Editing The Pen Addict 682/transcript (section)

== Is this episode one of the podcast from 12 years ago? ==
* Is this episode one of the podcast from 12 years ago?
* Like, when's the last time you bought a DVD, Myke?
* This was why I wanted to include this.
* So, James also says, We love you, James.
* This is amazing.
* You probably already have some, says James, and they're softened in brass.
* I got this tip from Minimal Scholar.
* And so, I'll put a link in the show notes to this in case you have no idea what anyone is talking about.
* But security tags on DVDs are like these things that would set off an alarm if you tried to steal it from a store, right?
* And I remember actually cutting myself quite badly on these quite a few times because in a prior life, I worked in a supermarket.
* And one of my jobs was managing the DVDs.
* And it meant that I had to kind of do things with these, like removing these things or putting them on.
* And sometimes they would kind of break open and the metal pieces that are inside of the plastic would give you pretty serious paper cuts.
* Yeah, I've just got to say, this is a fascinating thing.
* But James, one, you've got to buy DVDs.
* And two, you've still got to have the thing stuck to them.
* Like, I don't know who's just like got these lying around.
* It's incredible though.
* Now I'm thinking I probably have some video game cases that have the little strip in there.
* I should go look.
* I should go look at those.
* Like, I don't know that I have any DVDs currently.
* They're usually like stuck on.
* This is the thing.
* A lot of times these tags are like they've got like adhesive that keep the case closed.
* So you would take off the adhesive and throw this thing away.
* Oh, sure.
* Yeah, yeah, yeah.
* It's not on the internal.
* You kind of, in this scenario, the way that I'm imagining it is not only you have to have DVDs, you have to have DVDs that you've never opened.
* I don't know.
* I think they might be inside the cases.
* Sometimes, yeah.
* I feel like video games might be inside the cases.
* Anyway, my DVDs, I'll have to check and see if I've stored them inside my VCR and see if I can find any DVDs that might be laying around.
* But yeah, I'm actually going to go look for this because then I might just have some extra shims laying around.
* And now I want to do a comparison to see if they're softer than the brass, which the brass is already pretty pliable and soft.
* So now I'm actually genuinely curious about this.
* And I'm going to go look at my video game cases.
* And that's about the only shot I have at coming up with this.
* But I know exactly what they're talking about.
* I really, really, really want to get some follow-up from you on this one.
* Okay.
* Yeah, we'll note it down.
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* Yeah, they've sent me a box, and we're regular HelloFresh customers anyway.
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* But yeah, we've had that.
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* All right, we got our shout out of the week, Myke.
* It's a double.
* Do you have to say it again?
* Double, double, double.
* No, that's what you get.
* Even though it's a double three times, so I don't really know what that means.
* Yeah, so I don't have the trifecta of pen shows to recommend, but right now we have the Orlando Pen Show coming up this weekend as you're listening to this podcast this week when it drops live.
* Orlando Pen Show is about ready to kick off.
* That's, what, September 11th, 12th, 13th, and 14th.
* So the main days are the 12th and the 13th, Friday and Saturday.
* Then they have a couple events on the 11th, which is today, and then on the 14th, like a half show day.
* And then two weeks from now, and I wanted to go ahead and put this in the show notes because I don't know that I'm going to have a chance to shout it out.
* And I've been asked to shout out both of these shows, and I've been to both of these shows, and I love both of these shows.
* The Dallas Pen Show, September 26th and 27th, if you're in the area.
* Also a very good pen show to go attend, hang out.
* Brad, with the way that my travel home from Memphis tends to work, I may be in the area.
* That's true.
* That's true.
* You could probably just drive over to the Dallas Pen Show, like, the week after.
* Yeah.
* Yeah.
* You have had some travel issues.
* Luckily, Orlando is a drive for me when I've been.
* I think I've been to the show twice.
* I don't think I've been three times.
* I forget.
* And I've been to Dallas once, and they were both very, very good pen shows.
