The Pen Addict 190/transcript

The Pen Addict Podcast Transcript
Episode:	190
Title:	The Pilly Phen Show
Release Date:	January 27th, 2016
Hosts:	Brad Dowdy Myke Hurley
Guests:	No guests this episode
Additional Information
Official page:	Episode 190
Audio File:	Audio Episode 190
Podcast page:	The Pen Addict 190
Length:	7878 min <br />1.3 h <br /> minutes
Previous Transcript	Next Transcript

Myke Hurley: From RelayFM, this is The Pen Addict, episode 190. Today's show is brought to you by Harry's, and we're back to normal. My name is Myke Hurley, and I'm joined by only Mr. Brad Dowdy.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah, we're far from normal, but we actually are back to normal.

Pen Show

Myke Hurley: But surprise, we have a special guest.

Brad Dowdy: It's like, hey Myke, how's it going? I hadn't talked to you in a few weeks.

Myke Hurley: Yeah, it's nice to have guests. I love having guests, and I've suggested some more guests for the future to you.

Brad Dowdy: We have a guest next week, as a matter of fact. Oh, we do? I don't know if you know that. Yeah, I should probably share that with you.

Myke Hurley: Who is our guest next week?

Brad Dowdy: I can't tell you. I'll tell you after. Talk secret.

Myke Hurley: Interesting. All right, so we have a guest next week, apparently, everyone.

Brad Dowdy: Someone who has not been on the show before.

Myke Hurley: Oh, I know who our guest is next week.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah, that we have said we need to get on the show.

Myke Hurley: Yeah, no, this is a long time coming. But it's nice for us. I love having guests, but it's nice for it just to be the two of us as well.

Brad Dowdy: Oh, sure. Sure, because we always have lots to talk about, and our listeners want to hear us just talk about Pen sometimes, and go through the craziness that we seem to come up with in every episode. So, yeah, we definitely needed a me and you episode, for sure. And there'll be more of those. We're on a good guest run, which I quite enjoy as well.

Myke Hurley: Yeah, most definitely. But we've been holding back a lot of stuff. Oh, probably before we kick off today, we should mention the Atlanta Pen Show is coming up. We've mentioned this before. We are doing a Kickstarter again for the Atlanta Pen Show, so we can help get me out there and also create the video and fund some of the fun stuff that we're going to be doing there. We should actually have the Kickstarter ready before the next episode. So before episode 191, the Kickstarter should be up. Do we want to say what we're doing or do we want to keep that a secret?

Notebook Design

Brad Dowdy: I say we can say what we're doing. All right. We're going to do a really cool notebook this year. It's going to be a Pen Addict orange cover with an embossed Pen Addict logo and the sweet NotCo paper that we use. That's fountain pen friendly. So we're going to get that up here very, very soon so everyone can check that out and everyone can back it if they're interested in seeing the video for the Kickstarter, back it if they're interested in getting the notebooks, but importantly, back it so we can get Myke over here and do all these things.

Myke Hurley: We've been working on a notebook idea for a long time. It's something that we've both really, really wanted to do, and I'm very, very excited to get it out there. I think people are really going to love it. So, yeah, we'll wait and see what people think, but I'm very excited about it.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah, yeah. And then Mountain Biker Dave already in the chat room is saying we need an Atlanta pickup option. I think we can definitely work on that. I can't say for sure because we don't know the production dates as far as the notebook goes, but I think that would be a high probability of happening where you'd be able to pick up your notebooks at the show. But we'll just have to wait and see how that is.

Myke Hurley: Yeah, we'll work that out. That's more than possible to do, I'm sure. If they're produced in time.

Brad Dowdy: Yep. And the notebooks will be memo book size, standard field note size, three and a half by five and a half, three packs, pocketable notebooks of awesomeness. So, yeah, we're pretty excited. I've got a mock-up I'll have on the Kickstarter page. So, I'll be sure to let everyone know when it launches and it'll be up before next week.

Myke Hurley: Yeah. And as Brad said, we're going to be doing... I just need to call you dad. That's a whole thing for another time. Wow. As dad said, we're going to be doing a video again. So, there'll be a video only tier and the video will include the video episode of the show, which will either be episode 200 or 201. We're still trying to work out how we can make it episode 200.

Brad Dowdy: It's going to be 200. It's just going to happen. We're just going to have to take a week off or something.

Myke Hurley: And that's what I'm thinking probably do, but I'm just looking at our schedule.

Brad Dowdy: Which we never do. We hate doing that. And we did it this Christmas, which was fine. But, you know, during the regular year, we never miss.

Myke Hurley: But we've got to make it 200. It's got to be 200. It would be so upsetting if the live episode was episode 201. Yep. And we're going to be doing the backstage stuff and the video only stuff. So, obviously, you'll get the audio of the episode. But, like last year, Kickstarter backers got a little bit of extra where we showed the stuff that we'd find that was really interesting and stuff that we'd bought over the show. And there's going to be, you know, correct me if I'm wrong, we're going to do a few different tiers this year to get more or less of the notebooks.

Brad Dowdy: Like one or two packs of the notebooks. Yeah. So, we'll try to break it down. So, you know, you can buy just one pack or you can buy several. And, you know, also on the video, we're going to do it different this year in that we're going to have a live audience this year. Like everyone had to listen out in the bar and that kind of didn't work very well for everyone last year. So, we were kind of off alone. But this year, we'll have, if you make it to the Pen Show, we will have a live audience and then hopefully a little after party there as well. So, all those details forthcoming. Yep.

Myke Hurley: So, look out for that. We really, really appreciate it. If you want to support us, we would be very, very appreciative because the Pen Addict live at the Pen Addict Pen Show, at the Atlanta Pen Show is an event that we really look forward to now. So, we hope that we can make it happen.

Brad Dowdy: It's our one big event a year. So, it went so well last year that we're anxious to get back and do it again, even bigger and better this time. All right. So, let's get into this episode. We got some follow-up just from last week's episode. Our episode with June Thomas on the NYC stationary tour just got universally loved by everyone. I mean, not that all of our episodes are universally loved, right? But we got a lot of...

Myke Hurley: It was a Supergore episode.

Brad Dowdy: It was. It was really excellent. It turned out even better than I expected, mainly because June Thomas is awesome. I mean, there's not much more you can say about how great she is.

Myke Hurley: Mm-hmm.

Brad Dowdy: And everyone loved that episode. And then, just a couple of days ago, our friend Elaine from Jetpens, who runs the Owl Inc. blog, she just did her NYC stationary attractions blog post, which was fantastic. Yeah. She has a lot of pictures from CW and pictures with Caroline and Caitlin and all the other places that she went to. Elaine does awesome work on her blog. So, we'll have that link in the show notes. It's kind of in conjunction with... It fits into what we talked about last week a lot with a lot of pictures. And I didn't know you could get custom pencils at CW. So, she got Owl Inc. pencils there stamped.

Myke Hurley: I didn't know that. If I would have known that, I would have been walking away with a ton of them.

Brad Dowdy: So, she got Owl Inc. pencils stamped with the NYC January 2016. So, that's pretty cool. And, you know, she went to the Strand bookstore in Kinokinia. And she did find out that June was talking about the rolling a joint article that's up in the pen section. And Elaine took a picture set. It's still there. So, we have a picture. We'll link in the show notes. I thought that was hilarious. Just the extra space on the article about the Sino UM-153 that Kinokinia posted happens to have an additional little article on how to roll a joint. So, you know, the pen addict can also share other things, apparently. So, you learn a lot by purchasing pens at Kinokinia, apparently.

Myke Hurley: A little bit of extracurricular activity there.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Richard Mille

Brad Dowdy: So, this next pen that we want to talk about, I'm pretty sure you're not going to find this at Kinokinia. But I got a million links on this. And I'm sure you did, too.

Myke Hurley: This is one of the craziest things I've ever seen in real life.

Brad Dowdy: The first time I looked at it, and we're talking about the... I'm going to go with Richard Mille. I don't know if it's Mille. Mille. Richard Mille, whose watch work I've actually seen before. It's insanely impressive. I thought this was, like, super stupid and not real. But the more I looked at it, and the more I read about it, and the more I got into this pen, it's really fascinating. I mean, let's just say up front, Mille's watches are like 500 grand. So, this pen was $118,000. And I'm sure all of you have seen it by now. But I just wanted to talk about it. What do you think about this thing?

Myke Hurley: I think it's incredible.

Brad Dowdy: It really is. It's legitimately fascinating to look at the work that went into this. I mean, he obviously just did this because he could. Yeah. You know, this isn't going to be a pen like anyone that we would know ever owns.

Myke Hurley: No, it looks horrible to hold. Like, it's huge.

