Editing The Pen Addict 500/transcript (section)

== Listener Contributions ==


'''Speaker 02:''' Because now I have to say Violette Pensée. I don't even know if I said that right. And now we have a whole episode about pronunciation, Myke.

'''Brad:''' I was going to read Violet Pensée.

'''Speaker 02:''' We're never going to get through this.

'''Brad:''' I think it's probably right the way you're saying it.

'''Speaker 02:''' My first bottle of ink, my first purple ink, still my favorite.

'''Myke:''' All right. Mine comes from Cecilia. Although fountain pens are my obsession, my very favorite stationary item would be my Visconti Homo Sapiens mechanical pencil. What? For seven millimeters. I didn't even know this product existed. The weight, feel, patina, and with a 2B lead, it is my most used and versatile writing implement. Also, I bought it when I resigned from my previous job, which was meant to stay in the course of my life. So it has amazing memory associations each time I use it.

'''Speaker 02:''' All right. I'm two for two on writing things down, Myke.

'''Myke:''' Did you know that they made mechanical pencil resin for Dharmas Sapiens? Now I'm fascinated.

'''Speaker 02:''' See, this is why we did this. This is going to be a very expensive episode for me. All right. Tim writes, My traveler's notebook I made myself. It has been with me through many years and helped me in a million ways. Like that's the kind of importance that we're talking about here. I love that stuff.

'''Myke:''' Rachel Cooper says, My pilot decimal that is engraved with my name and credentials. My parents got it for me as a gift after I passed my registered dietitian exam after six years of schooling.

'''Speaker 02:''' Nice.

'''Myke:''' Nice.

'''Speaker 02:''' All right. Carol says, Fabiano T. Tipolo, printmaking paper, platinum century, 3776 UEF. Yes. Specifically, Chartres blue. I studied this cathedral for decades, visited France in 2016. Pencil, Rotring 600.5, runner-up, spoke, model four. Shout out to the spoke, model four, pencil ink, diatramentous document brown. These are very special because they represent my tools and medium used daily in my life as an artist. I like that. It's like a whole kit of.

'''Myke:''' Carol is the first rule breaker. We have a first rule breaker. We can keep it. What were the rules? That's not favorite thing. There's more than one thing there.

'''Speaker 02:''' Her favorite thing is what she uses to be an artist. Look, I'm not,

'''Myke:''' I'm not doubting any of this, but I'm going to, I want to keep her rule breakers tally here. So that's one.

'''Speaker 02:''' She will be happy to know she is a rule breaker. She's my,

'''Myke:''' there are some people, Brad, who broke the rules so badly. I had to remove them. Like there were a few people that were like, okay, I'm not going to do this. Here's my list. I'm like, no, we told you what we wanted. And you broke the rules. Only a couple of people removed for such fragrant rule breaking. Mine comes from Chris. I think my favorite item right now is the Hobonichi five-year tech show in the A6 size. I think it's more specific. I think it's more the specific size of the A6 that I like more than anything. I just started using it this year and it's my daily stoic entry journey. I think they meant journal. I just got into stoicism and it really helped me find my yearly theme as well. Honestly, I would love a little more room for each entry as I generally do my main daily journaling in the day, a page, Hobonichi tech, tech, tech, tech, tech, and A6 as well. Uh, I'm just not willing to give up the aesthetics and portability of the A6 for the larger A5.

'''Speaker 02:''' These, these five-year techos are getting me. Courtney Lewis says, while they're all special, the Sailor Shikiori spring rain with an architect nib, my husband bought me for my birthday in 2021. He's not a pen person. So it means a lot to me that he is so supportive of my hobbies.

'''Myke:''' It's very important that you have supportive partners. Like I have Brad. That's my supportive partner here. And Brad has me. Uh, Courtney, AKA finally Chicagoan, uh, Pelican Pelicano in blue left-handed version sadly vanished a couple of years ago. I think a pencil case vanished while I was moving because I'm missing kind of around five daily drivers. It was my first brand name fountain pen. It got me down the rabbit hole. Pelican Pelicano Junior in aqua left-handed and Pilot Cocuno in white, soft, violet, medium. My current daily drivers, they're smooth writing, reliable, and durable. Okay. Courtney gets added.

