Editing The Pen Addict 208/transcript (section)

== Myke Hurley ==


'''Brad Dowdy:''' I don't know. I hope you're ready. I hope you're ready for us. I hope you're at least ready for Myke. He's kind of rude sometimes, so we'll have to bring him in.

'''Adam Blaine:''' I'm kind of terrible. I'm sure it'll be fine.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Mm-hmm. But one thing before we go, Myke, you're heading to WWDC next week.

'''Myke Hurley:''' Yep.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' And you will have a special package that is being hand-delivered to you next week, so I will leave it at that.

'''Myke Hurley:''' Uh... What?

'''Brad Dowdy:''' What are you doing? What have you done? That's all you need to know. It's nothing I need to... You'll probably know everything in the envelope when it arrives. But just be forewarned that you will be having something a little special for you.

'''Myke Hurley:''' Okay.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Plus, it saves me shipping. You guys, you and Adam are so far away. Man, that shipping will get us. And then you have to pay customs on top of it. So, y'all system is bonkers.

'''Adam Blaine:''' Oh, I am aware of it. Yeah. Yeah. Customs fees are the bane of my existence.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Yeah. I hate that. You know, we talk about it. We curse about that all the time. And I actually feel bad when I send stuff over there. Then people have to pay extra. It's just like, oh, that's just a brutal, brutal, brutal system. But that's okay. We'll talk about all the good stuff that the Brits have going on. So, Adam, I want to start at the very beginning. How did the desk of Adam start?

'''Adam Blaine:''' Well, it's a long story. That's good. But the short version is I used to post on Instagram about paper planners because there's a huge community online for filofaxes. And I got into that at some point in the last few years. And then that slowly expanded into just looking at stationery on Instagram. And then one day I came across the pen addict podcast randomly. I can't remember how. It just popped up and I started listening. And then that kind of opened me into the world of like the fountain pen communities and the pen communities online as well. And then I started a Squarespace trial from the podcast just to play around with it and see what it was all about. I mainly did it just to play with the trial and just to mess about with all the features and stuff. And I was like, this looks cool. Let's just stick with it and try it. And it's just been the desk of Adam since.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' So have you always like shared things online before like saying, hey, I'm going to write this stationery blog now. I'm going to put all this stuff out there and do reviews and talk about the things I like. Did you have any kind of, were you online sharing things, you know, otherwise before? Did you have any like earlier blogs or is this kind of like the first foray into it?

'''Adam Blaine:''' No, this was the first thing that I tried with a blog with writing. I never really enjoyed writing from school. They always tried to teach me how to like to write in their style. So I never really enjoyed writing at all until I started writing the desk of Adam. And it kind of, I kind of taught myself how to write again and have a writing style. And then I just carried on with it. It stuck and I still enjoy it a couple of years on.

'''Myke Hurley:''' Considering you hadn't done anything like this before, why do you think this specific topic stuck with you, you know, in a way that maybe you hadn't anticipated?

'''Adam Blaine:''' Well, I've always been in love with stationery since a very young age. And I kind of lost that after leaving school because I just didn't have a use for it. So I didn't, you know, look into using awesome stationery. And then having a blog about stationery was perfect because it gave me an excuse to use everything and get more and try out some awesome things. And then the community online, the stationery community in particular, is just really, really awesome and supportive. So I kind of stuck with that.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Now, I noticed like the name you, if you dig back a little bit in like, you know, some of your first post or some of your, you know, initial feeds and stuff, your name was Adams Philo. So like the Philofax continues to blow my mind. I have never used one, but that community is massive. And that's obviously what you, what kind of drug you in. That was kind of like the entry point for you, right? So like, what's the deal about with Philofaxes and, you know, how did it, it just seems really, really much more ingrained in, in the UK than in the US. Like people coming up through school, just like live for their Philofaxes. It seems like all the, the Brits I talked to really just are knee deep into Philofax, at least to begin with.

'''Adam Blaine:''' Yeah. Well, in school, we was always given paper planners to track everything. And it kind of stemmed from that. I always used some sort of paper planner. I just couldn't put everything on tech. I always had to have something that I could write everything down in. And then when I just came across on Instagram, people posting their Philofaxes, I thought this looks cool. Let's join in with that. So I started with Adam's Philo because it was just an Instagram for me to post about a Philofaxe, which when you actually think about it on the, on the surface, just is the geekiest thing to do. Having Instagram just for a Philofaxe. And then I discovered all the other communities just off of Instagram about a Philofaxe's huge groups on Facebook. People were doing videos on YouTube. So I thought I'd join in with that. I carried the name across Adam's Philo onto YouTube as well. And then it just slowly expanded when I started the blog. And I wanted to include more general stationary instead of just a Philofax. So I kind of ditched the name Adam's Philo a while back and just kept posting on the desk of Adam.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Yeah. Myke, you used a Philofaxe, right? When I asked you this before, you said you did use it when you were a student.

'''Myke Hurley:''' Well, see, this is the thing, right? If you are in the UK and you like stationary, you will have had a history with Philofaxe. Right. I don't know why, but there are a really big brand here for that stuff, right? It feels like anybody that is interested in this type of thing will end up, get down the Philofaxe rabbit hole. And I think partly it's because as kids, as I mentioned when we had Tesseron, that they have the kids' versions. So it's embedded in us from a young age, right? That this is a thing that you should do. This is a thing that you'll enjoy.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Yeah. So that was never a part of our schooling growing up. If I wanted a planner, it would just be something I would pick up on my own. When I was at the office supply store buying my school supply list, if I wanted a planner, it was either Daytimer was popular, a little bit of Franklin Covey. But that's it. But Daytimer and Dayrunner, they're all similar type of systems. But Philofaxe, it just seems to be like it's it's the generic name now. Right. You know, it's the it's the Kleenex or Xerox. You know, it's Philofaxe. It's just the thing. And I'm starting to see. It's always been a huge community, but I'm seeing it pop up even more and more now. And a lot more retailers are carrying like the Philofaxe, you know, all set up because it's a it's like a knee deep thing. Right. It's a huge depth of a system. Right. It's not just a it's not a notebook cover. Right. It's a whole deal.

'''Myke Hurley:''' Yeah. I mean, at its core, it's like a fancy diary. But you can. What makes it a system is all the additions that they sell for it. It's kind of a very basic level reminds me of the Hobonichi because there are a bunch of accessories that you can get and all that for Philofaxe. And like, you know, like how you have with like the techos, you can get like the rulers and stuff to put in them. It's very much like that. Mm hmm.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Yeah. Yeah. So I don't know. I just find that interesting that I can tell that's how like Adam got started with it with his Adam's Philo name. I thought that was cool. And then like so the blog started in 2014, right? Yes. Like two, two and a half years ago. Yeah. So, you know, you've been I've been following you. You know, I love your posts. I love your style. And then like it seemed to like escalate quickly into now. You're the blogger of the year for 2016. Do I have this correct?

'''Adam Blaine:''' Yeah, that was a little bit crazy.