Brad Dowdy: It's enormous. It looks like a terrible functioning pen. But the engineering of how the nib extends and retracts is basically all made through a watch mechanism where you just click the top of the cap. And we have a link to the video on how it works. You just click the cap. The mechanism sets off. And you can see it all in the barrel of the pen. And then the nib extends. That's like, whoa. That's pretty sweet. Yeah.

Myke Hurley: This was like the guy maybe likes pens as well, right? Because it's like expensive stuff. Yeah. And he's like, I could do that.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. So the article we'll put in here from the wristwatch review, he kind of summarized it best at the end. He said, basically, who this pen is for. If your safe is already full of Richard Mille watches and you want something a little different to carry around. So if you have a watch safe and you own some of his watches, then you might be in the market for this pen. Yeah. But his watches are killer. I've seen him for a while on Tennis Players. He sponsors a couple of tennis players with like this lightweight titanium model that runs like 500 grand. So, yeah, it's just like stupid expensive, but it's kind of cool. I thought like for a second, I was like, this is dumb. And the more I watched it and the more I read about it, I was fascinated by it. And, you know, not that anyone, not that we'll ever see one of these in our lifetime, but it's kind of cool that someone took the time to build this and that can build this. And he's just like, forget all of you. I'm just going to make this. I don't even care. So pretty fascinating.

Brad Dowdy: We've got another link just a couple of days ago from a recent convert to the pen addict podcast, Play Repeat. I don't even know Play Repeat's real name. I didn't check it before. But, you know, he's been following us on Twitter for a little bit and just kind of stumbled into the blog. He wrote this great article. So it's essentially titled Best Strange Podcast. And it's a story of how he found the pen addict.

Myke Hurley: And so amazing.

Brad Dowdy: It was a great story. He basically was bored with listening to podcasts, had no idea about pens or anything beforehand, typed into Google and typed in the typed in the words Best Strange Podcast into Google and ended up on us somehow and became like a full bore addict. I mean, what do you think about this?

Myke Hurley: I just my face lit up reading this. It's so fantastic, like, just to hear the way that people can appreciate this show, as I know that a lot of people do, like, listen to this show and like this show and only have, like, even the slightest appreciation for what we're talking about. I just enjoy listening to me and you. And like, it was so fun. If you've got the guy's name. I don't.

Brad Dowdy: It went on as About Page. I do, too. Yeah. I looked at the About Page and it's not there.

Myke Hurley: So, the play repeat person, who I love very much now, was saying about, like, it's listening to the way that me and you have, like, grown into our relationship over this time. That's one of the things that makes me the happiest because we are, like, the best of friends. Right. And I like that people feel that way when they hear it, like, they understand that. And that makes me, yeah, that makes me really, really happy.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. See, he is a Glaswegian. So, he's in your neck of the woods. So, it's, I've had several emails over the years of people that don't care about pens, but listen to us because of our chemistry, which is, I guess, why we've lasted this long. And I find that to be strange, but there's nothing that can make you more happy than that. It's like, I'm not even into what you're talking about, but I just, like, listen to you talk. And I was like, wow, that makes you feel kind of good. So, I thought that article was really neat, especially just, I just, like, you know, Best Strange Podcast is such a, it's just such a random thing to stumble into our little world. And I am glad that he did. And it's pretty cool.

Brad Dowdy: Related, somewhat, I just got this alert this morning. I opened up Instagram just to kind of check what was going on. And I had, I was tagged in a picture from Artist Magazine, which I had never heard of before. And in the physical issue of the March issue of Artist Magazine, we are in an article called Easel Listening. Get it? Easel Listening.

Myke Hurley: Oh, I love that.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. Ten podcasts to listen to while you work. And obviously for artists. And the pen addict made the cut, which is so random. Can you get a copy of that? Yeah. I'll have to find out. I've just found it this morning. It just went up yesterday. And I'll have to figure out where this, you know, I'll have to go to their website and see what I can find. So, it was pretty cool. So, I thought that was really, really neat. You know, and there's some other podcasts on there. It's just an image of the, I don't have a link to the article. I don't know if it's even online. But we'll see if we can get a hard copy of the Artist Magazine.

Myke Hurley: I can read. Do you want me to read what it says? Yeah. What does it say? It says, number nine, the pen addict. You know when you're signing the receipt at a restaurant and it's one of those good pens? Have to fight the urge to take it with you? This show's for you.

Brad Dowdy: Isn't that how a lot of us got started? Yeah, no doubt. It's like, this pen is terrible. Then all of a sudden you find something just randomly, like at a restaurant.

Myke Hurley: You had a great little part in the refill, which is, by the way, gotta say, this is genuine. I love your newsletter. Oh, thank you. I appreciate that. I don't read every word because it's too much for me. It is. Like for me, like it's too much. No, I understand. But it isn't too much. But for me, because I don't read for him. Yeah, yeah. Well, that's a balance. I like pick and choose the parts that I want to read. And I read it on the weekend, like in the morning when I'm having my coffee on a Sunday or something. I freaking love it. Oh, good. It's awesome. So there was this one part this week where someone was saying, who was it that was saying about their boss took their pen in a meeting?

Brad Dowdy: Oh, yeah.

Brad Dowdy: She's on Instagram. You caught me off guard. I can't think of her name right offhand, but yeah.

Myke Hurley: And just you giving some tips, which we spoke about on the show before. Like, you know, have a honeypot around of good pens sitting on your desk or whatever. Oh, yeah. I've got to say, like, I'm going to put a link in the show notes. If you're not signed up for Brad's membership, you should be. Because genuinely, the newsletter is worth the money.

Brad Dowdy: Well, I appreciate that. There's nothing that makes me more nervous every week than writing that newsletter.

Myke Hurley: Yeah, no doubt. Because that's the one that people were paying you for. Everything else, like if you don't like it, it doesn't matter. Like, just read the next post or don't ever come back. Like, it's fine. But this one, it's like, yeah, you've got to sweat that.

Brad Dowdy: Amanda in the chat room reminded me. It's Heidi that did that. Heidi, yeah. I did that. I posted that because a lot of people know. But that's, like, if you're a pen addict and you're listening to this podcast, that's a legitimate issue for people that don't understand, like, the things that you're into. And they say, let me borrow a pen. And, like, we all go, we all pause for, like, three seconds. Instead of going here, we all go, what do I do?

Myke Hurley: Man, people must have thought I was so weird when I was at my desk or whatever. Yeah. Because then I would, like, reach into my drawer and get another pen out for them.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. No, I did the same thing. People would say, let me borrow a pen. I'd say, okay, just a second. Set the one down that I'm using. Reach over. Grab a different one for them to use. Absolutely.

Brad Dowdy: Absolutely.

Criminal Podcast

Brad Dowdy: Speaking of best strange podcast, Criminal. Have you ever listened to Criminal?

Myke Hurley: No, I'm familiar with it.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah, I'm familiar with it because it's a very, very popular podcast. But I got sent this link. This past week, they had a sketch room artist on there. It's a short episode. There's, like, a 20, 25-minute episode. It was fascinating. I listened to – her name is Andy Austin. And she had so many neat little tidbits in this podcast. It's not necessarily about art and art supplies, but it's about how she basically had no experience.

Brad Dowdy: She was in a courtroom. She wanted to be a journalist. And she got some advice from, I guess, one of her – I don't know who – I'd have to go back and listen to it. Who gave her this advice when she was in journalism school? She said, everybody can write. Not everybody can draw. So she was in the courtroom as a journalist one day, overheard someone saying that their courtroom artist wasn't going to be there the next day. Said she could – went up – walked up to that person and said, I can do that. And 43 years later, she's just retired from being a sketch room artist. It was just a fascinating, fascinating story. And she said, what's different with her is, you know, all these courtroom artwork you see is generally in either chalk or colored pencil. She works in ballpoint with watercolors on top. Wow. And you can tell in her artwork that it's actually different. And it was just a really good episode. I thoroughly enjoyed it. I wrote down, like, several quotes from it in just, like, a 20-minute show. I learned lots of little things, lots of neat little tidbits. And they did a little good talk.

Myke Hurley: Well, this is one of those things. This is such a pen addict's thing. Yeah. That this is unnecessary. Like – What do you mean? You don't need to do it the way that she's doing it. Right. He's putting more effort in than is required. Yep. You know? Do you get what I mean? Like, this is obviously harder to do, right? Because otherwise everyone would do it this way. Right. Right. She's putting – like, these are so much better than the courtroom drawings I've seen.

