Editing The Pen Addict 285/transcript (section)

== PodCon Event ==


'''Myke Hurley:''' I have two more international trips this year. Are you serious? I thought you were done. No, I'm not done. I'm going to Seattle next week.

'''Myke Hurley:''' Golly. So, by the way, if you're in and around the Seattle area, I'm going to be at an event called PodCon. Get a ticket to PodCon. Come to PodCon. It's going to be amazing. Oh, this is what the poster's for. This is what the poster's for. I'm doing a signing. Oh, that thing is sweet. Yep. There is a poster that is made, and you can only get it if you come to my signing at PodCon. People, except for a select few, including Brad Dowdy, people don't even know what the poster looks like. It is incredible. I'm probably will. It's incredible. It is. It's amazing. I will probably tweet an image of it after the signing. But come to my signing at PodCon. Get a ticket to PodCon. Come to PodCon if you're in and around the Seattle area. It looks like it's going to be a really fun event that I'm very excited to take a part of. But yeah, I'm going to be there. I'm actually going to be recording with you the day I get home, which I'm very intrigued about. See how that's going to fly.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Yeah, because we don't have any schedule adjustments for the rest of the year that I'm aware of.

'''Myke Hurley:''' We do not. Except for the fact that we're taking the last week of the year off, which you know about. Sure. Because then I'm actually going to be spending my first Christmas in Romania. So that's my second and final trip of the year. Then I don't have anything planned until the pen show.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Nice. Okay. Cool. Well, we bring up this travel topic because living in England as you do, you deal with a lot of American companies. And sometimes it behooves you to try to time shipping of goods, in this case pens, to the window where you're in the US. So what happened recently? Let's tell this story. Because I was very much a part of this story while it was happening.

'''Myke Hurley:''' So, I mean, this is the thing. This started years ago. Like, Karis Customs used to send me things when I was in San Francisco or whatever, and it seemed like a good idea. So, you know, I've had, like, Studio Neat send me stuff, just other pen companies. And if I'm getting something new and I'm going to be in the States, just get it sent to the hotel. Because typically it works really well because there's always somebody in the hotel, right? So they can always accept the package. And then I just hold on to it for you. Sometimes you pay them a small fee or whatever, but, like, it works great. And the fee that I pay is going to be way cheaper than the shipping and also no customs fees. So I'm very, very excited about doing that, right? It's, like, brilliant. And also I get my stuff quicker. So I figured I was going to be in Las Vegas for, like, a week. And I had mentioned that I had two purchases on the way, right? My Sean Newton pen and the fifth anniversary Bung Box Sailor pen, right, that I was working on. I was going to give it for those. This was a disaster. It ended up being an absolute disaster. It turns out, for a reason that I have yet to work out, sending to hotels in Las Vegas seems to be a problem. Both deliveries got delayed, and they both followed the same path. They were with USPS. I had a UPS delivery as well. That worked fine. The U.S. Postal Service had serious problems with delivering to this hotel.

'''Myke Hurley:''' Both deliveries were, like, out for delivery on the day, then got redirected to some random post box by the airport, like, not even the post office. And then they sat there, and then they said delivered, right? They've been forwarded and delivered. And then the day after that, they just arrived at the hotel, like, with no additional tracking information.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' But with you chasing them for a day in between, right?

'''Myke Hurley:''' Yeah. I tried to call the post office. That was effectively pointless. Yeah. So then I kind of just was like, well, we'll see what happens. I was working with Sean Newton and with the individual that I'm buying the Sailor Pro Gear from, and we were like, I don't really know what to do here. And everyone's been super nice. Like, oh, we'll refund you. I was like, just don't worry about this. Like, we'll work it out together. So the Newton pen just arrived randomly. So I have that, which I'll talk about in a moment. But the Pro Gear, that one seemed to follow, like, a bunch of different problems. At one moment, it said that it arrived in Vegas, then went back to Florida, and then came back to Vegas again. I'm not sure if it actually did this. But the timing between these events would indicate that maybe it did. It's a mystery what happened here. But where the story is right now, the Pro Gear arrived at the hotel. The hotel very kindly have returned it to the sender.

'''Myke Hurley:''' So once they get it, we're going to arrange for it to be sent to me at home. I mean, of course, I'm going to be in Seattle, but I've decided let's not do this. Let's just get it sent straight to home. And I'll talk to them, and I'll probably say, like, send it by UPS or FedEx or something, and I'll pay extra. Like, let's just do this. I mean, I found out recently, it is expensive but reasonable to get something to America overnight via FedEx. I'm always reminded of this every time I do it. Like, this is not the cheapest thing in the world. Yeah, exactly. This is what I'm referring to. But, like, I sent Brad a package, and it was just there the next day, which is a thing that seems – well, it was attempted to be delivered the next day. But, you know, it got to you. And that always surprises me how you can do that for, like – I mean, it's not cheap. It's like 50 pounds, right? Like, which is not cheap. But that is – in my mind, that is a small price to pay for an overnight delivery to Macon, Georgia from London, England. Right? Like, I feel like that is a – I'm always surprised about this, right? Like, that FedEx can do that. Like, just something about the time seems wrong to me. So, yeah, I'll probably – we'll do something like that for the bunk box because I really want that pen. And I want to make sure that it arrives safely.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' So, we'll see. Yeah. Which is why a lot of times we just end up shipping to me in the U.S. I'll package up a few things and send them on to you, you know, kind of group ship them. But, yeah, I mean, there's nothing more rage-inducing than dealing with the Postal Service. I mean, we could have an entire podcast of just – if we just wanted to be bent out of shape the whole time talking about Postal Service issues. I have three of the Pen Addict Retro 51 pens that have been run over by trucks.

'''Myke Hurley:''' No!

'''Brad Dowdy:''' That I've gotten pictures of tire marks on the envelope and a flat pen in the box. Three of them.

'''Myke Hurley:''' I mean, I know that happened to the Lanier, like a friend of ours, right? Yeah. Theirs got run over, but it's a bag. So, like, it survives.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Yeah. So, I'm going to send out some – I'm going to post some of these pictures in, like, a little collage. I'm just laughing. I need to see this. I'm collecting them all. I'm getting them all sent back to me. I'm going to take it up to the post office. I probably have no recourse. It'll probably be, you know, turn my hair more gray than I have any chance of getting, you know, any compensation for that. But the pictures are just beautiful. I bet. I mean, they are just straight up flat. It's kind of amazing.

'''Myke Hurley:''' So, this probably isn't the right place for this discussion. But did you hold one of those for me?

'''Myke Hurley:''' Oh, yeah. Phew. Okay. Thank you.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Yeah, yeah, yeah. Have you got any left? I hope so. I hope I held it for you. Like, I'm pretty sure I did.

'''Myke Hurley:''' Okay. But are there any left, though? Are they still available to buy?

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Yeah. Yeah, yeah. So, I ordered 600 this time. I did 300 last time. I ordered 600 this time. I think I've sold about half of them. Okay. Which is just over a week.

'''Myke Hurley:''' That's pretty good. So, if you haven't held one for me, you still can. And I will work that out with you later. But this is one of the most beautiful retro 51s that has ever been made. It is called the Isometric. What I love about this design. So, I'll put a link in the show notes so people can go and find it. But you didn't just do a Brad Dowdy one again, right? Like, you found some artwork that you loved by a guy called Michael Jacobs who I met in Chicago.