'''Speaker 02:''' I was going to say, that's two pens. Are you, is that the list? I'm keeping a tally here,

'''Myke:''' Brad.

'''Brad:''' We're going to,

'''Speaker 02:''' all right, let's,

'''Brad:''' we got 278 responses. At the end of this, we'll work out the percentage of people that did not follow the rule. The one simple rule.

'''Speaker 02:''' I can't believe this. All right, Steven Laverty, you're on deck. Let's see if you can handle this. Cause we, I didn't pre-edit all of these. We didn't read all this stuff. Myke did a really good job putting together this. I skimmed.

'''Myke:''' Basically what I did, I'll tell you my, my, my thing here. I would, if this was me that set this up, I think Brad was way too generous with the character count. Shocking. I said this to him, uh, when we were putting this together, way too generous with the character count. Uh, so what I did is the ones that were really long. I did read them just to make sure. Cause some of them needed editing. They didn't get cut. They just got like tightened a little bit.

'''Speaker 02:''' Yep. Yep. Yep. All right. Steven says the desk sharpeners that teachers had on their desk when I went to primary school in the 1980s, when your pencil was broken or blunt enough and the teacher decided if it was blunt enough, you could go to the front of the class, pull the little lever to open the sharpener, insert the pencil, release the lever. And the pencil was gripped in the metal jaws that left a toothy ring around the paint of the pencil. You then turn the handle and felt the shavings drop into the sharpener. The whole process of walking to the desk and using the sharpener and getting a new sharp point was exciting and often the highlight of a school week. Isn't it funny how we have those, uh, those great memories of our stationary uses when we were young.

'''Myke:''' Big sense memory for me though.

'''Speaker 02:''' Mm hmm.

'''Brad:''' Mm hmm.

'''Myke:''' Mine comes from Chris Hockinson, the Baron Fig Squire. I know the company gets a lot of flack in our circles, but it's a darn good pen. No tip wiggle, perfectly weighted, slightly widened grip section. I keep trying new pens and keep coming back. I just can't quit you, Squire. Great pen. Great pen.

'''Speaker 02:''' They crushed the Squire. Yeah, no argument for me either. I praise the Squire any chance I can get.

'''Myke:''' The original one. I don't like their click one. I don't like the way their click mechanism. Correct. The original twist. They used a bad click mechanism, but the twist one is fantastic.

'''Speaker 02:''' Yep. Zach B says, It is definitely not my most used, but my favorite just on history grounds has to be my vintage scriptomechanical pencil. It's black, marked property of US government, and identical to the ones used by NASA astronauts during the Mercury and Gemini programs. The 1.1 millimeter lead is hard, but not impossible to come by, unfortunately. Regardless, it lives in my NASA flight jacket pocket, ready to be used. Killer.

'''Myke:''' That's nice. That's real good. Kathleen, a.k.a. Galantium. Cathine. Is that Cathine? Or is that just spelled wrong? Cathine. Cathine, okay. Oh, I should also say, we are going to pronounce your name wrong. Yes. Facts. You know, there's kind of nothing we could do about that. I mean, maybe we could have said, give us a phonetic thing, but that still doesn't usually work. Anyway. Yep. So, this is just blanket apologies for names, okay? Mm-hmm. My favorite stationary items, uh-oh. Plural. Uh-oh. Uh-oh. Or at least the most sentimental, the Pilot Precise V5 and TWSBI Eco. The Precise was my gateway to good pens in general, when I mindlessly picked one up in middle school, and it led to me, it led me to Brad waxing poetic about the purple ones on the blog, and you can guess what's happened since then. Mm-hmm. The Eco is my favorite pen, full stop. A clear Eco and a bottle of Diamine Red Lustre was my first dip into fountain pens, and TWSBI continues to make great pens that aren't the most bland thing you've ever seen at great prices. And that price is what, is really what makes the Eco, and now the swipe and go so special. The accessibility of these pens cannot be underrated, and without them, we'd have a lot less pen addicts in the world, and I'd be among them. I really appreciate that. I think it's completely true. It's one of the things I love about TWSBI, but, uh, Cathine gets into the rule breakers list.