Brad Dowdy: Right. So, like, one of her – I guess probably the biggest trial she ever did was John Wayne Gacy, who was basically an American serial killer. Um, and one of the things that I noticed that I've never seen in other courtroom drawings was when she has a chart of the – one of the attorneys up there going over this chart. You can literally read the words on the chart. That's what I'm talking about. Anyone else would just do, like, a scribble line. They would be more focused on the attorney or the courtroom.

Myke Hurley: Yeah. You don't need to do that.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. She actually has legible writing on this card, what they were presenting that day.

Myke Hurley: And the picture of John Wayne Gacy where the orange and yellow is, like, blended in together. Right? But do you see what I mean? Like, it's not a criticism because we all do it, but it's the going further than necessary because you enjoy the tools.

Brad Dowdy: Right. Right. Like, she has a lot more detail in –

Myke Hurley: She's effectively painting him as opposed to doing a courtroom drawing of him.

Brad Dowdy: Yep. Yep. So –

Myke Hurley: That's amazing.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. So, 43 years worth of doing this, and it was a fascinating episode. Yeah, the episode's only 17 minutes long. Oh. I'm going to put it on my list. Yeah. When I listened to it, I got, like, an hour's worth of entertainment out of it. It felt like it was that good. I enjoyed it.

Myke Hurley: That is the thing with those types of shows, like, the heavily edited shows and stuff that I've done like this as well is what you're doing is taking out a lot of the chitter-chatter, right? Like, so all the stuff that me and you have. Right. So, all you're getting is, like, incredibly condensed information, which when I listen to these types of shows, they always feel way longer than the one or two hour shows that I put together. Yeah. Because your brain is, like, working every single moment. Yeah. Yeah. Not a criticism, which is a different style, but it's one of the reasons that I personally prefer the types of shows that me and you do. Sure. Because they're easier listening.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah, yeah, yeah. I, you know, those shows are informational. Our shows are personal. Does that, I think, is that, do you think that's accurate?

Myke Hurley: Yeah. We're, like, character-driven personality shows. Right. I think that's the difference. Like, this is a personality-based show rather than an information-based show. We talk about a lot, but the key thing in our show, we're very meta now, the key thing in our show, as was pointed out in that amazing Best Strange Podcast article, is it's our relationship that makes the show enjoyable.

Brad Dowdy: Right.

Myke Hurley: Right. But anyway, that's enough podcast inside baseball.

Notebook Purchase

Brad Dowdy: One of the things that our show is known for is making people spend money. So, I'm going to do a little bit of that right here real quick because I'm going to spend money on this and I'm ticked off that I missed the beginning of it. And it was a topic in the chat room, but we all love our Tomoe River paper for, you know, fountain pen writing. And you can buy it in, like, Seven Seas at that Nanami paper. You have the Seven Seas blank, you know, journal. It's, like, 300, 400 pages worth of Tomoe River bound. It lays flat. And I've always wanted a gridded version of some sign. So, they came out with a cross-field journal, A5 size, which is basically a reticle grid, a blue grid on the white Tomoe paper. I believe it's white. Yeah, it's white. Oh, it is the off-white. Yeah. So, I actually haven't. I've been pretty good at spending so far this year. I'd have to think if, I'm not going to lie. I'm lucky enough to get so many products for free. And, you know, my desk overflowing with things to use. So, I haven't been buying a lot of things recently. I have to have this notebook. The reason I'm mad is because Nanami is on vacation right now. So, I can't order it. They take down the, when they go on vacation, they take down the buy buttons, which is okay. So, their orders aren't piling up. So, when they get back from vacation, they'll turn the buy buttons back on. Then, they'll be able to order it sometime next week. They'll be back in town. But, I pretty much have to have this. And so, everyone, wait until I buy mine before you buy them all out. I know a bunch of you already have it because you were able to get it before they went on vacation. But, I got to have this. This will be a good purchase that I am super, super anxious for. Do you need me to get you one? This doesn't look like your kind of thing.

Myke Hurley: Why? But, I want one. Yeah. I mean.

Myke Hurley: Yeah. Go on then. Yeah. Yeah. Pick one up and I'll grab it from you. Yep. In Atlanta.

Brad Dowdy: Yep. Because I'm probably going to buy a couple anyway.

Myke Hurley: It's a good looking notebook.

Brad Dowdy: It's a good looking notebook. And the amount of pages and the size they can do. Yeah. Whatever. I'll stop talking about this. So, everyone doesn't buy it. So, I can make sure to get mine and Myke's. If you're in the writing mood, coming up next year, listener Paul joins who is a great, great supporter of the show and does a great ink reviewing blog. Yeah. Paul's great. Yeah. Paul's awesome. He sent me an email, said, hey, EncoWrimo is coming up, which is the February International Correspondence Writing Month. All through the month of February, people write a letter a day, send them out. And he said, hey, you know, a bunch of people listen to a lot of Relay shows. How about, you know, would anyone from Relay be open to sharing their address to receive some mail? So, I obviously would love to do that. I just asked in the Relay room this morning, I don't know if everyone has had a chance to look at it, but Aline Sims from Less Than or Equal, which is probably my new favorite, new to me podcast. She does an awesome job. We'll keep a list of, like, PO boxes for anyone that wants to receive mail. We'll link it in the show notes this week.

Website Promotion

Brad Dowdy: And, you know, I thought that was a cool idea that Paul did. Paul's website is gorgeous.inc, by the way.

Myke Hurley: I forgot to mention that. You're going to give me a list to put in?

Brad Dowdy: Yeah, well, it's in the show notes right now. But it's just two people, just me and Aline. I just asked everyone this morning if they're interested in that.

Myke Hurley: Yeah, but what I'm saying is this is totally unnecessary for people to hear. Are you going to create, like, a web link and that will update, maybe? Yeah, I'll figure out something. Maybe a dropler or something?

Brad Dowdy: Yeah.

Myke Hurley: So, it'll be in the show notes is what we're saying.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. So, there's already a Slack in the chat room. There is a list of people from the Pen Addict Slack room that they are keeping a doc. So, I'll just add them to the doc and then we can link to that.

Myke Hurley: Perfect. How's that? That's already in our show notes. Does it make your life easier now? It does. Because, for me, if it's going to be updating, then great. Let's keep it updated. The only reason I am not participating in this is because I know I will not send anything out because I am lazy.

Brad Dowdy: No, I'm not sending. Trust me. I'm not doing this to reciprocate. I'm doing it if people want to fill out their list. I know I will not be writing. I might write a couple letters back. But, yeah. I'll look at it. Yeah. It's not a one-for-one thing because you would be overwhelmed. Yeah. Yeah.

Myke Hurley: I love the IncoWriMo tagline. Is it vintage social media?

Brad Dowdy: That's so good. That's so good. But, yeah. I would love to be able to write a letter a day. I haven't been able to keep up with my postcard a week that I said I was going to do. So, I have to work on that. But, yeah. It's an awesome thing. And we'll talk about it more. And we'll make sure the addresses get out. Because people that are super serious about it, they'll go ahead and fill out their schedule for the month with the addresses that they're going to send to. So, that's why people are asking for addresses now. Make sense? Yep. They can go ahead and book their entire month of their one letter a day, know who it's going to. So, I think that's great.

New Year Resolutions

Brad Dowdy: All right. We got – we're just scratching the surface here. We got a lot more to talk about. But I want to talk about one of our very favorite sponsors. And that's our good friends at Harry's.

Myke Hurley: You bet. We are still in the month of January. So, it still is New Year's resolution time. This is something that people still think about. How are they going to change for the year? One thing you should change if you haven't already is to stop overpaying for a great shave. And this is what Harry's is all about. They make their own blades. They're German-engineered five-blade cartridges. They give you a close, comfortable shave without cuts or razor burn. Harry's believes so much in the quality of their blades that they put a guarantee on it. They guarantee the quality. You will get a full refund if you are not happy with Harry's blades. But I'm sure that you will be because you will be one of the over one million people who have switched to Harry's. Harry's razors offer a high-quality shave at about half the price of other big brand blades. On average, an everyday shaver will save $150 each year on blades using Harry's. And they'll ship them to your front door for free. Their starter set is a great deal, too. For just $15, you get a razor, moisturizing shave cream, and three razor blades. I'm really looking forward to Atlanta because our entire bathroom will be full of Harry's products, as it was last year. And the beautiful eucalyptus smells and aloe vera smells will be following me and Brad around for the whole time that we're at the pen show.

