Editing The Pen Addict 435/transcript (section)

== Jonathan's Custom Pen ==


'''Myke Hurley:''' I'll look forward to getting it sometime in 2024.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Okay. Okay. I owe you other stuff. So it's probably going to leave pretty soon. I still got to get you a pen though.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' But we're just out of it. We're sold out. So anyway, I love when a fun story comes together. And that's kind of what happened here. Like I didn't know what to expect. I mean, I knew what to expect in that the color of my pen was going to be pretty awesome. But I hadn't seen the final version of the pen. And then I have the wax seals. I tested the wax seal on stream yesterday. Played with fire on stream yesterday. It was pretty cool. It was fun. And then we opened up your box. We got to reveal that on stream. I didn't know what was going to be in it. And then I saw the logo and the logo nib on there. I'm like, yeah, this is awesome. Myke's going to dig this. So I can't wait to get those to you. I will get those to you sooner than later. So you can officially thank Jonathan once you receive your goods.

'''Myke Hurley:''' Yeah, I definitely will. It's amazing. It really is amazing.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Yeah, so he's got a whole set of pictures he's going to put up on the Relay FM logo. And that I can send you to those offline. I have like videos and images. It's like way too much stuff to put in the show doc.

'''Myke Hurley:''' I'm super pumped to see what more tools will unlock for Jonathan. Yeah. So having something like this laser cutter. I mean, he's already created a new type of product, right? Which is the wax seal, right? So like I'm just really excited to see that he is branching out into other areas because he is an individual whose creativity kind of holds no bounds, which is what makes him so talented at the stuff that he already does. So, you know, I'm just I'm just really excited to see him pushing out into other areas. And so having new tools allows him to do new things. And I'm keen to see what he ends up working on past this. Because it's just, you know, I just have no doubt that he's going to keep coming up with weird and wonderful ideas. Yep. That's what he does.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' I had the exact same thought. I was like, oh, this is a cool way to spread around some of the things that he does. Like it's it's all connected together, but it's a little bit different and a little bit individual. And I don't know. It's very cool. So I'm very, very happy with with how these turned out. And thank you again, Jonathan. All right. So one quick link before we get into the ask, ask TPA. We we have a lot of questions to get to. I don't know if we'll get to them all today. We'll work on that. We've been we've been hoarding them a little bit. But I was on the stationary orbit podcast, which published this past weekend, Myke. So this was a cool guest experience that I had. And John had an awesome set of questions for me. It wasn't your standard questions like the first question out of the gate that John asked me is why hasn't Lamy hired me yet? So, you know how the interview is going to go when that's the lead in question. So we talked about a range of pen stuff, a range of non pen stuff. And I just had a really, really fun time. So I wanted to make sure to share that link for anyone who's not subscribed to stationary orbit podcast. Please go do so. Listen to my episode where where John peppers me about art and music and ice cream and sneakers and why I don't work for Lamy yet. So it was good stuff.

'''Myke Hurley:''' I like the logo a lot.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Yeah, he did a good job.

'''Myke Hurley:''' It's nice.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Yep. Very cool.

'''Myke Hurley:''' All right. Let's take our final break and then we can dive in some hashtag ask TPA questions. So this episode of the pen addict is brought to you by Express VPN. We all know how a VPN protects your privacy and security online, but it can also take your TV watching to the next level by unlocking movies and shows that are available in other countries. Express VPN hides your IP address so you can control where you want sites to think you're located and you can choose from almost 100 different countries. Just think about all of the Netflix libraries you could go through. If you love anime, you could use Express VPN to access Japanese Netflix. But it's not just Netflix. Express VPN works with any streaming service. Hulu, BBC iPlayer, YouTube, whatever you want, you can get to it. Express VPN is ridiculously fast, which makes it a fantastic choice of all of the VPNs out there because when you're watching shows, you don't want buffering or lag. You want to be able to stream in high quality in HD and you can do that with Express VPN. This is something I've done myself. You know, I've poked around on different streaming services when at home and it's super good. Like if you want to be able to get other shows and other content from around the world. But one of my favorite uses for this exact thing is if you're binge watching something at home and you're traveling, you can go back to your home country's content and watch it there. So like a good example of this is when we were watching Schitt's Creek, which is on Netflix in the UK. When we were overseas, when we were watching that show, we couldn't get it because it was on a different network or whatever. So I was able to fire up Express VPN, open up the Netflix, say that I was in the UK, open up the Netflix app and I could get that content and we could watch it again in lovely HD. It was super fast, super smooth. So yeah, you can watch stuff while you're at home. But when you travel again, you'll also be able to do it too. So it's just like another really great use of Express VPN. It's compatible with all of your devices, phones, media consoles, smart TVs and more. So you can watch what you want wherever you want. If you go to expressvpn.com slash penaddict, you can get three extra months of Express VPN for free. So support the show, watch what you want and protect yourself at expressvpn.com slash penaddict. Our thanks to Express VPN for their support of this show and all of Relay FM. So it is time for some Ask TPA questions. If you ever want to send in a question for the show, you can send out a tweet with the hashtag Ask TPA. You can use question mark Ask TPA in the Relay FM members discord or you can email them to hello at penaddict.com. Our first question comes from Zach today. And Zach says, I have a budget of around $300 and I'm looking for something. I really like the solid colored black barrel and cap of the Pro Gear black and gold. I'm a classic color sort of person along with its two-tone 21 karat gold nib. But I'm also enamored with the idea of the Custom 823 of its incapacity filling system and what many say is one of the best nibs out there. What I don't... That's a Pilot Custom 823, right? Yes. I didn't mention that. What I don't love are the translucent smoke and amber colors. I like a fine, fine, medium line with... Fine or fine, medium line. Not fine, fine, medium line. I was like, what on earth is that? A fine slash fine, medium line with... But I've also recently discovered that I enjoy stub nibs as well. What should I do? Go for the sailor? Go for the Pilot? I would love to hear what Brad and Myke would choose.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Number one, Zach, I owe you an apology. This email slipped through the cracks. I've sat on this for quite some time. Oh, yeah. Zach very well could have moved out of the country by now. It's been so long since I have received this email, so I'd like to apologize. But I think I have an answer. I think regular listeners of the show are probably yelling the answer. And I think it's probably going to be the best choice based on Zach's conversation around... I like the classic style of the pro gear. I want the nib of the 823, but I don't like how it looks. Pilot makes a pen called the Pilot Custom Heritage 912, which is one of the best deals for an understated classic gold nib fountain pen where you can get a good enough ink capacity. It fits the larger pilot converter, the Pilot Con 70. So you get more ink capacity in the pro gear. Obviously far less than the 823. But you'll get that same awesome Pilot nib with way more nib choices than they used to offer in the 912, at least in the U.S. market. So they've expanded the types of nibs. They go all the way up to their stub nib. And, you know, they have Waverly nibs and Falcons and FAs and POs and all kinds of wild stuff now. If you like the classic style, want great quality and really good ink capacity, I think the Pilot 912 is the way to go.

'''Myke Hurley:''' So, I mean, out of the two, is it 912 on 92? Which one is it? The Custom Heritage?

'''Brad Dowdy:''' 912. Okay, sorry. So he's mentioned it. So the 92 is a lower cost. The 92 is actually a piston filler. