The Pen Addict 95/transcript

The Pen Addict Podcast Transcript
Episode:	95
Title:	Fabber Castle
Release Date:	February 26th, 2014
Hosts:	Brad Dowdy Myke Hurley
Guests:	No guests this episode
Additional Information
Official page:	Episode 95
Audio File:	Audio Episode 95
Podcast page:	The Pen Addict 95
Length:	4747 min <br />0.783 h <br /> minutes
Previous Transcript	Next Transcript

Myke Hurley: Hello and welcome to episode 95 of The Pen Addict podcast, a weekly show where we discuss pens, paper, and the analogue tools that we love so dearly. My name is Myke Hurley and I am joined by a guy who in school, he definitely wasn't that dumb. In fact, he was quite sharpie.

Myke Hurley: This is Brad Dowdy.

Myke Hurley: That was horrible. I know. It's just getting so difficult now. That was great. I'm so sorry, everyone. I'm really sorry.

Mont Blanc

Brad Dowdy: Oh, good grief. Oh, Brad.

Myke Hurley: What? We're so useless. What? Do you know, two weeks ago, we've been doing the show for two years.

Brad Dowdy: I know. Can you believe that? I mean, we don't even keep up with our own anniversary. Someone hit us up on Twitter and said, Hey, congrats on two years. We're like, Hey, all right. Woo-hoo!

Myke Hurley: I just thought I'd check it. Yeah, I remember getting that tweet now. I just thought I'd check it then because obviously, you know, we're approaching a bigger milestone. That's right. More to come on that soon.

Brad Dowdy: How are you? I'm good, sir. How about you? I'm good. I fixed my Mont Blanc. That's awesome. I'm so excited for you. And it turned out it wasn't necessarily a nib problem, right?

Myke Hurley: Well, I mean, you know, as a long time listeners will know, I have a Mont Blanc that I was given for my 18th birthday. And one day I dropped it. And since that day, it didn't work properly. And I've kind of just left it. It was taken to a store. Before the store criticized the fact that the pen had never been cleaned because this was before my pen addict days, I'd just been using it. And, you know, it kind of dried up. And I thought to myself, why don't I just try and clean it? So I spent some time over the weekend. It honestly took about 30 minutes to clean just to run enough water through it and through the converter and stuff like that to clean it out, you know, so there's no blank ink left. And it's now working like a dream. I think maybe what had happened was there was like a lot of dried ink in the mechanism under the nib. And when I dropped it, it sludged it and therefore was kind of blocking ink flow. And this was maybe like holding the nib in a bad position or something because now it's writing like an absolute dream. That's awesome. And I'm just happy because it was a gift. And I'm just really happy that I'm able to use it again.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. Good fountain pen hygiene is key.

Myke Hurley: Yep. And I believe, I believe, I'm trying to find it for the show notes, that I have a Mozart, a Montblanc Mozart. Okay.

Myke Hurley: Nice. Which is, you know, I don't even know if I'm able to find it. But I remember there being a picture of Mozart on the box. Gotcha.

Brad Dowdy: Gotcha. And what ink went into it?

Myke Hurley: I put a Roshizuku Kompeki. There you go. Perfect. I think, I think I found it. Hang on. No, this isn't my one.

Brad Dowdy: I mean, they did some with, I'm not a Montblanc guru, but they did a lot of, you know, special names, you know, a lot of literary figures I know and different people.

Myke Hurley: It's from this Mozart line. Okay. But, uh, I can't find the exact one that is mine. Um, Meisterstuck.

Brad Dowdy: Mm-hmm. Well, that's one of their, that's one of their common names.

Myke Hurley: Homage, uh, Mozart.

Brad Dowdy: Cool.

Brad Dowdy: There you go. I want to see it. You'll have to put that in the show notes for everyone to see.

Myke Hurley: Yeah, I'll try and find the one that I have.

Myke Hurley: So, yeah. So, I just went to just. Excellent. It was not. I'm excited for you. It's not really too much. It's just, you know, I'm kind of pleased that it's back.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah, for sure. I mean, heck. I mean, I'd be very pleased that that was, that pin was back. So, that's good. I'm glad to, uh, glad to see that you, uh, you cleaned it up and it's good to go. That's awesome.

Last Week's Episode

Brad Dowdy: So, we had, we had an interesting episode last week, Myke, I felt. Um, you know, I was a little rambly. I was a little confused. Um, you know, was a little bit unsure about the topic. I was, uh, mentioning. And it generated probably, I don't know, maybe the most feedback that I've ever gotten on any single episode in my inbox.

Myke Hurley: Hmm.