Brad Dowdy: So this is how stupid I am about Harry's. And I know y'all are probably sick of me telling all my little anecdotes. But I was last night, I was in our bathroom here at home and just, you know, I don't know, shaving, whatever I was doing in there. And I was going, you know, I'm going to L.A. pretty soon for the L.A. pen show. I wonder if I have enough stuff. I wonder if I have enough Harry's stuff to take with me because I don't want to not have it when I travel. It's just the stupidest things in my head I always think about at these random times for my Harry's products. It's like I'm fully addicted. It's like I can't not have it anymore. They've sucked me in somehow. You know, the robots are in my brains now that I can only use that stuff. So I actually worry about these things weeks in advance to make sure I have enough stuff to carry with me when I travel. It's mind boggling.

Myke Hurley: Well, you need it.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah, I need it.

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Brad Dowdy: So the Pilly, the Pilly, the Pilly Pen Show. The Pilly Pen Show. Pilly Pen Show. Pilly Pen Show went off this weekend and I was so jealous of every woman that was there. Now, they had about two feet of snow. So, you know, a couple vendors didn't show and I'm sure that kept a few people away. But the people who did go and the vendors that were there made the best of it and had like the awesomest time. And I'm jealous of everyone that was there. And everyone was sending me pictures and texts about all the cool stuff that they bought. And I was talking to everyone while they were there about how much fun they were having. And I was like, I'm so jealous. I miss all of you. So we have some links in the show notes that you can live through them vicariously as I did all weekend. I followed the Pilly Pen Show 2016 hashtag on Instagram.

Myke Hurley: And contributed to it with your beautiful glasses.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. Actually, I'm wearing my beautiful glasses now.

Myke Hurley: Where are they from?

Brad Dowdy: These glasses?

Myke Hurley: Yeah.

Brad Dowdy: Warby Parker.

Myke Hurley: Not an ad. Not an ad, by the way. Just checking. Yeah, they're good looking frames, man.

Brad Dowdy: Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. And I just got my sunglasses in from them last week. So I'm pretty much a customer of them.

Myke Hurley: I love that one of the top nine posts on that hashtag is you and you weren't even there. I kind of feel guilty about that.

Brad Dowdy: I don't like to, I don't like to, I didn't mean to Bogart other people's hashtags, but I was like, I'm so jealous. I'm not at the hashtag Philly Pen Show 2016.

Myke Hurley: Your Instagram game is too strong, man. Yeah. Too strong.

Brad Dowdy: I don't, I don't like Bogart and other people's stuff, but there, there's so much other good stuff to see in there, especially Franklin Kristoff, who, uh, who dropped in, uh, all kinds of, um, uh, what do you want to say? Not promo pens, but like special editions, limited editions. I see Jim.

Myke Hurley: I see Jim doing some work there.

Brad Dowdy: So all of our, all of our listeners that were there, all the slackers who were there were apparently like, oh, hovering, I guess is the best word waiting for all the, um, all the pins to drop at the Franklin Kristoff table. So they can, uh, abscond with, uh, several of them.

Myke Hurley: I know, um, I'm looking at a post, a post from Merva drawers and oh my word, they've got that like green and white ring on them.

Brad Dowdy: Um, yeah, Tanya came away with a few. I know Dan Don came away with three or four. I mean, they just kind of went, uh, went pretty crazy and just looking at the pens, I can see why. I mean, they were really cool looking. So Franklin Kristoff did a good job hosting. Uh, I know Carrie from fountain pen days did a great job promoting. He was there with, um, all fountain pen day swag. He had a table there. We've got a link in the show notes, all his pictures he took. Um, he had a meetup, uh, one night, um, and just did a lot of cool stuff. Cool things. And had a big time. I know he was worn out. I talked to him afterwards and he was just exhausted, which it's amazing how tired you get at these things. Um, so it, it, it's, it's pretty cool. So this kicked the, uh, pen show season off, right. Which makes me even more anxious to get out there and, uh, to the, to all these pen shows this year. I I'm ready and, uh, looking how much fun everyone had in Philly. You know, anyone who's anywhere close, you know, within a few hours or half days drive to a pen show, you need to go. It's just a fun experience. Um, even if you've never been, there's people there, other people there that have never been. Um, and you can, you can talk, hang out, look at pens, um, and, and figure out what's going on. It's really cool.

Myke Hurley: Remind me what ones you're going to be at.

Brad Dowdy: LA that's coming up in February, then Atlanta and Chicago in April, then DC and San Francisco in August.

Myke Hurley: Boy, oh boy.

Brad Dowdy: Yep. Yep. So that's the schedule as we stand right now. That's the confirmed schedule. Um, there's unconfirmed, there's unconfirmed things that, you know, maybe we can do some more. Who knows yet?

Myke Hurley: Are you going to come to London? Uh, when is it? Isn't it in October? I think it's in October. I missed, I missed it again. Cause I'm the worst. I just, I like, okay, I'll remember. And then someone says to me, you're going to keep coming this weekend. It's like, oh man.

Brad Dowdy: So I keep saying I need to go get my passport just because, you know, something like that. So yes, I won't say I'm coming, but I need to keep that like on my radar for in the future. Right.

Myke Hurley: That'd be sweet, man. We could do a pen addict live in London. Oh, that'd be crazy.

Brad Dowdy: That would be crazy.

Live Show Plans

Myke Hurley: So that would, I'll tell you what, 2017, we're going to do a live. We're going to do a live show in another location. We're going to do one in Atlanta and one somewhere else. How about that? Look at you. Look at you. Why not, man?

Brad Dowdy: Why not? You're throwing down the big time.

Myke Hurley: Well, so many of those, um, pen shows are in places that I haven't been, but want to go to. Like, I really, really want to go to Chicago.

Brad Dowdy: Hmm.

Myke Hurley: Right. I just haven't had a reason. And that would be a great reason.

Brad Dowdy: That would be a great reason. And we could have the, the field notes, HQ tour, shooting video.

Myke Hurley: I want to go to field notes. I want to go to cards against humanity. Like we could do the live show there. Yeah. Their office. Like they have like a whole auditorium thing that they would let us use. Nice.

Brad Dowdy: So nice plans, man. We got them.

Myke Hurley: Got more than we can keep.

Pen List Update

Brad Dowdy: So changing the topic abruptly, I did a long awaited top five pens update, um, a few weeks ago on the blog. And I wanted to just talk about it real quick because number one, there's not a ton of change. There's a decent amount of change, but I was talking about previous plans. The last time I updated, I was talking about doing it maybe quarterly. This looks like it's going to be like a twice a year update because there's just not that much change in the non fountain pen categories. Like the gel ink pens, no one's breaking any ground, any new ground in this realm, right? You know, the top five pens in the store that, you know, people will ask, you know, where if I go to Staples, what can I get? That's a good pen. There's nothing new really happening there. Right. So a lot of these things, you know, there's some shuffling of deck chairs, maybe, um, within those categories. There's rarely anything new in those categories, but then things like fountain pens, there's always something new. Um, and there's always kind of some shuffling going around and fountain pen inks. Um, you know, that's having some changes. Um, I even changed up the paper a pretty good bit because there's so much paper and there's a lot. I haven't still haven't tested in the paper. Um, I added two new lists, uh, this year, one that, um, um, you'll be fond of. It's the top five mechanical pencils. Um, and then I also added a wooden pencils list. So there's a lot of cool things that I updated, but I don't think it's an every three months type of update cycle because I don't think there'll be that much change. I don't, I, it takes me months to get to a review for one thing. Like I just did the TWSBI eco review and that depends been out like five months now, right? Or four months, something like that.

Myke Hurley: Yeah, I have that one. I won't mention that in a little bit.

Brad Dowdy: Okay. Okay. So updating a list like this, which everyone wants all the time, which I agree with. I wish I could update this like once a month, it would be great, but there's nothing necessarily to update that frequently. So I think like a twice a year update, I think is pretty good. Um, just looking at how little changed in some categories and how much changed in others, I think six months is about the good timeframe for this. And I made sure to update that in the, uh, intro because before I'd said I would try to do it every three months. And, uh, I just don't think that works for what I'm trying to accomplish with this list. So any thoughts on this list at all?

Myke Hurley: Nothing new. Um, I mean, I never disagree with you by and large on this stuff. Like I just looked at the top five mechanical pencils. I really want you to try out a Colt Pens mechanical pencil. I think that that might, I personally, I haven't used all the stuff on this list, but I mean, I've used your one and two and I believe that the Colt Pens should be on here.

Brad Dowdy: Okay. So I, I have one of those and I gave it to Jeff. So I'll have to steal it back from the, uh, from the shop. Did you use it at all? Uh-uh. No. Yeah.

Myke Hurley: You need to use it. Cause I think I personally, I think it belongs on this list. Okay. Because it's cool. For me, it's the, uh, it's the retractable knock mechanism that it has with the button. It's fantastic. Absolutely. It's the best one that I've used because you don't bring out more lead every time you retract. Right. Because all of the other ones have like a double mechanism in the knock on the top, but the button on the side is, works really well. And it's a really fantastic way of doing it. It feels cool to fiddle with, you know? Okay. So I, yeah, thoroughly, thoroughly recommend that one. Um, and I, I think that, I mean, I don't know, I can't speak for you, but I think that it should be on your list.

