Editing The Pen Addict 170/transcript (section)

== Skill Craft Pens ==


'''Brad Dowdy:''' So one of the pens that has been on my radar for years and listeners have emailed me about for years and that I have never reviewed for years because, honestly, I just keep forgetting. I'm terrible sometimes. Is skill craft pens. Have you heard of skill craft pens, Michael? I expect the answer is no.

'''Myke Hurley:''' I'm pleased you asked me this question because I was going to jump in. I've never heard of them and I can't see why anybody looking at the photo that is on your Instagram. Can't see why anybody cares. Right. Because they look like they look like the pens that the field notes just throw in as little freebies. Right. Exactly. Little ballpoint pen.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Exactly. Exactly. And it's essentially why people know the name and why they are so, I say popular in air quotes. They're popular just from their ubiquitousness or ubiquity, whatever the proper term is there. It's because they're pretty much a U.S. government approved pen. And so, you know, all the different agencies in the U.S. government from, you know, office work to military, you know, the skill craft pen is on there. One of the few things that they're able to order for a writing instrument, at least, you know.

'''Myke Hurley:''' What a contract to have, huh?

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Right. Right. So the thing about skill craft pens is no one will say that they are going to give you an amazing writing experience. But the thing about the skill craft pens is more about the company and who makes the pens and why they're in business and why what they do is important work. And we'll put a link in the show notes, but they basically run a program called the AbilityOne program. And let me just read it off of here so I don't mess it up. It says the AbilityOne program is a federal initiative to help people who are blind or have other significant disabilities find employment by working with a national network of over 600 nonprofit agencies that sell products and services. To the U.S. government. Skill craft pens are made by blind people in this program. It's really, really cool. And, you know, I've been chatting with them via email and I'm going to review the pen soon.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' And people have a fondness, whether they even know the skill craft story or not, or how these pens are made and why it's important, you know, this company exists. People have a fondness for, you know, like things they get things they use in their job that they don't see other places. Like, you know, I my office is never going to carry skill craft pens. They'll go through corporate express or one of these other generic things and get these junky generic call points. And then, you know, the government employees, they'll only see these skill crafts. So they've been using these pens for decades, you know, in some cases. So a lot of people have a lot of love for these skill craft pens. And a lot of people were commenting on the Instagram post saying, you know, my dad used to have drawers filled with them. My mom's pen cups were filled with these pens just, you know, because of their job. So it really it kind of brings them back to a to a time when, you know, it brings back some fond memories. And then to have the additional story on top of it about how the products are made and things like that. It's just pretty cool. And I've waited too long to review the skill craft pen. So I have a I got a box in from skill craft and I will be reviewing them soon. But in the UK, is there any would there be any type of stationary equivalent? Like, have you ever heard of any products? Like there's two things that come up in the U.S. government here. It's the skill craft pens I see a lot. And then in the army, there's these green issued hard hard bound notebooks. Those are the kind of two government products that I see that have kind of bled over, you know, to people emailing me. Hey, check out these products. You know, this is what I used in the army, things like that. Have you is there anything like that you've seen in the UK that's kind of, you know, runs through the government type of thing that people really latch on to?

'''Myke Hurley:''' Can't think of anything. I mean, you know, yeah, stuff like Bic, you know, like those clear Bic pens. They're just everywhere.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Yeah, that's the main stock. Yeah.

'''Myke Hurley:''' Like that's it. Like every business I've ever been in, every office I've ever been in, like that just seems to be the prevailing pen. It's just like a Bic pen.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Sure, sure. And we're going to talk about that pen in a little bit. No way. Yeah, way, way, way, way. Before we do that, we're going to talk about how we pronounce things.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' That's always a fun, that's always a fun email to get, isn't it?

'''Myke Hurley:''' See, I'm looking at what's here in the thing. Are we going to find out that it's actually Pilot? Like we've been saying Pilot wrong all this time?

'''Brad Dowdy:''' No. So, Bartek, which I'm probably pronouncing that wrong, sent us a Pilot Orochizuku pronunciation guide. A lot of the Orochizuku inks I have very much trouble with. You know, a few of them, you know, listening through the YouTube video. And we'll share this with everyone so you can pronounce the YouTube, pronounce the YouTube, pronounce the Orochizuku inks correctly. Yautube. Yautube.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Google-ay. So, this is perfect. I love this kind of stuff. I like being corrected on this stuff and I like learning about this stuff. And even though I still butcher it sometimes just because I honestly I get going too fast and not thinking about what I'm saying a lot of times. I'll butcher pronunciations that I know good and well. I'm saying it wrong. But it's cool to see these videos like with the Je Harbin video. That was super helpful. And this Orochizuku one is helpful too. So, have you listened to this yet, Myke?