Email Feedback

Brad Dowdy: So, I got lots of emails kind of on both sides of the discussion. Um, you know, the, generally, if anyone hasn't, just happens to jump in in this episode and last episode was just me kind of talking about the, the state of the pin industry and lack of innovation. And if, you know, certain types of pins have been solved and there's nothing else we need to look at in those certain areas. Um, and I don't believe that's the case. And that was kind of my point in bringing up the topic. But I, I got some really good feedback and I wanted to share a couple of things from both sides of the ledger, if you will. Um, I think the best email I got was from Abby. Um, she's from Australia and, um, you know, she pretty much wholeheartedly disagreed and was pretty disappointed with the episode as a whole. So, let me read, let me read, it was a, I copied what I put in the show notes, Myke, is probably one third of the email that she sent. So, she did an awesome job putting her ideas down. And, um, and I'm going to talk about that at the end. But let me go through some of the, the points that she made. And, um, I think they really hit home with me. And, um, it was, it was, uh, it was a great email. So, let me, let me look at this. Let me, uh, go through this real quick. She says, hey Brad, I'm most of the way through listening to your podcast and I had to stop and write something because this is the second week in a row I felt somewhat left out because of the types of pens I love and rely on. This is a long one, but hopefully maybe worthwhile. I know you love your fountain pens, but your podcast is slowly but surely getting out of the realm of relevancy to me. That makes me sad as I really do enjoy listening to you guys. My everyday pen for as long as I can recall has been a Lamy logo ballpoint. Admittedly, not the best writing experience. Especially since I could only find a medium refill, but an incredibly reliable workhorse that is never, that never has a yeah, but moment when I need it to work on the first try or smudges on the back of the credit card. I know what you said was that you were bored stiff reviewing them because it's the same old stuff. But what I heard was that my workhorse pen choice isn't worth bothering with and real pen addicts have long ago moved on. I'm guessing that wasn't what you meant, but it was still a bit of a kick in the guts. And that's definitely what I didn't mean. And I actually wrote a long reply back to Abby and, you know, agreeing with most of her points. And that's absolutely what I didn't mean. But this next point she makes really kind of kind of gets at what I was trying to get at last week. She says, if you base your idea of the pen experience on the idea of it being a linear progression and keep poking people towards the top end, then don't be too surprised when people can't follow you there. Not everyone can love fountain pens, not because they don't see the beauty in the instrument, but because not everyone's everyday writing situation is a fountain pen situation. Some people stop at ballpoints not because they aren't informed, but because that's what they love. Some people stop at ballpoints because they simply cannot crowbar in a writing situation that will be suitable for anything else. I think that strikes at really the point I was trying to make last week was I don't want that to happen. I don't want there to be this linear progression and, you know, pushing people the right way. I think my whole concern last week was I don't want to do these things. I want to keep talking about these, you know, new ballpoint pens and new gel ink pens and, you know, new rollerball pens and things like that. And I was worried that I wasn't. And this kind of hit home to me kind of like, well, that's kind of what I was feeling in the back of my head that I'm kind of losing track a little bit. Of covering everything. And that was my underlying fear that maybe I did or didn't get across last week that I don't want to force this fountain pen experience that I'm having right now down people's throats. And I want to make sure that I'm talking about and writing about pens for everybody. And, you know, maybe that didn't come off like crystal clear in last week's episode. But, you know, in the way Abby laid out her email, that's exactly what I was worried about, that people, you know, were not enjoying the show or the blog anymore if they became too focused on one thing. In this case, maybe fountain pens. So, I guess last week's episode actually probably came from a little place of fear for me that I was getting too pigeonholed. And I want to do all these other things. But maybe I was a little scared to or maybe I wasn't excited enough about the products to do them justice and things like that. So, you know, she went on and made a couple other good points. And, you know, she says, you know, don't worry about helping people move on from a G2 or move up to a retro 50, 51. Don't be the pen ambassador. Be the pen sommelier. Help them find the perfect pen to go with their life, their task, and their budget. And I think I did make that point last week that, you know, I want to help people find the pen that's right for their situation because not everyone's situation is the same. So, anyway, I thought Abby made some great points. And it really hit home with the email because that was the kind of things I was worried about when I started down that road in last week's episode. So, you know, with what she said on that side of the ledger, I actually got a greater quantity of emails like this one from JP, who's at NotSoModernMan on Twitter. So, JP says, there are, as you stated, people who love their Pilot G2s and cannot imagine how a pen could get better, especially the .38. I recently noticed that a client's desk had no less than 10 G2s in the .38 on her desk. That is too specific to be happenstance. Through discussion, we reveal to each other that we both share an affinity for pens, even though our preferences differ greatly. She uses nothing but the Pilot G2. And the reason is it's the best pen she's ever used. Exactly. This is the way it is with most people. He says, poor misguided souls, which is a little unfair. They just don't know what they're missing. Because unless you're actually searching past Walmart and Staples, the Pilot G2 could very well be the best pen you've ever used. I don't know why Pilot and Uni and others don't import more to the states. Perhaps Pilot and others would like to do that. But why question why Staples is ordering G2s by the Pilot? People really don't know what they might be missing. One of my favorite things to do is to truly listen to what someone wants in a pen, such as Myke talked about in episode 91. That was when we were going through your list of, okay, I have a friend that wants a fountain pen, and these are the exact requirements. That's what he's referencing to. It says, and bring a person a pen which fits what was described. This brings such great smiles from friends and family. I cannot tell you what a $4 pen does to brighten the day of a crossworder who can't seem to keep the letters in the boxes anymore. For business, there's nothing quite like the unique gesture of bird-dogging that perfect pen for a client or a colleague. Even if it's a cheap plastic pen, the fact that you listened is never forgotten. Before I left the lady who loves the G2s and will not have any other pen, I gave her a Uni Sino Ultra Micro 207 just to try. I received a text two days later. I love my pen. Thank you. And I haven't even put in my JetPens order for her yet. So to sum up this quick comment, none are solved. The difference is we pen addicts are aware of this.