Brad Dowdy: No, no, that's probably something that's a pretty cool and I will enjoy. Um, you know, I did just get in the, um, it, they didn't make it in time, but the Kurt, the Kurt Toga is obviously on the list, but the, I just got a couple of Disney models in from jet pins. Those are pretty good. Yeah. Yeah. That's a Mickey mouse and some things. They just came out with able to get the Disney ones over. They're really neat. They're really neat. I like those a lot. So I'll do a review of those soon.

Myke Hurley: I didn't know that, that I didn't know that, um, that Japan's had those. Cause we were looking at them on Amazon, right?

Brad Dowdy: So we looked at the princess models and I don't know that jet pins got the princess models, but they got like Mickey, Minnie mouse ears, that kind of stuff. That kind of stuff. They even have special led, uh, holders, you know, the, you know, the little plastic led tins, which, you know, they just charge your premium for because of the branding, but it's just a, it's just a little older, but they even have those, um, in there. So that thought that was pretty cool.

Myke Hurley: I really like this. I love, I love these. I absolutely love these. I'm buying a good job. I'm buying, I'm going to buy the three character ones right now. I'm going to buy Mickey, Minnie and Donald cause I have no idea how to know it sold out.

Brad Dowdy: So yeah, they just came out yesterday. So that's all right.

Myke Hurley: I need to go get them in before these, these pen addict listeners suckers go and buy them. Yeah. These are, these are fantastic. Did you say that the lead holders were separate? Yeah.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. You know, just spare leds. Um, and they have Disney, uh, branding on them.

Myke Hurley: Oh yeah. Cause I can't see those on the page.

Brad Dowdy: They're probably, I hadn't even looked yet. So they're probably in the new, new arrivals.

Myke Hurley: All right. Well, let's go buy all of it. While I'm at jet pens, I don't very frequently order from jet pens. Cause it's like, it has to come over from the States. Is there anything else I should be buying? Oh gosh. I don't know. What should I add to this order?

Brad Dowdy: Okay. So it's the, just for the leads, it's your unique Kuro Togo led HB Disney. There's Disney black, Disney pink, Disney white.

Myke Hurley: Oh yeah.

Brad Dowdy: It looks like Disney blue. So it's just a way to charge you a premium.

Myke Hurley: Yeah, man. Like why not? Excuse me. I'll get, I'll get this white and pink guy. That looks awesome. Yeah. I think that's the one I got actually too.

Brad Dowdy: What else shall I buy? Well, I don't know. Yeah. I've got a whole top five pens list of stuff you can go look at. I don't know.

Eco Pen Discussion

Myke Hurley: Otherwise, I mean, did I sell to Isby? Yeah. All right. So let's, let's bump this up the list. I want to talk about the eco. Okay. Now I've been holding off on one of these for a while. And I was specifically holding off after I read your review was my thought because I wanted to wait for the colored versions. But while I'm here, I might as well get one. Your review was glowing.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. I really liked this pen.

Myke Hurley: Now, what are we thinking build quality wise, right? And you're feeling that this one is in a better situation than what maybe some of the stuff we've seen previously. I mean, it's difficult to tell because you haven't had it for long enough to like really put it through its paces.

Brad Dowdy: Right. But I've been using it for a few months. I've seen no immediate issues. The deal with this pen is actually has less parts than like the 580, for example. The section is not removable. It's built into the barrel itself. So the section you don't remove, you can remove the nib and the feed. You just pull them out. But there's no section that screws off to where you can get into the barrel proper, if that makes sense. So really kind of the only moving parts is the piston mechanism, which I mean, I haven't had a problem with yet. The only thing you generally run into with pistons in Twisbees, if you use if you really, really use the pen a lot. I have a Twisbees mini that I used for my ink review pen. So I'm new ink, clean it out, do a review, clean it out. And I was cleaning it out constantly. It loses some of that lubrication. So the piston will stick and stutter. So you just take it out. They give you the tool, put the little silicone grease around it again, and then it moves properly again. That's pretty much the only moving parts in this pen, aside from the feed and the nib, which don't really move. They're just, they stay put. And we put in a post when the Eco first came out from Mountain Biker Dave about the process, the manufacturing process. And I should have looked at it. I don't have the right words that he used for looking at it, but he basically looked at this through some, I don't know, some machine he's got. Polarizer? Yeah. So you could tell like this, I don't know. You could tell like the stress points basically, like in the 580, the stress points were higher because of all the faceting design in the barrels. And this one doesn't have that. It's just smooth and cylindrical. So there's less stress in there. So I, I mean, you never know. Some people have written TWSBI off completely and sworn off of them. And I cannot blame them one iota. They had lots of pens with lots of problems.

Myke Hurley: Well, you know, I was getting there, right? But like, I have an underlying love for their stuff, right? Right. It's just the quality that drives me crazy. But everything else about them is on point constantly, right? Right. Their design is fantastic. I think personally, I think the Eco is the best looking design pen that they've done, including the cap. I know that maybe you're not too crazy about the cap. I love the cap.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. So I love the, I love the red logo on the top of the cap. I don't dislike the cap. I'm just saying that's the part that stands out visually to me from a, um, off kind of off, uh, kilter kind of perspective. It's just a little bit big and it's really not a big deal. It's not something that says, oh, well, I can't buy this pen now. It's like, I actually love the clip design. I love the top. I love the, like the finial, the red finial. I don't love the size because it's just a little bit bulky, but it doesn't matter. I mean, I, it's just, you know, the cap is what keeps it clipped onto my, to my pen case. And when, um, I write with it, I don't post the cap anyway. So it doesn't affect me that if I did post the cap, it would drive me crazy. Um, it's a little bit too big for posting in my opinion, but the one thing you left out when you were saying all the things they do, right, is they nail price points too, right? They make pins with features that you can't get at the price points that they're at. And, you know, have there been some bumps in the road along the way? Absolutely. Um, have people that have sworn them off completely and will say never again, or are they, you know, good to do so? Yeah, I can see people have been burnt a lot of times. Um, I haven't seen much talk about TWSBI Eco failure points so far. Um, it doesn't mean there aren't any, I am just not super familiar with any, I haven't had any issues. Um, but I haven't had issues with any of my 580s or minis either. The only one I've ever had an issue with is the micarta, which had a feed and collar issue that had to get replaced. Um, so, you know, I, it's a fantastic pin. Um, I think it's probably better than the Lamy Safari for like an entry level pin. If the person purchasing it wants to get away from cartridges, you know, sometimes for beginners, cartridges are hard to get away from.

Myke Hurley: I know you didn't put it ahead of the Metropolitan.

Brad Dowdy: No, because I think it's that much better, uh, of a price. It's, it's 50% less than this. And the quality of writing that you get with the Metropolitan is killer. The style and the feel of the pen, it's so well balanced. It just feels good to write with. Um, and you know, I think the cartridges do, do make a difference for like a pure beginner from a pure beginner's perspective. They're very afraid, um, of getting that bottle of ink and filling up a fountain pen. The very first pen that they get, um, I was the exact same way, you know, I'm never going to use fountain pens. Okay. Okay. I'll try a fountain pens, but I'm only going to use cartridges. And now we're here.

Brad Dowdy: So that's kind of how it works.

Myke Hurley: All right. I'm just placing my order of jet pens right now.

Brad Dowdy: So, so on the, we talk all the time about how TWSBI teases things on the Facebook page. Um, they've been talking the yellow, they did one with a yellow cap. That would be an instant purchase for me. They did a full demonstrator one, which actually is not my favorite, which is probably surprising because I'm a big demonstrator guy. I like the black better than the full demonstrator. But if they do other colors, like they like to mix in a lot of colors, like they're doing on the AL with the green is the next one that's going to come out. They do. If they start doing like orange and purple and lime green and yellow on these ecos, I'm going to have a problem. It's going to be like Skittles or something.

Myke Hurley: So, uh, this isn't the first eco that I have purchased. Oh really? I bought one as a gift.

Brad Dowdy: Oh yeah.

