Editing The Pen Addict 658/transcript (section)

== Introduction and Overview of Topics ==

* And we're going to talk, you and I have a lot to talk about, about the things that you do online, the things that you and I get up to, like at pen shows, and a lot of teaching, a lot of fun stuff we're going to talk about. But first, as I've been doing, I got to talk about some new stuff. And I'm actually kind of curious. I have a couple of items I want to bring up this week, and I'm actually curious your thoughts on these items as we go. So, the first one almost made me like jump out of my seat. So, I'm on Instagram, and Pilot actually has a really good Instagram for all Instagram's pros and cons. Like, it's really good to see manufacturers, like that's where they release a lot of their new stuff. Right? So, I'm just scrolling Instagram, and then I get an image of a Pilot High Tech C in like the weirdest barrel colors ever. Like, you know, blue and yellow, orange, orange and green, you know, baby blue and pink, like green on green. Like, I'm like, yes, this is amazing because I love the High Tech C. You might know this. I love the High Tech C. And it hasn't changed in years, right? It's been around, I'm going to guess at least 20 years, maybe more at this point. And it's just kind of sits there and does its thing. It's just very unique. If people aren't familiar with the Pilot High Tech C, it is a micro tip gel ink pen. It goes all the way down to 0.25 millimeters. And it's finicky, right? It's not the most perfect pen in the world. But it's kind of the pen that set me down this path of like, oh, Japanese stationery is cooler than anything else you can get. So, these colors pop up. I'm like, yes, this is going to be rad. And like, all the colors are cool. And they're going to have fun ink colors. And it's called the 1980 series. And then I was like, oh, I kept reading, did the translation. The only ink color of these is black. It's just like a barrel treatment. And I was kind of disappointed. I'm still going to get them now. And they have so many colors. You can swap them out yourself. But like, I went from like, insanely high. And it's like, yes, neon green. This is going to be rad. And it's like, womp, womp, black ink. I was like, well, I can do that with my regular pen. So, I'm curious. Do you use any micro gel ink pens, especially one as aggressive as the High Tech C? So, the funny thing is, the High Tech C was actually like my fancy pen in school in the 90s. Nice. So, I had like the black ink, the blue ink. And these were the pens that I didn't let my friends borrow because they're micro tip. And if you're not gentle with them, yeah, they'll bend or, you know, they'll stop working. Instantly. Right? So, yeah, these were like my coveted pens. So, they'll always have a special place in my heart. But I agree with you. It's a little bit, you know, like, oh, maybe you could have bright inks. And, but also, you know, it's kind of a nostalgic, like, maybe they should just be what they are. True. Like, they really leaned into this post. And like, they did it all colorful. And they have all these characters. And like, hey, we're doing 1980s. And then it's like, woohoo, black .4 millimeter ink. It's like, okay. Yeah. I would have liked a little throwback.
* Yeah. Do some, they already have like 25 or 30 ink colors, right? They have these inks and these refills. They didn't change the style of the pen, right? It's going to still fit the same refill, which is a particular refill, which as we've learned over the decades of doing this, this is a very particular refill. And then they're doing these colors in the Coleto barrel, which is the multi-pen barrel. That's its own separate refill. They have a billion colors of all of these. But if you want the pen, you have to buy it in black. And you know what? I'm still going to do it. I'll probably buy, I'll probably buy each one of them. Maybe I'll, I don't know if they're only going to come in .4 millimeter. That's what they were showing in the image. Yeah. It looks like only .4 millimeter. So a little bit bummed, but I can buy my own refills for them. Yeah. That's another thing as a long-term user or a long-time user of the high tech C, their refills just don't last like forever. Like if you buy, like if I buy a black .4 refill and I buy a purple to swap out with that and I let the black sit and don't use it for something in like a couple of years, I'm going to have a really hard time getting that going. Like I've never found a better word than finicky for this pen. And I want it to be perfect. It's not perfect. Despite as much as I rave about it, it, it is not a pen for everybody. So we'll see. I like that they're doing it. Hopefully I can get my hands on them. I usually find a way if they don't get imported into the U S market, but we'll see. That's it's pretty cool. So love to see this from pilot. Next up, I didn't even think about this this year, but last year, Kaweco started a program called the DIY sport where they basically sent a build a bear kit in out into the wild to retailers around the world. And the concept was, Hey, go into these stores. These stores would promote the event for the Kaweco and you would build a Kaweco sport. And last year, the color was called berry. It was the berry sport. Really fun, you know, like wine red, you know, berry color. And I was like, okay, like I, I wasn't like, I want the full build a bear, right? If we're going to do this, right. Let me customize this to like the nth degree, like Leuchtturm allows now, like at pen shows, you and I were at the California, California pen show. I built a Leuchtturm Dreggerfell, right? Yeah. So I was kind of like, huh, you know, great. I like them doing this, but I'll admit that I was, I was wrong in that I got so much positive feedback on this. I'm like, Hey, this is great for Kaweco.
* And everyone has had just a positive experience getting to put everything on, like not just pick parts because you can't really pick colors, but like you're putting, you're stamping the finial onto the top of the cap. Like you get to do all the little nuts and bolts stuff, which is even more than picking out all of, all of the parts.