Brad Dowdy: So I thought both of those emails provided great perspective on kind of the points I was trying to make last week. And Abby's email really struck home with me because I was kind of, I don't know how it came across last week.

Brad Dowdy: But that's kind of what I was getting at. There was like this, you know, deep-seated feeling in me like, you know, am I going down a path where, you know, kind of getting off like the real core of what I want the pen addict to be. And so, yeah, I took those emails to heart and it was some really good stuff. And, you know, I just want to make sure to cover everything that everyone wants to know about because that's really, that's how the pen addict got started was a, was a, it was basically about discovery for me, right? Discovering that, hey, there are better things out there. There are better things out there that fit for me. And maybe there's some things out there that are better fit for you. So, you know, I'm definitely don't want to alienate anybody going, you know, deep diving into fountain pens or something like that. And that's certainly not going to happen because I love other pens way, way too much to, you know, totally discount any other pens. So thank you, Abby and JP and everyone else who sent emails. It was, you know, the quantity and of the quality of the conversation around last episode was excellent. And, you know, we have some great listeners that take their time to write thousand word emails, Myke. That's pretty awesome.

Myke Hurley: I mean, I think that on all sides, that was awesome feedback. It's definitely something to think about. It makes me sad a little bit to, to, to make someone unhappy with the show. Um, so for anybody that, that, that, um, maybe hasn't enjoyed the show as much or whatever, I apologize. Like I, you know, I, I don't want that. Um, for me personally, like this is kind of just where my head is at, you know, with, with, with pens. I'm, my interests now lie in fountain pens and the odd thing breaks through. But for me really, my, my pen money, um, is going on fountain pens. Um, I guess you're the, you know, the one of us that has always been a little bit more widespread, I think. So I guess we just need to make sure that we try and, um, I don't know, keep, keep things rolling and keep trying to make sure we're trying out new stuff for people. But, but I do apologize if, if the show hasn't been as enjoyable for some, although, you know, but there's, there's like, it's 10, it's like six of one, half dozen of another. It's some people love the, you can't win.

Brad Dowdy: Right. Right. Yeah. And we're not trying to win. I just want to, I think last episode was honestly coming from a place of, you know, confusion and if not fear in my head that, you know, I could see the kind of the writing on the wall that I'm getting a little heavy in certain areas on the blog and the podcast. And so maybe it came from me, you know, worrying about that a little bit, you know, am I, you know, going down the right path, doing the right thing. And it was just good to have that conversation to kind of get, um, kind of get a feel from, uh, what the listeners and readers were thinking. So, I mean, I thought it was totally good. I mean, it's, um, uh, I guess eyeopening a little bit, just, you know, I just want to make sure that, you know, it, this is a huge, huge topic we talk about. Um, you know, the world of pens is massive and, um, we don't get to everything every week and just know that we, and especially me are working on, you know, covering, reviewing, talking about, discussing, uh, all kinds of pens and maybe even pencils, which is a whole another, that's a whole another episode. Um, but, um, yeah, so no, everything will be covered. And, um, you know, sometimes we get on tangents. It's, it's, it's funny if you look, kind of look back at our history, Myke, on the, on the podcast, our topics tend to run for like two, three, four episodes. You know, there's kind of like a thread between a handful of episodes and then it kind of goes into this other thread.

Myke Hurley: Yeah.