Myke Hurley: For Tiffany, I'm a friend of the show and host of top four on Relay FM. Um, I bought, I bought her a little care package. She started to get interested in this stuff. Uh, and I bought her a private metropolitan because just because, and I also bought her a TWSBI eco of a stub nib because I think, I think that the stub nib is something that most people will either love or hate. And I believe that she'd love it. And I think she did because I'm going to put this in the show notes. She tweeted to me yesterday. A little Myke was right. Uh, picture that she drew with her stub nib in a teal ink. I think it may have been a Hiroshi Zuko teal ink. And then if you look through the chain, if you look through the chain on, on twitter.com, you'll see that she's gone ahead now and gone to Goulet and bought a Noodless Flex, a Jinhao 159. Uh-huh. Now, these are good, right? This is like one of those cheap pens that people love. Yes.

Brad Dowdy: Yes.

Myke Hurley: Yeah. And two bottles of Noodless, including Apache Sunset.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah, that Apache Sunset is awesome.

Myke Hurley: That's a beauty. And I am so happy to see Tiff go down this route because she's a friend of mine and I love it with more of my friends start to get into pens. And I think, I think it's safe to say at this point that she's in pretty deep.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So she's, she's, she's in now. And we have to remind the listeners in case they missed it a few episodes ago when Myke had visited the Armands in New York, we discovered that Tiffany was a backer of the Visionnaire. Yeah. Yeah. So this is kind of a result of that. Myke's like, let me fix this for you. But I need to know what ink she used on her, on her eco. All right. Give me a minute. And I'll tell you. It looks like it might, if it, it might be Tsukiyo. I don't know if it's in Roshizuku, but it's just beautiful.

Myke Hurley: You wait right there, buddy. And I'll pull up the order that I had.

Brad Dowdy: So Tiffany's into the adult coloring and all these things. So we've been talking to her a bunch about this. It was a Kujaku. Kujaku. It's a deep tuck wise blue. That's one I don't have. I need to get that one. Kujaku. Yeah. That's an extremely popular one. And it's beautiful. It's quite looking. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. So yeah, good job in getting her the eco. And I'd be interested if anyone who does buy the eco and runs into problems, we usually hear them. But I just haven't had that rash of this is cracking, that's cracking, this isn't working anymore in the eco. So if you have issues, definitely let us know. So because I like to bring that up when we're discussing these things because I don't want to send people down the wrong path. But it seems like the QC on Twisby, it continues to improve. And that's just kind of how the company's set up. They've definitely had some issues. And I think they're reining it in and waiting a little bit longer to get things right, which is why it took two years for the eco to show up. Yep.

Myke Hurley: All right. So I have three crew togas and an eco on the way.

Myke Hurley: JetPans International shipping is so weird. They do like a 950 one and it says it can take up to 45 days, which is insane. And then they have a $50 one to get it in like five. Obviously, I went with a 950 shipping. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But it's saying, you know, usually it's about two weeks, but it's like they put it on their site and it's like, ah, you make it so difficult.

Brad Dowdy: There's nothing, there's no redeeming values when it comes to shipping and shipping prices.

Myke Hurley: No, International shipping is a nightmare. There's no way around it, but it's, you know, it is what it is. Yep. There was one more review that you did that I'm so surprised that one hasn't already been on and two, you did it now, which is the Bic Crystal ballpoint.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah.

Myke Hurley: Probably the most popular pen in the world, right?

Brad Dowdy: I would say so. The most popular, the most copied, you know, it just is. Everyone knows this pen, right?

Brad Dowdy: And I'd never reviewed it and that was kind of on accident. It wasn't on purpose because I've always liked this pen and always like really respect the story behind it. And I always really enjoyed seeing how people use this pen because it is everywhere and people can do cool things with it. Like artists and engineers do these great, great looking pens. And actually it was probably like a year ago, someone emailed me said, Hey, why haven't you reviewed the crystal? I was like, you know, I don't, I don't have a good answer and I will rectify that situation. So I bought some, which that's the great thing about them. You know, they run about 20 cents a pen, right? So I think I bought a 10 pack for like two something. And because you can't really buy just one, you know, if you go to the grocery store, you're not going to buy a 20 cent pen. They don't package them that way.

Brad Dowdy: I mean, it's just a great pen. I mean, it's literally museum quality, you know, it's in the museum of modern art as just a, an example of what great design looks like. And you know, how it's just a simple shape, a simple form factor can like take over an industry, which is what this pen did when it came out.

Brad Dowdy: You know, the ballpoint ink has improved over the years. I believe, you know, they've made it less messy. Like you used to use these pens when I was in school and they would just glob up around the tip and leave these blobs of ink on your paper. When I write with it now, that doesn't happen anymore. I don't know if that's taken away some of the artistic properties of it, but people still use it so much for art because it shades. Well, the type of ink it is the oil-based ink, it has some shading. I obviously don't have the skills to bring that out in any artistic kind of way, but you know, I have some links in the article to people who do, and you just do, you know, a big ballpoint, you know, ballpoint artwork on online. And you can see just like photo quality artwork done with one of the simplest pens on the planet. And it's a great pen. And I actually got a, people would just email me, it's like, thank you for doing that review. I'm glad you finally did that. And I was like, okay, apparently it's a thing. So it's cool. I should do this, you know, more often. I need to do things that I don't normally do. And especially when it's a pen as famous as this, right? I mean, I just have to review this pen. Just because it has to have been there. Yeah. I'm just sorry it took so long. It's just an awesome pen. You should have this pen like laying around the house. You just should. It's, you know, there's no, there's no reason not to. And it's actually a pretty good writer. It's not the greatest writing pen. You know, there's a lot of white space in the ink, which we talked about, you know, in how ballpoint and gel ink pens perform. You want to see a solid line without any white space in there. It doesn't skip, but you know, just the ball doesn't roll evenly. Sometimes it leaves a little bit of white space in there. You know, it's not, obviously, if you want me to make a list of the best writing ballpoint pens ever, it's not going to be number one, but it doesn't mean it's not a great pen. You know, it's just a really good pen. It's good for what you get. Yep. Not in the 20 cents per pen market is some of Pilot's UK pens.

Myke Hurley: Yeah, tell me what's going on here.

Brad Dowdy: So, without getting into too much detail, our good friend Ian, who writes pen, paper, pencils, pencils, pen, paper, pencil.net, who's also someone we need to get on the podcast. And I've talked to him about coming on before. I need to follow up on that. He did an article on Pilot's UK's pen pricing, basically. And, you know, it's something we've always discussed in general terms, and maybe some specific terms about basically Japanese importers here in the U.S. And, you know, why can't we get everything that Pilot makes in Japan? Why can't it come here to the U.S. or to other markets in the U.K.? For this example of Ian's, he talks about that. You know, some of the U.K. retailers were importing Pilot products from Japan. Pilot UK, as a regional Pilot, I don't know if they would be a distributor or a standalone company, they were upset that retailers were bringing these pens in, told them they had to stop, and basically, I mean, basically told them to stop, that they had to remove these pens for sale, and they could only buy the authorized whatever Pilot UK is carrying, and it's allowed to sell in the U.K.

Myke Hurley: From Pilot's perspective, I can kind of understand that, whilst I think that it's a ridiculous thing to do. You know, it's like, because they make their decisions about what products that they want to be in certain areas, whether it's right or wrong, but, do you know what I mean? Yes. So it's like, they're going to say that. It's like, well, no, this is not what we want you to do. But I think they should just make everything available for everyone.

Brad Dowdy: So this goes through a couple of posts, because Ian got a really long, detailed answer from Pilot, which was mostly good. I mean, from a business perspective, you understand where they're coming from, as far as discussing why or why, not why they can or can't bring products in. The answers are good. They're not great. But, I mean, it's also a corporation. There's going to be some things they can't directly say.

Brad Dowdy: But, you know, a lot of it goes down into things as detailed as ink formulation or things as simple as a trademark brand. You know, do we have to rename this pen because someone else has the trademark in that region? You know?

Myke Hurley: Yeah.

Pilot UK

Brad Dowdy: They talk about that happening. The problem, in a nutshell, in my perspective, is that we're in a global marketplace now. Right? Ian wants to support his UK vendors.

Brad Dowdy: But Ian has the internet. And he can make a couple of clicks, find a product he can't get in the UK for cheaper than a similar model in the UK, and click a button and it's his. But Ian's frustration lies in, well, why can't my regional stores that I like to support, why can't I spend that money with them?

Myke Hurley: Why do I have to spend so much money on shipping? Right. Right? Because I can still buy them. It doesn't matter where I'm buying them from. Just let me buy them locally. And then you end up with all the money that you end up with, Pilot, for doing that. Right. I get it. Right.