* Dallas is a very busy pen show because they just kind of cram it into Friday and Saturday, and they bring a good crowd.
* And Orlando is just kind of a really great event that's grown on me.
* It's one of my favorite shows to go to.
* It's just extremely well run.
* It has great space.
* It's in a great hotel.
* It's very efficiently set up and enjoyable.
* Lots of great vendors.
* So, yeah, Orlando show definitely growing in Dallas.
* One of the stalwarts of the pen show circuit here in the U.S.
* So, definitely go check them out if they're available.
* So, two really good pen shows this month.
* And, yeah, we'll keep going.
* We've got some other pen shows coming up later this year, including the Tokyo International Pen Show that we had feedback on or asked TPA on last week.
* And I've already gotten feedback.
* It's like, hey, can they follow up if they go to the show and let us know?
* Yes.
* I want to know that.
* Hopefully, we'll see.
* We'll get some feedback on that.
* So, there we go.
* All right.
* So, a couple of product notes.
* I got the Lamy Balloon, my tariff pens in very quickly.
* Oh, they did arrive.
* Okay.
* Yeah.
* They came in.
* I got them Monday.
* So, it was pretty quick.
* Did you pay the driver by cash in hand?
* I did not.
* Oh, that's a shame.
* I didn't give him a Sopranos handshake just to, like, drop off the packages.
* No.
* So, no, I got the package.
* Easy, like, easy travel aside from the extra payments.
* And I inked them up.
* And the balloon is fantastic.
* It is essentially the Lamy Safari slash Vista pen with a different cap.
* So, to no one's surprise.
* Like, they basically, the balloon name, I guess, will relate to the cap on this.
* So, it's a rounded cap.
* It's translucent.
* And it has kind of this weird oval-shaped clip.
* I don't think the clip is very good on these pens.
* Like, when you have to compare them to the Safari or the All-Star or the Vista, the standard kind of wire clip is much better and much more Lamy.
* But this clip and cap is what makes this pin the balloon.
* And you pay less for it.
* I think it looks nicer than the standard one, though.
* Like, you know.
* So, if you don't use the clip, maybe.
* Yeah, it's one of those things where visually it's fine, but functionally it's a little bit flimsy and not as clippy as the standard wire clip.
* It's a little bit softer and more pliable.
* So, it's completely fine.
* I just prefer the wire clip.
* Which makes me want to say, get rid of the balloon and just make the Vista the colorful pin.
* Which I don't think they're going to do.
* But, like, this is essentially a Vista with a different cap, right?
* It's translucent.
* It has, like, this one is pink, blue, and green.
* The translucency we went over all this last week.
* And this is what I want from the Vista.
* And if you just did the Vista, you could use the standard clip on that.
* But, I don't know.
* It's a great pin.
* And I like the fact that it's cheaper than the Safari by several dollars, I think.
* And, I don't know.
* It's great.
* I still prefer the Safari, of course, over this.
* Like, I do think the clip makes that much of a difference.
* And I've just had the Safaris for so much longer.
* But I'm glad this exists.
* And I'm interested to see if this styling or these translucent colors kind of jump over into a product like the Vista.
* And then you could just, like, eliminate the balloon completely.
* And just, like, lean into the Vista.
* That's when I started Lamy.
* That's, like, the Vista is my main priority.
* Because that's kind of the platform pin where you could do just the weird, wild stuff.
* More than the Safaris or the All-Stars do.
* So, in short, great pin.
* It's essentially a Safari barrel with a different cap and clip.
* And I don't think the clip is as good as the standard Safari.
* So, there you go.
* Okay.
* I'm glad I have the colorful ones, though.
* It's my show notes pin today.
* It's hot.
* I chose the pink one because it's awesome.
* And, yeah.
* It's great.
* Did you get the packaging?
* The nice packaging?
* The case?
* No.
* Like, the little case things, no.
* Okay.
* Nope.
* I skipped those because I wouldn't use them.
* Yeah, yeah.