Brad Dowdy: So it's cool. We, you know, it's, uh, it was all good. I was happy to get the feedback and it was, uh, it was really good stuff. So, um, we will, uh, move on from there and, and try to keep doing a good job and doing even better jobs. So, uh, thank you everyone for their feedback on, on last week's episode. It was awesome.

Myke Hurley: Yeah. Thank you. As always, everyone. Thank you.

Mont Blanc Pen

Brad Dowdy: Yes, very much. And, um, speaking of feedback and your, your Mont Blanc, Myke, that you just fixed, you may have to shelf it because we found the pen for you. Oh yeah. This is from, yeah, this is your pen. This is from Keith Keitover on, uh, on Twitter sent me this link. So this is the Omos limited edition Phoenix plated fountain pen with diamonds.

Brad Dowdy: And it can be yours, Myke. Yeah. For only $48,000.

Myke Hurley: Well, Amazon tells me that I'm going to save $12,000. I get a 20% discount. So that's good at least, right?

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. I mean, this is a deal. And not only that, the reviews of this pen are amazing. I mean, if you're not going to buy this pen just because of saving 20%, I mean, that's deal enough alone. Just listen to some of these reviews.

Myke Hurley: Yeah.

Brad Dowdy: You know, it says, uh, sorry. It says, you know, this, this pen is the perfect tool. I use this pen to write my monthly $10 check to sponsor a starving child in Africa. It's the least I can do.

Brad Dowdy: Um, what a screaming deal. I can't tell you how long I've been waiting for this pen to go on sale. 60 grand is a little steep, even for me. And to save $12,000 at that, put my kid through college, F that, daddy's getting a pen.

Myke Hurley: Why no pack of five option? This pen is amazing, but I lose them all the time. And the fact I can't buy them in a pack of five is outrageous. This means I have to buy them all separate and spend $5 on shipping per pen.

Brad Dowdy: So yeah, it's really great. Is this a good pen for Mark Zuckerberg to write the $16 billion check to the WhatsApp people?

Myke Hurley: It seems like it would be right. I'd love to know what sort of pen CEOs use.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah, it says, Zuck already has a pen crafted from the souls of Candy Crush players. So the answer to answer your query, no.

Myke Hurley: So I've started watching House of Cards on Netflix. And when they seem, it seems, I didn't know this, but it seems to be that when a bill is signed into law in the United States, there are commemorative pens that are given out to the bill writers and other key members of people that are involved in the making of the bill. I would love to know what those pens are.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah, that's a good question. And that's come up a few times over the years where I've gotten a picture of, you know, someone said, you know, what pen is Barack Obama using here? Or they'll show a picture of actually him signing something and there'll be a tray of like 20 pens, right? Well, he'll just use one for one signature and then set it off. And then those are all gifts for people or something like that. So there's been a few different articles over the years about what actually pens they are. And I can't remember off the top of my head. For some reason, I think Cross is somehow involved, but I could be totally wrong on that. But anyway.

Myke Hurley: Oh, hang on a second. Huh? Found an article here. The longest continuously running presidential pen is an inexpensive all metal ballpoint originally made by Autopoint. Generally gold, but sometimes silver tones and imprinted of a signature and occasionally a seal. So these pens were first used by LBJ in at least five varieties, including a silver and gold turned one for his ranch. They cost $3 each. The pen that is used today by President Obama is the black lacquered Cross Townsend rollerball pens or rolling ball pens, as this says here. Rollerball pens at a cost of around $130 each. Wow.

Myke Hurley: Cool. Okay. So there you go. I'll put that in the show notes. So whether it's incorrect or not, put some Googling found it. So that will work for me.

Brad Dowdy: So anyway, back to this Omos limited edition. We just put that in there because of the reviews. It's like the Bic ballpoint or the, was it the Bic for women one? Yeah. Which has just thousands and thousands of reviews. If you have some time to kill and need a good laugh, just go check out the reviews on this $48,000 pen that's 20% off. And it's pretty amazing. And thanks for Keith for sending that. And thanks for Keith for sending that in.

Myke Hurley: Across Townsend. Yeah. This looks quite a lot like the one that they use in House of Cards. Okay.

Brad Dowdy: So maybe that's it. It's pretty, you know, very businessy looking. Yeah. Just getting it for free, right? Yeah. Yeah. I stumbled across last night. I had actually put the show notes together. And then I just happened to be going through some of my feeds last night. And Chad Doan from Doan Paper has come out with the product that I've been waiting for for a long time. He told me about his intentions to make something along the lines of a composition style sized notebook. And it's finally getting ready to come out March 1st. He put a link out. It's called the Large Utility Notebook. And it's 5 inches by 7 inches staple bound. What's composition? So in the U.S. it's like a school book. Oh, I know these.

Myke Hurley: They've got the weird colors on the covers.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. Like the marble cover. So it's just called a composition book. It's kind of a generic term. But actually I think Mead, the manufacturer Mead just calls them the composition book. And they're in that general dimension. And they're always like either staple bound or glue bound on the left edge of the binding. And I've always enjoyed that format. Before I started writing The Pen Addict, you know, we're probably, you know, 10 or 15 years ago, you know, when I'm working in an office, that's all I used was composition books for notebooks. I wouldn't use legal pads or steno books or anything like that. I just had composition book after composition book. And then all of a sudden the composition book turned into a search and I found graph paper composition books and I was in heaven. So this is going to be a big product for me. So I don't know if anyone else is into this size or not, but I'm excited about it. But this is going to be a heavy rotation product for me just because the format size is perfect for me. So stay tuned. I will be ordering come March 1st and I'll put up a review and we'll go from there. But I know Chad has had this on the radar for a long time, so I'm glad to see it come out. And when I posted on Twitter, a bunch of other people were pretty excited about this too. So pretty cool, pretty cool stuff.

Pen Reviews

Brad Dowdy: All right, so I got a few, I got a few pen reviews I want to talk about, Myke. So why don't you talk about our friends at Squarespace?

Myke Hurley: Sounds like a great idea, Brad. So I want to take a quick moment to thank our friends over at Squarespace for supporting this week's episode of The Pen Addict. They are the all-in-one platform that make it easy and fast to create your own website. For a free trial and 10% off, go to squarespace.com and use the offer code Tallyho2. Squarespace are constantly updating their platform with new features, designs, and more support. They have beautiful templates for you to get started with and tons of style options for you to adjust so you can really create your own space online. Everything in Squarespace is drag and drop, so it's easy to add content from your desktop and even rearrange elements of your content within a page or within the web browser. Squarespace make it super easy to make sure that your site looks beautiful on all devices because every site, every Squarespace design, every Squarespace layout and template features its own responsive, unique mobile web design. So you don't even have to do anything. It just does it automatically. Can't get much easier than that. You can easily connect Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, Pinterest, Instagram, Google, and many, many more web and social services to Squarespace to have content pulled in and content pushed out. Squarespace also has e-commerce on their platform, so if you want to set up a shop and sell things in just a few minutes, well, Squarespace Commerce will let you do that. And you can now set up Squarespace Commerce on any Squarespace plan. It's incredibly easy to use, but if you need any help, over 70 Squarespace employees are on the customer care team based in New York City. They're available for live chat during the week and have super fast email support throughout the day and night. You can try out Squarespace for free. There's no credit card required to do this. And if you decide to purchase, it starts at just $8 a month and includes a domain name if you sign up for a year. Make sure that you get 10% off and support this show by using the code TALLYHO2. But before I finish today, if you are an engineer or a designer, well, this could be the time for you. Squarespace are looking to hire 30 engineers and designers by March 15th. This means they're inviting potential candidates, which could be you, and their spouses to be New Yorkers for a weekend completely on them. So if you want to go hang out with the Squarespace crew and check out New York City, well, go to beapartofit.squarespace.com to learn more. Thank you so much to Squarespace for supporting 5x5 and the Pen Addict.

Brad Dowdy: Thank you, Squarespace.

Myke Hurley: Ta-da!

Brad Dowdy: And dude, I can't tell you how much their iOS apps have improved. You keep telling me that, right? They're so good.

Myke Hurley: So you're really, really getting a good time with it, right?

Brad Dowdy: Yeah, I mean, it's helping me with some administration stuff. You know, so it's – and it works. And it's great. So very happy with the improvements they did on that. They basically tore it down, started it from scratch, and built something useful. So it's great. Very handy. Good. All right, pen blog of the week. Awesome. This guy.

Myke Hurley: Huh? Sorry, I said awesome.

Brad Dowdy: Everything is awesome.

Myke Hurley: Oh, man. It's such a good movie.

Brad Dowdy: It is. I think I might have to go again this weekend with the kids. I loved it so much. Yeah. The Lego movie, everyone. Yeah. Lego movie is great.

Myke Hurley: Do it. It's awesome. Everything is awesome. Yep.

Mad Men Props

Brad Dowdy: So this guy, this is George from My Supply Room. And his blog goes way back. And I have a special place in my heart for George because he reached out to me long, long ago when I was starting my blog. And he said he was a reader. And he's got this crazy collection of pens in his garage or basement or some room in his house. And he wanted a place to, you know, he thought he should start a blog and have some place to show and talk about these pens because he's, you know, he's passionate about it. And he's a collector of old and vintage pens. And so, you know, we had some conversations in the beginning about getting him started. So I've always followed George, not just for that reason, but because the guy's collection is out of hand. Amazing. Amazing. Amazing. After he started this blog. And I've mentioned this on the podcast before for a long time listeners might have caught me mention this. But once he started putting out all these old pens, like from the 60s, certain Hollywood types reached out for from the prop department. A show you may have heard of called Mad Men. Myke?

Myke Hurley: No way.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. So George provides the pen props to Mad Men out of his collection.

Myke Hurley: That's so awesome.

Brad Dowdy: Yep. Wow. Yep. That's so cool. So how cool is that?

Myke Hurley: That's a small world, man.

Brad Dowdy: Yep. And he doesn't talk about it very much. He's he, you know, he keeps it pretty much on the down low. He's mentioned it a couple of times because they gifted him like a big display unit one time for, you know, sending them some pens. They got him like an old, you know, like an old retro, you know, I can't remember. It might have been like a Parker display or Schaefer display something. You know, they said he talked about, you know, with my work with the show and they gave me this. And so that was pretty cool. So if you want to see a very cool pen collection and learn something about, you know, where a lot of pens we're using today, like, you know, the big clicks and and some of the traditional ballpoints. And, you know, one of his recent posts, he's got an old paper mate flare, which I mean, this thing looks like it's from the 60. Yeah, it's 1966 paper mate flare, which, you know, is still in use today. So you can learn a lot of good history from his site and you should definitely check it out. So that's George. His blog is my supply room and we'll have the link. It's my supply room dot blog spot dot com. And we'll have that link in the show notes and make sure you have some time to kill because once you start scrolling through the links, you're going to be lost there for a little bit.

Brad Dowdy: So I did a few reviews in the past couple of weeks that we haven't had time to cover. And I always like to I now like to at least mention those on the podcast. So sometimes, you know, I get a little bit of feedback on the reviews or, you know, it's good to not just hear or not just read the words about the pen, but to kind of have a little bit deeper explanation and conversation. And one of the ones I wanted to talk about was the Uni Jetstream Prime 3 color ballpoint. And what this is, it's a multi pen and Jetstream. Uni is cranking on the Jetstream line in Japan. I mean, they make all different colors, all different sizes. They make tons of different multi pens. I was actually this one. I was actually surprised this one came out because it's like a high end multi pen. This is like a metal barrel business.

Brad Dowdy: Desk, I don't know, just a real nice, nicely done Jetstream multi pen. And I was actually I was excited to review it. It's pretty expensive. All things considered, it's $45 at Jetpens, which is real expensive. But some people want a nicer barrel pen, you know, for whatever reason, for work or for durability, who knows?

Brad Dowdy: And the one I chose is really cool looking. It's a black and chrome two tone barrel. It's really nice. The refills are great. The Jetstream refills. The good thing about them is they're standard D1 size refills. And if you're not familiar with the D1 refill, it's a real small metal refill that actually fits in a lot of pens. It's kind of a universal size. And you can mix and match different different D1 refills. Like I could use this Jetstream barrel and I could use the D1 refill of the Zebra Charbo gel 0.4 millimeter. And it would fit right in this pen. No questions asked. So that's a great feature about this pen. But they did one thing on this pen that kind of blew my mind and kind of throws it off for me. I really think they've kind of gone on the Lamy design path here, which is good. It's a very German looking pen from a Japanese company. It's these sleek lines and, you know, this black and chrome. It really, if you told me it was a Lamy, I would almost believe you until you look at the end of the clip. And there's this little faux plastic blue jewel on the clip. I don't know where the heck this came from. It's so random. And it really confuses the design of the pen completely.

Pen Design

Brad Dowdy: It just breaks up the whole design. I mean, it loses. It's jarring. The design of it, it's very, very strange. And I don't know what to make of it because the pen is great looking. Otherwise, but that little jewel. And it's not, I mean, you can tell it's just a little cheap piece of plastic. It's, in my opinion, it's a poor design decision. Some people may like it, you know, whatever. But it kind of overrides what's normally or what I think is actually a pretty good pen. And although I really think, you know, if you're looking for a Jetstream multi-pen, I think some of the lower end models are just as good, if not better, than this. That you can get for anywhere from like $7 to $15. The Jetstream multi-pens that I've used are really, really good.

Myke Hurley: Do you have any feeling about the multi-pen versus the standard? Like, do they run out quicker that you've noticed or anything like that?

Brad Dowdy: Yeah, they'll definitely run out quicker.

Myke Hurley: So they're thinner, are they? Yeah.