Brad Dowdy: So it's a challenge for Pilot UK that they don't have a great answer for. It's a challenge for Ian because, you know, he doesn't get a great answer to, I don't want to say it's an unsolvable problem. But I just go back to, from Pilot's perspective, Pilot UK's perspective specifically, it's got to be difficult for them as a business to satiate all of our needs. But that's the world we live in now. I can get anything I want online, you know, as long as I know where to go. And with someone like Pilot, you know, I can get some model that they don't sell in the U.S. by making one click over to a store in Japan and making that purchase. I don't know who that hurts or who that benefits. It's a weird kind of thing right now. But reading what Ian's, you know, talking about, it pains him not to just be able to buy that in the U.K. because he wants to support his regional retailers, which I am totally supportive of. But, you know, I've bought plenty of pins from Japan that I could get for cheaper. Over there, I would rather purchase them from someone here who, you know, I would rather support, you know, someone local, if you will. If at all possible, that would be my first choice. So when you start asking questions about these things, why can't I have this pin? And here it is right here. Your parent company sells it. Let me purchase it. And their answer is no. It's kind of hard to, you know, realize all the machinations that have to go on in the background for that to actually happen. But, I mean, from a consumer's perspective, the choice is easy. If they really want that pin, they can get it. They don't. It doesn't matter what Pilot UK says. I can go get the pin. I'd just rather do it a different way. So.

Myke Hurley: Gotta hand it to Pilot, though. They wrote that massive email response. Yeah. It was a huge response. More than they needed to do, in all honesty. Yeah. They could just put, this is how it is. Suck it. Right. Like, you know. But they didn't.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. They, let me see if I can find it real quick. I generally like the email. I thought it was a little bit dismissive in areas. Yep. But to put this whole thing out there, they answered appropriately.

Myke Hurley: Mm-hmm.

Brad Dowdy: You know, people that listen to this show and read this from that perspective are going to see a couple of issues with it. I thought he was dismissive of the small scale where the fanatics lie, which is us, as opposed to the big scale that Pilot is dealing with on a day-to-day basis with massive retailers and massive purchases. You know, that kind of thing. So, it's a balance. I don't envy the position that they're in. So, it's an interesting read. I don't have an answer. And no one does. Pilot doesn't have an answer. Ian doesn't have an answer. I don't have an answer. But it's good to have the conversation because of how the market is these days, I think. You know, it's a global market. Why, you know, having large corporations such as Pilot have so many disparate offices across the world that carry different things when it's easy for someone in one place to buy something from another place. But Pilot can't sell it in that place because of whatever. However, it's confusing to the consumer a little bit. So, I don't know.

Myke Hurley: Couldn't agree more.

Brad Dowdy: Yep. Yep, yep, yep. All right. Let's wrap this up on another issue that you've kind of been having recently. And I've been feeling this a little bit. So, why don't you talk about it?

Pen Use

Myke Hurley: All right. Now, me and you talk every week, right? Talk about pens. Talk about paper. I'm starting to feel like a bit of a fraud.

Myke Hurley: I'm not using my stuff.

Brad Dowdy: Mm-hmm.

Myke Hurley: Right? I have notebooks and field notes just piling up in closets. I'm using basically one notebook and one mechanical pencil a couple of times a day to take show notes. But it's not even really worthy of that. You know, like, it's not really enough. I'm coloring on my iPad. I'm not coloring in my coloring books.

Myke Hurley: I feel like I need to be using my stuff more. I have all these incredible pens that I love so much. But the thing is, the pens aren't good for what I'm doing with show notes taken because you hear this.

Myke Hurley: Mm-hmm. You hear this. Right. Right. And the point of it is, like, I take the notes so I'm editing stuff out. Right? Yeah. I don't want to have to then be editing this out constantly. Right? Because that's what I was doing when I was using the fountain pens. Yeah. I'd hear, like, the pen caps coming on and off all the time.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. So, in this show, you don't have to edit that out. But in other ones, yeah.

Myke Hurley: Yeah. Because the whole point is, like, I'm trying to make the show sound better by taking these notes. And then you end up making them sound worse by taking the notes. Right. And I've got all this stuff just building up. And I want to use it. But, like, I haven't got a use for it. Like, so I have to maybe create some uses. But I don't know what they are that, like, stick. I want to fix it, man. Like, I feel like I'm becoming a collector, an admirer more than a user. Mm-hmm. And I don't want that to be the case anymore.

Brad Dowdy: So, I've started to find that with notebooks. And I don't have a good answer for you yet. But I'm working on it.

Brad Dowdy: You know, I've started to get too many notebooks. Too much paper.

Myke Hurley: My field notes, like, the space that I have for it in my cupboard is getting obscene. One thing that I'm going to stop doing is buying extras. I have, like, a gajillion snow blind.

Brad Dowdy: Well, that was an accident, sort of, right? Yeah.

Myke Hurley: But, I mean, I didn't even need all the ones that I did buy. So, I'm actually planning on bringing a bunch to Atlanta. Good. Giveaway. I'm going to be, yeah, I'm going to be, like, bringing some stuff to just get rid of, I think.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. So, I've slowed way down on field notes purchasing probably in the past year. Just getting the colors. I used to always buy extras. I've not bought extras the last couple editions. Just because I'm not using them fast enough to make it worthwhile. I don't need them sitting there. I would rather use them and not have, like, a collection of them, even though I do. I definitely haven't been buying, like, all the show editions, promotional editions, all those things like that. I actually had a rant on the field nuts group. Not a rant. It actually was not. It was actually far from a rant. It was just a statement of a, I don't know if it was an opinion. Or I have some nice long emails about opinions and preferences, which are really, really good. We'll share that another day. But I don't need to. I'm certainly not chasing notebooks. That's just stupid to me these days. Like, I like the cool notebooks and that if I can purchase them easily, okay, I'll purchase them. But, like, hunting down, like, just random editions that are so frequently released. Like, I'm done with that game. Like, that makes me not want to use them. So, finding, like, a core set of things I use every day. Okay. So, Jenny at Three Staples just did a post that I was actually going to talk about soon to where she's figured out the things, like, the setup that works for her every day. Right? So, she has, like, a calendar, a planner, like, a journal, a planner, and a notebook. And then the pens that go with it. And these things are used for specific things. And that's kind of what I've been working on as I've started to work for myself. You know, I've definitely been using my pens a lot. So, I don't have any issues with pens like you're having. Paper, I have not been. Like, I'm, like, overwhelmed with paper right now. And although I said the one thing that I want to buy is another notebook. Right? That's, like, the last thing I need.

Brad Dowdy: So, with these pens, I'm determining, or my keepers are, like, the best pens. Those are getting the most use. Those are getting separated from the rest of the crowd. And I'm enjoying. I'm getting the enjoyment out of those particular pens. And I'm okay with these other 30 pens that are sitting on my desk or whatever. Not using them. You know, maybe I'll sell them. I always talk about selling them. And we'll have to do, like, a bigger topic on this. Like, thinning the herd. We've talked about this on and off over the years. So, I've made myself use the pens. I don't have an answer for, like, your notebook issue. Right? Because you said this when you quit your job, you know, well over a year ago, that you were concerned that you're actually going to be using your analog tools less. Right? Because...

Myke Hurley: That has happened.

Brad Dowdy: At work, you had specific uses for specific things at specific times. You knew those things were going to get used. And starting working for yourself and building Relay FM. You knew that that's kind of going to ramp down a little bit in how would you handle it. But, um, I just think, you know, it's a lot of the things that we've talked about over the years. Like, I now carry, like, starting probably in the beginning of this month, I started carrying, um, a notebook with me all the time. Not that I didn't before, but if I forgot it, I was like, ah, no big deal. Now, I don't leave the house without it. Even if I don't use it or don't have any intention to use it, I always have something there with me at all times. Even if it's just like a scratch pad, just a doodle or whatever. And then I have things separate that I keep, like, work-related stuff in. Like, my Hobonichi Tekko has a lot of, you know, works, dates, planning, that kind of thing. So, I kind of have those two things going in conjunction to where I have just kind of some inboxy type notebooks. And then I have some defined use notebooks. Right? And I don't know what those uses are for you besides editing. But, you know, when you're going to, if you're going to a co-working space or something, you know.

Myke Hurley: Yeah, I take, I always have them with me, right? Right. I have them in my bag. I have them on my desk here. But the thing is, like, a lot of the stuff that I would want to write down or, like, say, for example, my to-do list or my calendar and stuff, people that, things that people keep in their notebooks. I get anxiety that I'm going to lose them. Like, I was thinking about this the other day. I was sitting in a waiting room for Adina. And she was going for, like, a cosmetic thing. And she came out and she was booking her next appointment. And she booked it and she put it in her phone. And I was thinking to myself, previously, like, you know, before these devices, people would put these things into a paper planner, right? Like, into a diary or a journal. And I was thinking, what happened when you lose that? Did you just never go to the appointments? Right? That's true. Like, that was actually, obviously, that must have been what happened, right? Like, people would lose their diaries and then they wouldn't know what their appointment is in a month because they haven't got it. Like, I never had that problem because it's all synced. You know? And it's on these digital devices. And that's what I worry about with a lot of this stuff. Because where I sit, well, we all do. But, like, maybe me especially sit right in the middle of all of this. Right. A lot of that stuff I want to put in a digital tool because it means that I can't ever lose it. Right. So I'm still trying to work out what that thing is for me. Maybe it is, like, forcing myself to get into a habit of taking some notes or something every day. I don't know what it is, but I know that I have to have more of this going on in my life because I kind of miss it.