* And I was going to get, I'm going to give away the other two anyway.
* And I could have done, like, the whole little package deal.
* But I thought, let me just get all pins and go with that.
* Speaking of translucent pins, Myke, I'm very happy to see that the Sailor 2Zoo has done well.
* And I assume it's done well because we're now in version 3 of colors of the pin.
* And that's always a sign to me that a pin is doing well when you launch a pin and the 2Zoo is a different pin.
* And you'll have to go back and listen to our podcast or link to my review.
* The design of the pin allows for you to rotate the nib to meet your writing angle.
* That's the one.
* Okay.
* That's the one.
* I was going to ask you to remind me.
* I couldn't remember what it was about the 2Zoo because I was thinking of, what was that one, like, click and lock and twist and click?
* Do you remember that pin?
* Yes.
* Yeah.
* I can't remember exactly what that was.
* Ball knock, click, ball, click.
* The ball knock zone.
* Ball knock zone.
* Yeah.
* So that's a pilot friction is the ball knock zone.
* Not a fountain pen, standard pen.
* The 2Zoo, it has this rotation in the nib if you want it.
* I don't think that's a feature that sells this pin.
* I think what sells this pin is it's a good pin, right?
* And then the feature is a bonus if you need it.
* But I think, like, the percentage of people who buy this pin because it's a cool pin versus the people who buy this pin because of the need for a rotating nib is it's got to be 80-20 for just the pin, if not much, much less than that.
* Like, I think I'm probably being generous.
* Yeah.
* Yeah.
* I still think it's, like, it's just a differentiator in the store.
* It is.
* Like, you probably come to it because you like the look of it.
* And you're like, oh, it does this.
* That seems like something I might want.
* Yeah.
* But what really stood out on this pin is the steel nib.
* So, Sailor has had problems in their low-end pin categories.
* And that's why I talk about this one a lot because Pilot and Platinum own this category, like, from $5 to $50.
* Like, it's all Pilot and Platinum.
* Like, every pin they make in that category is exceptional value.
* And Sailor had nothing because they – and not without trying.
* It's just that their nibs were consistently poor.
* Their inexpensive steel nibs on their entry-level pins were consistently poor.
* And they've kind of adjusted it.
* And they've been successful with this nib.
* I thought it was fantastic.
* I thought the pin as a whole was fantastic.
* It just fit and felt great.
* It's a little maybe expensive for what it is.
* But when you add in the cost of the engineering of the movable parts in here, like, $45 is completely fine for it.
* Like, that's about what I would expect.
* But what I would like to see is Sailor.
* And I think they're starting to do this.
* They're going to do some more steel nib pins, like I saw one at the DC pin show with Sailor leaning into some steel nib options as opposed to gold.
* Which I wonder if we'll see some new innovative steel nib pins from other companies, too, as the price of gold keeps going up, right?
* Like, that's an added cost.
* That's one of the things that keeps the cost of the pins going up.
* Aside from just general materials costs going up, the gold is a much higher percentage price jump.
* But, like, there are benefits now to making a unique, innovative, some kind of feature in a steel nib to be able to increase the price of a steel nib without it being too much.
* That's interesting.
* I wouldn't have thought of that.
* But, yeah.
* Are there other materials better than steel that aren't gold?
* Not really.
* Okay.
* I mean, there's always been kind of, like, there's a titanium nib out there.
* It's just never good enough.
* Squeaky.
* Like, and then anything else is getting into, like, different metal alloys that are just not really conducive to making, you know, a large quantity of nibs and having them perform well and behave with, like, ink chemicals and chemical reactions and things like that.
* You've got to start thinking about that with inks.
* I wonder if, like, I do wonder if there is an opportunity for somebody to try and do something new, though.
* Like, with a different type of testing, different type of formulation, something, something, something.
* Because gold's not going to get cheaper would be my expectation.
* Sure.
* So, yeah.
* It'll be interesting to see if anybody, I don't know, takes it upon themselves to try and do something new.