'''Speaker 02:''' Johnny from Louisiana. For me, this was easy. It's my Pilot Metropolitan and Black Crocodile with a medium nib. This is the first fountain pen I bought when I started listening in early 2017. Little did I know, this would be the same pen I'd use when I got married three years later. Very nice.

'''Myke:''' The crocodile thing, that's the grip section, right?

'''Speaker 02:''' Yeah, so in the first batch, especially, they did some, uh, like reptile pattern prints, uh, in the, not in the grip section, but right above, like a barrel band type of thing.

'''Myke:''' Thomas H. The Lamy Safari. It's a reliable, relatively cheap workhorse pen of a utilitarian design that I find beautiful. I have several in a variety of colors and always keep them inked up.

'''Speaker 02:''' Let me just tell y'all right now, episode 501 is gonna be hot. It just, just be ready for episode 501. We're getting into Lamy's new stuff that we are. Oh, yeah. It's gonna be on. It's gonna be on. Fox Peterson. Fun fact, Myke, there are actually three shades of gray Sharpie brand permanent markers available in both the fine and ultra tip pen. I know this because when I'm looking at a pen cup containing baseline fountain pens, gel pens, paints, roller balls, et cetera, of decent quality, I nearly always have a reason to grab one of the ultra fine gray Sharpies first. Drawing a sketch, the lightest gray Sharpie is easy enough to color over and provide shade. Making a note, using the darker gray Sharpie and annotate on that spare piece of tape you have within arm's range. Gray is close enough to black to be readable in monotone photos you choose to scan and gray Sharpies have the alcohol base that's great for layering, blending, and even coloring in the tiny blotch on my car seat cover left from where I learned that I accidentally sprayed bleach on it. I'm no big spender, but I've got a few retro 51s and a Benu pen and a large collection of Lamy Safaris and limited edition colors, but my favorite pen is the least colorful of them all and the least unique. Pour one out for the ultra fine gray Sharpie in any of its three shades and hey, if you spill, you can always color in that blotch with your Sharpie while you're at it.

'''Myke:''' I'm going to say Fox didn't break the rule here.

'''Myke:''' This one feels to me that they were just making some comparisons. Okay. I mean,

'''Speaker 02:''' I agree with you. I'm just shocked at your lacks so far.

'''Myke:''' I make the rules now. Okay. I'm the pen addict now. That's what happens for the next 500 if we swap it around. Fox Peterson, by the way, sounds like an anchor, like a TV anchor. Yes. Like that's a great name. Like they sound like, hi, I'm Fox Peterson and welcome to the 6 p.m. news. Anyway,

'''Myke:''' Neil Sivola, Sivula, Neil Sivula. Why did I put an extra V in there? Neil Sivula, Levenger five-year journal recommended years ago by friend of the show, Patrick Rohn. Neil said friend of the pod and I couldn't bring myself to say that. Like seriously.

'''Speaker 02:''' That's one of your words.

'''Myke:''' I don't like pod. Doesn't, no. Just started my third five-year journal. Wow. I may not be able to journal more proficially, prolifically during my day, but the last 10 years I've been faithfully jotting a few ideas down while I make my morning tea. It has been a real pleasure to be reminded of important events over the years. I bet I could go back and find an entry about Brad's brief sabbatical from the podcast all those years ago. Yes, I've been here since the beginning. Congratulations, gentlemen.

'''Speaker 02:''' Man, if I didn't do that sabbatical, we wouldn't have hit this date, right?

'''Myke:''' Ages ago. No, we wouldn't have hit the date and we would have hit 500 ages ago, but then we could have had two separate celebrations, you know?

'''Speaker 02:''' Michael C., all the beat-to-heck field notes that my father had used. He always had one sticking out of his shirt or pants pocket along with a mechanical pencil. If you put him on the list, I'm going to hurt you.

'''Myke:''' No, that's fine. Okay,

'''Speaker 02:''' all right.