Brad Dowdy: Do you have – Brandon in the chat room had a good point. Do you ever take, like, a digital break? Do you ever go to the coffee shop with just a pen and paper?

Myke Hurley: No, never. Yeah. Because all of my work requires it. You know? Like, if I'm leaving to go with a pen and paper somewhere, I'm doing something else. Mm-hmm. And that's fine, but, you know, for work stuff, like, I need to be doing things online. I need to be connected and all that sort of stuff. You know? I don't really know – this is the thing. I don't know what it would be. And then maybe that's the thing. Like, and I'm sure we're going to get lots of feedback, and I really welcome it. Like, I want people to give me ideas of what I should be doing. Like, whether it's stuff that seems simple, whether it's stuff where it's, like, Myke, can you just slap yourself in the face and write a journal every day? Like, just deal with it. And maybe that is what it is. But I feel like I need something, and the only thing I can think of right now is to turn to our incredible audience and ask for the suggestions.

Brad Dowdy: And I think the purchasing of less stuff is a good start. I mean – Yeah, I'm going to.

Myke Hurley: Well, I just bought three mechanical pencils today, but –

Brad Dowdy: Yeah, we don't actually practice what we preach all the time.

Myke Hurley: No, but that's part of the collection aspect. And I'm fine with that, like, right? Because a lot of the stuff that I have – I am a collector, and I'm good with the collecting, right? But what I'm collecting is stuff that can be used, so I should be using more of it.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, you know, me, like, kind of backing down on field notes, you know, just all the extra stuff, not the color stuff. I like that. But not buying extra colors editions, just having what comes in my subscription and actually using that. I get more enjoyment out of having used notebooks than seeing notebooks in packaging, right? So stopping, you know, piling up the packaging and actually, you know, lowering that tower of notebooks is very cool. You know, that gives you a feeling of satisfaction. Then the next time you buy something, it gives you more enjoyment knowing that you're going to rip it open and start using it right away. But I know we all just have massive hordes of this stuff. So, you know, it's a challenge. I mean, for sure. You know, you don't want to, you know, spend money blindly and not be using the things that you're purchasing. So it's certainly a challenge. And it's been a challenge for me so far this year. But I'm feeling like I'm coming around as pens. I feel pretty good about paper. I'm definitely having a challenge with.

Myke Hurley: Yeah. But you are just a general user of this stuff in those ways more than me. As in, like, you do have a paper planner and stuff like that, which I don't have. And for me, like, I don't care that my field notes are piling up. That doesn't bother me because they are my collection. You know, that's what I like. My problem is I'm just not using my stuff. Yeah. You know, if I use one field notes for every five I bring in, I'm totally cool with that. And eventually I'll just give more and more of it away to people. Like, every now and then I give Adina a stack of them. Right. And she goes and uses them. Right. And that's totally fine with me. And I'm probably, you know, I'm thinking about now, like, what can I bring to Atlanta to just give away to people? I'm going to start doing more of that. Absolutely. But I look at this, like, this Sailor Pro gear and my Edison over there, like, my two favorite pens in the whole world. And they never get used. You know, like, the ink is just sitting in them. Yeah. Sorry, Thomas. He'll get real mad at me for that. Yeah. And they just don't get used. Like, this thing. Like, I'm just grabbing this. Well, there it goes flying across the table. So, I've broken it now. So, I don't need to use it anymore. You know, I could just, let me undo this thing here. Like, how beautiful that is. Mm-hmm. That beautiful orange ink that I have in it.

Brad Dowdy: Mm-hmm.

Myke Hurley: I've got this Franklin Kristoff over here with this stormy gray thing in it. Well, that needs to be cleaned. Yeah.

Myke Hurley: That's not writing at all, is it? Yeah.

Brad Dowdy: Not with that glitter.

Myke Hurley: Not with that glitter. I think it's all clogged up in here.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. You get my point, right? Yeah. Yeah. It's a challenge. I mean, that's for sure. You know, I just think it's okay to, like, cull the herd. If you need to, like, start, you know, selling things or find, like, the perfect things for you. There's always going to be more, you know, down the line. So, I never hesitate. You know, if you want to get rid of something, get rid of it. I would not hesitate. And, you know, the time you have away from these things kind of refreshes you. So, when you do buy something, you know, six months or a year down the line, that it becomes more special. And you end up, you know, enjoying it more. And you get more pleasure out of it.

Myke Hurley: Yeah. No, definitely. Definitely. Again, like, it's not even so much of giving away because, oh, I'm not using them. I just want to use them more. This Franken-Kristoff is screwed, by the way.

Brad Dowdy: You're just going to have to soak it. Yeah. Remember that time a long time ago I'd never get, like, said I'd never get an ultrasonic cleaner? I keep thinking about that these days. Do I need one of those? Maybe I should have one of those.

Myke Hurley: Yeah. This thing is going to need some serious work for it.

Brad Dowdy: That's going to need some more.

Myke Hurley: It starts working again.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. That's the danger zone, leaving that stormy gray in any pen.

Myke Hurley: Yeah. This is the Emerald of Shivor I've got in there.

Brad Dowdy: Oh, okay, okay. Yeah, that'll do it. Yeah.

Myke Hurley: So it's not as bad as the stormy gray, but this thing is, the ink is slushing around in here. Yeah. But there is absolutely zero coming out of it. Yeah. There you go, Franklin. You are a little project for sometime in the future.

Brad Dowdy: That's right. Well, we'll get you fixed up, Myke. We'll get you on the right path.

Myke Hurley: I've already started taking some notes from people in the chat room. So, like, I'm going to build some suggestions and stuff like that, and we can come back to this. Yeah. Hopefully next, or maybe week after next.

Ink Usage

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. You know, it comes in waves. I mean, it just does. I go through cycles where I'm using all the things all the time, and then sometimes I stare at this stuff and going, why do I have all this stuff? So, you know, we all tend to figure it out and what works best for us, and I'm confident we will with you two.

Myke Hurley: Yeah, I hope so.

Brad Dowdy: All right, mate. I think we'll let you ponder on this, and I'll ponder on it, and we'll get some feedback from the listeners and all their tips and tricks on how they're using all this stuff. Because I know a bunch of them just came home with five new pins from the Philly Pin Show this week, so we've got to see how they get them in use. Yeah.

Myke Hurley: Yeah. See, now I'm just sad. I've just picked up my Edison Pearl. What do I have? It's the Pearl, isn't it? No, the Menlo. Menlo.

Brad Dowdy: Yes, you have the Menlo as your Tabaldi one.

Myke Hurley: And I've just started using it.

Myke Hurley: Jeez. These pens are great, man.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. Give yourself some pen time on the weekend. That's what I do. That's where I go clean my pens and get in new inks and, like, test out all the inks and, you know, do ink samples and just kind of play around with them. I'm not doing anything important, but I, like, on the weekend, I'll take, like, an hour, clean a few pens, get some fresh ink in there, give them some new life, and just start writing with them, see what comes out, and just kind of play around. It's fun.

Myke Hurley: Yeah, it's my birthday this weekend.

Brad Dowdy: Oh, happy birthday.

Myke Hurley: Thank you. So it fills up the right time to do it. Yes.

Myke Hurley: Oh, I'm going to feel sad. Let's wrap this one up. If you want to go find our notes for this week, head on over to relay.fm slash penaddict slash 190. If you want to find Brad online, head on over to penaddict.com on knock.co. And he's over at Instagram. He is penaddict. And Twitter is at dowdyism, D-O-W-D-Y-I-S-M. If you want to find me online, you can now sometimes find some stuff over at mikewasright.com. That's the new URL. Nice. And I'm also imike on Twitter, I-M-Y-K-E. If you would like to support our sponsor, that would be fantastic. And that is the great people over at Harry's. And don't forget to keep your eye out for the Pen Addict Live 2016 from the Atlanta Pen Show Kickstarter. Yes.

Brad Dowdy: We will send out all that info very, very soon.

Myke Hurley: So thank you so much for listening. And we'll be back next week. Until then, say goodbye, Brad. Goodbye, Brad. Goodbye, Brad.