close to each other. I didn't go, didn't go crazy in Philadelphia, thankfully. Uh, and I went a little bit, a little bit off the, uh, off the list here, uh, in California, but totally worth it. If you're listening to this and you're like, oh man, I would love to go to a pen show right now. Well, you can do it from the comfort of your own home by taking yourself over to Enigma Stationery. Enigma Stationery offer unique items made from in-house designs along with top brands and hard to find imports. Pen's desk select is back as the resident teenager in the Enigma family. 13 year old Pen is always looking for some new and exciting items to share with fellow stationery lovers. With a name like Pen. I mean, you kidding me? It's perfect, right? Pen's desk select is the curated box of new items inspired by a theme. Pen's theme for volume two is bookish bliss, and it features items at the intersection of reading and stationery. Each box includes 20 items of a value of over $160, but you can get one yourself for just $99 of only 15 boxes available for pre-order shipping in April. If you want free US shipping or discounted international shipping on orders of over $50 or more plus a free gift, take yourself to enigma stationery.com slash pen addict and use the code pen addict 25 at checkout now. That's enigma stationery.com slash pen addict to get your hands on version two of Pen's desk select plus a free gift and free US shipping on orders of $50 or more with the code pen addict 25. Our thanks to enigma stationery for their support of this show and relay. It's a special shout out to the ink towel, which they sent us from their last sponsorship. They sent me. I think we both got it. I've been using that on stream and on my desk because I'm always like slinging ink around my desk. And every time I break it out or people like, what's that? I want that. That's cool. So they did a really good job with that. And it's a big, it's a big towel too. So like, it's perfect for my desk. So it's great. Love it. It's great. All right. One new item that I mentioned, what probably last week that is now actually available for sale, the Dominant Industry Log of Elixir book.
• So this is related to the kind of the painting that I did with fountain pen inks topic that we discussed last week. And this is the new book that was coming out is now available to order. You know, our friends at Pen Chalet have it. I have ordered it. My order is in. And they also did two ink colors with this. So I bought the inks that don't necessarily go with it, but they're launching at the same time. So I have ordered all this stuff. So we'll have more inky fun on stream. These books are just really cool. And like the price is just like kind of ridiculous for what it is. Like it's $22 or something for like a 240 page coloring book. That's with amazing paper. Like it's kind of rad. So this is the one you were talking about with the ink painting, right? Yes. Yeah. So we did the ink painting. So they had an edition called Log of Atlantis. So which, you know, like a lot of underwater themes. And things like that. So this one looks a little bit more.
• It's called the Log of Elixir. And it's kind of, I don't know. It's not really. It looks kind of industrial. Not like steampunk. But like a lot of like traditional, like magical, like alchemy and stuff like that. So it's kind of, it seems like it's along those lines this time. So it looks pretty cool. So have fun to play with this. And have around the house. And have fun with. So yeah, very cool.
• I've got some follow-up from Greg who said, I just wanted to share my experience with my consigning birth certificates in the UK. I am Canadian, but my son was born in England. I went through a similar thinking with what to use for signing the birth certificate. And I brought a good ballpoint pen to do it. When we got to the registrar's office at the county council, I pulled out my pen to sign it. But I was quickly handed a Lamy ST filled with registrar's ink. I don't know if this is common in the UK, but that was my experience. And this is exactly what I'm talking about. I don't want to be in this scenario where they're like, No, you friggin' nerd. Use this pen you're supposed to use. Yeah, the registrar's ink is definitely a thing. And we've talked about this years ago where there was a, I don't know if it was like around wedding time or something like that. But they are big believers in the registrar's ink. And you will get a pen filled with registrar's ink in a lot of official capacities in the UK that I've found. Which is weird because they might be forcing a fountain pen into people's hands, which is not going to work for a lot of people who are not familiar with that. They're going to have a real tough time with that. So I find that to be odd that that's a thing.
• If it is a Lamy ST, that's not a fountain pen. Okay, what is that? It's like a ballpoint. Huh, I wonder how they're getting that ink in there. We'll have to see. If that's the case, I want to know that. Because registrar's is like, they use the official Diamine registrar's ink, I think is their registrar's ink, if I'm remembering correctly, back in the day. It's a really aggressive, permanent ink. Like, obviously, smart to use on official documentation, right? That ink is not going anywhere ever. But I would be interested to see if they had some type of standard pen capacity to use registrar's ink. And that would be kind of cool. I would be in on that. Yeah. I mean, again, we're just taking this from Greg's feedback. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I mean, Greg's right. We're wrong. Should we do a couple of RSTPAs and close this one up? Let's do it. All right, Matthew writes in. This is a question for me, too. I thought I'd answer it. Okay. I'll answer it. Myke, while you're on paternity leave, do you have any plans to keep up with the shows you typically co-host? And if so, would you possibly be using the feedback form to send your co-host notes and comments? Oh, my gosh. So, I mean, one, my plan is to listen to the podcasts that I'm not on. I want to do that. Maybe in a few weeks. Yeah. Well, you know, again, I don't know what it's like yet, but I'm sure there's time in the day where I'm just like, you know, hanging out with the baby and the baby can't talk. So, you know, I guess I'll listen to a podcast. Yeah. Yeah. Because I plan to not really keep up with news via the ways I would normally do that. And so I'm going to use the shows that I usually host that are being filled in to kind of keep up to date with everything that I care about. So that's my plan, at least. We'll see how it goes. The idea of sending a follow-up by the feedback form is incredible, and I had not considered it, and everyone better watch out now. It is because, like, you don't want to open Slack. That's going to lead to things you don't want to be involved in. So just hit the feedback form. Like, if you want to send me a message, I mean, you could always just text me, but instead of messaging me. Yeah, but I could be more of a menace this way. Yeah, you should. And, like, normally you'd send me a message in Slack, right? But, like, you're not going to want to. You're like, you need to delete Slack for, like, weeks.