Brad Dowdy: So you can pretty much, just one of the safe assumptions you can always make is a multi-pen refill will run out quicker than a standard ink refill. Just because they can't put the full size ink cartridges in the multi-pens. Okay. So you can pretty much always assume that. And then when you get into gel multi-pens, you burn through those like crazy. So you have to be prepared. Like with the Coleto, you know, if you're a heavy user of the Pilot Hi-Tech C Coleto, you need to have like refills handy to swap in. Because you will run out at a moment's notice. But, you know, for a lot of people, myself included, they're worth it just because they write great. So, anyway, I just wanted to talk about that Jetstream because I thought it was a great addition to the product line. But it's a little pricey and it's a little bit thrown off design-wise on what could be a lot better design, I think. One pen I do like the design of, and I just posted this review yesterday. Oh, baby. Is it the Sailor Regulus Fountain Pen? Yep. This pen's been on the radar for ages. I finally got one from JetPens late last year. And I reviewed it, I don't know, a while back. And I never posted it. You know, I try to keep things backlogged, you know. So when I have time, you know, I'll go through what needs to be posted and posted. So this one just took me a while to get to. Because I hadn't written it up, I'd done the handwritten review and the photographs and things like that. And sometimes it just takes me a while to write it up. This is a great pen. I'm very happy with this pen. I obviously went with the orange barrel. I mean, that was kind of a no-brainer. It's got black, blue, and gray. But I was actually, the pictures look awesome of the orange barrel. In person, it's a little bit lighter and a little bit more sparkly than I'd like. I think I'd actually maybe prefer one of the darker ones. But this pen writes so well. And the combination of it and the Sailor Nano Ultra Black cartridges, which, if anyone's familiar with that ink or not familiar with that ink, it's like one of the high-end Sailor inks. It's just this rich, black, pigmented ink. I mean, it takes a little bit of extra maintenance. You've got to clean it a lot between cartridges. You know you need to clean it because it'll kind of dry out quicker. But the writing experience is awesome. I mean, the pen just glides across the page.

Myke Hurley: I've just taken a look at the image, and now, like, I've looked at it on the flicker and I've zoomed it in. I can kind of see what you mean by sparkly. I couldn't see the sparkliness before.

Brad Dowdy: Right. And, like, the product pages on the JetPens, you can't see it at all. In person, this pen looks a little bit different than it does in the way it photographs. Like, the way I photographed it, it looks, I mean, as weak as my photography skills are, it looks exactly like the JetPens photographs. In person, it doesn't look like that. So, yeah, you can expand on the pictures and maybe you can see the little glimmer it has. But it's not bad. I mean, I totally, I use this pen a lot just because it's the right size. The nib is amazing. I love the ink. So, it's just one of those pens where I'm dead set on, all right, this pen gets this ink cartridge, and I know this is the writing experience I'm going to have. Like, this pen I don't play around with much. I don't have a converter for it. I'm not doing all kinds of different inks. This is it. This combination is done for me. I ink it up just like this and go to town because I love it. I've actually burned through a couple cartridges on this. I've written with it so much here in the past few weeks or so. So, it's really cool. And I kind of liken it to the Pelican M205 from a price point perspective. It's not a cheap pen by any stretch. It's $115. And the Pelican M205 is around $130. And they're kind of that in-between, no-man's-land zone, right, where it's hard to – there's considerations you have to take. Well, why should I buy this pen instead of a Twisby? So, you know, it's a pen you need to do your research on, you know, make sure it's a good fit for you, just like the Pelican M205. But in the end, I've been happy with it, just like the Pelican M205 I was ecstatic with.

Brad Dowdy: And one other recent review, which has kind of got me down this path that I've kept thinking about going down, and then I never really get going. And now I've kind of got this bug a little bit about woodcase pencils. So, I got the – someone give me the right pronunciation because I've mentioned it before. I want to say Faber-Castell, but I know it's probably Faber-Castell.

Myke Hurley: I would call it Faber-Castell. I can't even believe that you'd call it Faber-Castell.

Brad Dowdy: I don't call it that, but it's hard to – it's just like Kaweco. You have to think – I have to think about pronouncing it, but I think it should be Faber-Castell because that sounds right and that looks right. But no, I – you know, it's just American of me, I guess. I don't know. But the Grip 2001 is a Faber-Castell classic. I mean, this is a pencil that's been around for – I don't know. I want to say decades in a company that's been around for hundreds and hundreds of years.