'''Myke Hurley:''' I have not.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' So, there's some tough ones in here. There's, you know, like Fuyugaki. We're pretty close on. Like, it's that one's pretty straightforward. But a lot of the ones with any kind of leading TS sound in there, I am way off on that making that sound. That's a real, real tough sound to make. So, you know, listen to the pronunciation guide. Keep this saved for when you buy a new Orochizuku ink. So, that way when we talk about them, we can say them appropriately.

'''Myke Hurley:''' We're never going to get it right, are we?

'''Brad Dowdy:''' That's okay. It's part of the process.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Always learning, Michael.

'''Myke Hurley:''' Yeah?

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Yeah. Speaking of learning.

'''Myke Hurley:''' Oh, look at that. I'm so proud of it. Wait, hang on. Hang on. When segues happen, you're supposed to, like, ignore them. High five. Right? Not me. And go with it. Because that's the point of the segway, right? Is to lead in. Sometimes. Every now and then. They are so good.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Yeah. I'm Captain Obvious over here. Yeah. I want credit.

'''Myke Hurley:''' I'm very proud of you right now.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' I gave myself a high five. Did you hear that?

'''Myke Hurley:''' I did hear it. I did hear it.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' All right. Tell us about our good friends at lynda.com.

'''Myke Hurley:''' Lynda.com is the online learning platform that has over 3,000 on-demand video courses that can help you strengthen your business technology and creative skills. You can get yourself a free 10-day trial by visiting lynda.com slash penaddict. That's L-Y-N-D-A dot com slash penaddict. Lynda.com is for people that have problems that they want to solve. It's people that are curious. People who want to make things happen. Maybe, you know, it's about time that you really understood how to use Excel. Like, you've always wanted to know what a pivot table was and how to use it. Lynda.com can help you with that. Maybe you want to start your own business and you want to get a bit better understanding of viral marketing and advertising. And you want to think about sales stuff and want to work out how to optimize your conversion rates. All of these things seem really, really complicated. But lynda.com have great videos by super awesome experts who are really passionate about teaching and they'll be able to help you with this stuff. Maybe you want to learn a bit more about design. Maybe you want to learn about Illustrator, Photoshop. You want to learn about color, typography. These are all the things that you've been wanting to master as a hobby for years, but you've never known where to start. Well, I can tell you where you start. You start at lynda.com and there you can feed your curious mind. You'll be able to watch these videos in your web browser and follow along with their fantastic transcript stuff so you can read exactly what's happening right in front of you. And you will even be able to click back in those transcripts later. If you want to just go back to a part of a video, you can just search for the word or the phrase that you're looking for. Click that part of the transcript and the video will start playing along exactly at that point. There's also stuff when you're watching along online, you'll be able to, some of the courses, you'll be able to download project files and things like that. So maybe if you're working on logic, you know, like the audio editing application, you can follow along with what's happening with a demo project file. If you want to watch on the go, maybe you've just got a bit of time every day when you're on the bus or on your break and you want to do some lynda.com learning, then you can watch and download courses to your Android or iOS device, so your phone or your tablet, and you can watch on the go wherever you like. You can also create and save playlists of courses that you want to watch. They're all broken down into bite-sized pieces so you can arrange them in whatever order you like. Customize your own learning path and share it with your friends, colleagues and team members. lynda.com is a fantastic resource and your membership will give you unlimited access to training on hundreds of topics all for one flat rate. Whether you're looking to become an industry expert, you're passionate about a hobby, or you just want to learn something new, I would love it if you would visit lynda.com slash penaddict, that's lynda.com slash penaddict and sign up for your free 10-day trial because it will also help support this show. Thank you so much to lynda.com for their continued support with The Pen Addict.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Awesome. Thank you, lynda.com.

'''Myke Hurley:''' Have you ever seen Ace Ventura? Uh-huh, yeah. So at the end of that, when I finished that sentence, I felt like Ace Ventura. You know, when he talks for loads of time, he just doesn't breathe?

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Yeah, I was getting that feeling there at the minute, right when you were getting close to the end, I was like, whoa. I felt like I was on a roll.

'''Myke Hurley:''' Sometimes when I'm on a roll, I decide not to breathe. I don't know if that's the right thing to do, but it's the way I work, I guess.