Listener Feedback and Ink Recommendations

• So, yes, feedback, panaticfeedback.com. I'm going to be using it. I'm going to be using it. I love this. This is so smart. And Craig wrote in to say, as my ink collection has continued to grow, I'm curious if there are any inks you would consider essential that every pen addict should try or own. I'm not looking for brands or product lines, you know, but specific inks. Yeah, so I actually talk about this a little bit at the pen show where, you know, there's brands that I rate highly. And then there's specific colors within the brands that I rate highly. And I'm actually blanking. I was talking about, there was some ink we were referring to. And I was saying, like, it's not just a good ink. Oh, I know exactly what it is. Sailor Manio Akibi.
• So, it's a magenta type of color. But it has so much character that what I was, my idea, and this is kind of, like, along the lines what Craig is talking about. And I can put together a list because this, I was actually thinking, oh, I should put together a list of these inks, not just ink brands. Because that would be, I said, Akibi is essentially, like, a top five, no worse than a top ten ink color, period, like, of any lineup, right? The singular color. Not just, hey, Sailor Manio inks are good. Or Sailor Manio Akibi is good. But this singular color would be in my, like, personal, if I had to pick five inks, would Akibi be in it? Or if I had to pick ten inks, would Akibi be in it? And it's not going to make it past ten, for sure. So, yeah, that's, like, what Craig is talking about. And I need to, I'll put together a list like this. It's a challenge, a little bit, because this is going to be highly personal, right? I only have X inks. And for me, X is a giant number. And X is also a tiny percentage of all the inks, right? So, but, yeah, I can put down, like, my favorites. And this is something I've been thinking about. So, I'm probably using another one today that would certainly make a top ten, which I already mentioned. And that's Taranishi Guitar and Nostalgic Honey. So, those are two right there to start with that are kind of non-standard, but easily available, at least for now. Akibi is going away at some point because Sailor's inks always go away. But, yeah, I think I could probably do, like, probably a list of, like, ten would be good. If I only had ten inks out of my collection, what would they be? Those are probably going to be two of them. So, let's start there, Craig. And then we'll see if I can feature some other ones. I have four. Okay.
• Hiroshizuku Kompeki.
• Just a great blow.
• Mont Blanc Lucky Orange.
• If you can find it. Sure. Robert Oster, Pen Addict, Fire on Fire, OBS, Califolio, Andronopor.
• Oh, that's a good one. I think I... Akibi's in that range, but a little bit different color. I have other blues, other oranges, and other, like, pinks that I like more. But I think that these, for me, have been some of the inks that I've really enjoyed in the past and have kind of opened me up to exploring a little further. Because I think that they all possess really interesting properties. Like, Kompeki is blue, but it's, like, not the blue that you're used to, which is what I like about it. Lucky Orange is just the most beautiful, like, orange. It's a pure orange. Yeah. Like, just as a... Like, if you put that side by side to Fire on Fire, they're very different. Yeah. It's like Mont Blanc Lucky Orange is not trying to be a sheening ink. It's not trying... Yeah. It's not trying to be anything. It's just trying to be, like, the perfect orange. Where Fire on Fire, I think, is great sheening. And then Califolio and Andrenopal is the kind of... It's kind of like the ink color that will, like, blow your mind with the way that it looks on the page. So, there would be recommendations that I would have. Those are really, really good choices, too. So, yeah. Yeah, good call. You got to be about out... You got to be almost out of Lucky Orange, right? That one's going away. I don't like to think about it. I don't like to think about it. Because those came in the small bottles. They did. They did. I've used it sparingly, I would say. Yeah. Yeah. Well, that's it for me.
• No! That's it for me. So, I'm going away now. Bye.
• I'm going to be gone for a while. Yep. I'll be back, hopefully, possibly sometime in April, towards the end of April. Okay. So, keep an eye out on my Instagram. Obviously, that's where I will post our baby announcement. But it's coming up real soon. So, keep an eye out for that. Please be kind to Brad. Brad's going to be bringing in a bunch of great guests over the next couple of months. I look forward to hearing every episode. They're always a good time. Yes. Thank you, Brad Dowdy, for holding down the fort. I appreciate you. I would also like to extend thanks at this point. And I'll do this again later. But to Jim Metzendorf. Jim is an incredible audio editor. And Jim's going to be handling the edit of the show in my absence, too. So, thank you all for allowing me to do this. I love you. I appreciate you. And I'll be back later. If you want to find me online, just go to Instagram. I'm Ike on Instagram. You can find Brad over at PenAddict.com. Spokedesign.com. He streams multiple times a week. Twitch.tv slash PenAddict. And you can find Brad on all the social medias, too.
• And I think. Oh, and also thank you to Enigma Stationery and Squarespace for their support of this week's episode.
• Until next week. For you. Say goodbye, Brad. Goodbye, Brad.