Brad Dowdy: This is one of their more popular current line pencils, and I tried some out, and the set I got from JetPens contained three lead grades. And lead grades are a whole different discussion that we'll have sometime. And we've kind of talked about it in a way, way old episode before, but I'm not that experienced with it, so I always have to refer to a chart. And the ones I got were kind of in this middle range, but I found – I always thought I wanted the darker lead pencils, that I would like those the best. But there's a tradeoff, you know, generally, in general terms, and, you know, hardcore pencil people will probably correct me. But in general terms, the darker the lead, the softer it's going to be. Well, I kind of like a harder lead, a more firm, you know, lead to where the tip's not losing shape as quickly. You know, I like to keep a sharper point. So I found that the HB grade pencil was really, really great to write with. And the review, actually, I did with the 2B, which is the softer of the 3. But when I was done with that, I just kept writing with the HB because I could write these lines that were fantastic. And if you, you know, you blow up the picture, you can see that my lines are just neat and clean. And it was a super enjoyable experience. So I've gone on from there and ordered several more pencils from JetPens. So I want to be reviewing them, you know, maybe not as thoroughly as some of my pencil compatriots. But, you know, we're going to have to work on doing some more pencil reviews and maybe some pencil talk on this show sometime. And we might – I'm working on a guest for that as we speak. So hopefully soon. And, yeah, that's something I wanted to bring up because it's definitely an outlier for me. I feel like with the pencils, Myke, it's back when I started – it's like starting the blog all over again. It's this whole learning experience. It's like I don't know much, but let's try to figure it out together.

Myke Hurley: I don't know much, but I know I love pens. That's right. That's right. I was pretty proud of that.

Myke Hurley: I don't know much. Should I just leave?

Brad Dowdy: That was great. No, that was fantastic.

TWSBI Pens

Brad Dowdy: Last thing, and we'll leave it on this. I finally ordered a couple of pens I've been talking about. I guess I'm completing the whole TWSBI lineup. I don't know if I have one of each or not. I haven't really thought about it. But when I placed this order, I was like, I think I kind of have all their pens now when this order comes in. But I just ordered a TWSBI micarta, which I've had one on loan that I need to get shipped back out from our friend Jim Cant on Twitter. He sent me this pen. He heard me talking about it on the show and talking about it in different spots. And he said, hey, let me let you borrow mine and see if you really like it. And it turns out I really, really do like it and have one on order for myself. And I went ahead and ordered the TWSBI Classic as well. So I will be getting those pens in hopefully in about a week. And we'll do some reviews on those. But I'm pretty excited to get those in. You know, since the micarta gets a lot of play and it's a lot of people's favorite pens. But ever since the Classic came out, it kind of had this big release. And then I haven't heard a peep about it or I don't see any pictures about it or really anything. You know, people reviewed it right when it came out, like the first week. And then poof, it was gone. So I don't know if it's just not sticking, if it has that stickiness like the 580. People talk about the 580 all the time and take pictures of the 580 all the time.

Myke Hurley: I mean, you can tell me, I guess, from having it in person when you get it. But I just don't think I like the way that it looks. I think it looks kind of strange.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah, I think a couple of people have said that. And, you know, some of the barrel design aspects were a little bit confusing compared to some of the other work that they've done with other designs. So, yeah, we'll see how it goes, especially when you consider it's the same price as the 580. And then the 580 aluminum piston filler is coming soon. So we'll see. I don't know if it's just going to cannibalize this whole Classic thing or not. So it kind of seems to be heading that route. But we'll see. I have one on order. I think I actually ordered the exact same one that Myke Dudek reviewed, which was the blue with the 1.1 stub nib. So we'll see.

Brad Dowdy: But, yeah, I'm excited to get them in just to try it out. I'm actually really excited for the micarta. That's going to be a heavy rotation pin just off the testing I've done with the little loaner I've had. I've been very happy. So I think that's it, buddy. I've got a lot going on these days with the pins. Got a bunch of new pins in to review. Stacks of pins, actually.

Myke Hurley: Oh, yeah?

Brad Dowdy: Yeah, yeah. And I don't think there's a fountain pin in there.

Myke Hurley: I haven't bought anything new in what feels like a long time.

Brad Dowdy: Mm-hmm. But I've gotten a bunch of new stuff from JetPen, some new products, some old products, some products that people asked me to review that I've forgotten about that I've got several things in that I'm going to get to sooner rather than later. So we'll definitely be talking about them in future episodes.

Myke Hurley: Sounds awesome. So if you want to catch up with what we've spoken about today, go to 5by5.tv slash penaddict slash 95. 95.

Myke Hurley: If you want to catch up with Brad, he is at dowdyism, D-O-W-D-Y-I-S-M. And he also writes at penaddict.com. And I'm iMike. I-M-Y-K-E. Thank you so much for listening to this week's episode of The Pen Addict. If you want to send us some feedback, you can also do that by email by going to 5by5.tv slash penaddict. And you can see the big button that says contact. Thanks to our emailers, Abby and JP. Thanks for your really, really valuable feedback about the show. Thank you for being here, Brad. And thank you all for listening. Until next time, Brad, wish these people a goodbye.

Brad Dowdy: Goodbye, lovely people.