* Even with steel, right?
* That, like, we're going to use steel and we're going to formulate it in a new way or we're going to form the nib in such a way that it produces a more desirable result on a high end or something?
* Yeah.
* Maybe we'll start seeing some more, like, nib manipulation as far as, like, tipping shapes go.
* Which you're starting to see because, like, this is a...
* Cuts in the nib to bounce, aka softness, that kind of stuff.
* So, there's some things out there like that right now.
* And we might just see more exploration in that space just for pure cost reasons, right?
* Yep.
* So, long story short, I think the Tuzu is a very good pen and I wanted to give sailor props on that.
* I was honestly skeptical when this pen launched.
* But getting it in hand, testing it, using it, I'm like, okay, they did a really good job here and I wanted to give them credit for that.
* The other area where I give sailor more of a hard time is when they launch all the different colors every week of their mainline fountain pens, like the Pro Gears and the 1911s.
* But another area I give them props in is they started this annual Tea Time series several years ago.
* And this is one of my favorite series that they do.
* So, they do this once a year, usually towards, like, the fall time frame heading into the holidays.
* We've definitely had some, like, Christmas-themed ones just in recent past.
* So, the new one's out this year.
* Tea Time, I guess, is the fifth series.
* Is that what they're saying here?
* What's funny is I didn't know this existed or this had launched until someone, when I was streaming, said, hey, have you seen the new Pelican Sailor?
* And I'm like, what are you talking about?
* Yeah, that's a perfect way to put it.
* They sent me the link and I'm like, oh, my goodness.
* It is exactly the Pelican color.
* The classic Pelican black and green and gold.
* Like, that's all you can see in this pen.
* The finial is great.
* I think it's supposed to be a matcha-themed pen, which it looks fantastic.
* Look, I'm not knocking it.
* I immediately saw Pelican.
* I was like, oh, this one's a winner.
* Like, to me, it's like that is a classic look.
* And the classic is Pelican.
* I just hadn't put it together in my head.
* Like, this feels like a classic pen look.
* It's like, yes, because it is.
* Yeah, so they go big into this release every year because they do a king of pen.
* And they always do.
* They seem to do two colors.
* So, like, they have the traditional, the green one.
* And then they have, like, a purple and white one.
* I forget.
* Which T is that one?
* I'll have to look and see exactly what they're calling that one.
* So, they do a couple of different sizes.
* So, the green one has the king of pen in it, right?
* Which means that they're putting a lot in.
* Anytime a king of pen goes into release, that means it's a big, broad, wide release.
* Because that's a, like, that's a thousand dollar pen.
* So, then you get the different 1911, excuse me, Pro Gears and Pro Gear Slims.
* And then they, each of them have a ballpoint, which I don't remember.
* I usually remember having one ballpoint.
* But this time, both the colors have a ballpoint, which they must sell those pretty well.
* But anyway, Sailor Tea Time series is always a favorite of mine.
* They do, if nothing else, they do good inks that match with these.
* So, I think these are going to do, I usually end up buying the inks if I don't buy.
* I don't, yeah, I don't own any of the Tea Time pens.
* But I've definitely used some of the inks in the past.
* And I don't know.
* This is just a very enjoyable series for me.
* That I think they, that they theme and execute very, very well.
* As opposed to just, like, throwing something out there.
* It's like, hey, sunrise, boo, pew, pew, pew.
* You know, like, all right, now it's Wednesday.
* Let's do a sunset, woo.
* So, these are great.
* It seems like the other one is not named after tea.
* It's named after, like, a sweet treat that goes with tea.
* Okay.
* They, they've done, like, they've done, like, Christmas, like, one year, one year was, like, Christmas pudding.
* So, they do, like, a tea and then, like, maybe a complimentary.
* Yeah.
* So, like, Christmas pudding was, like, last year or two years ago.
* And then there's been, like, some Moroccan tea and some other.
* No, it's okay.
* So, I've got to the press release.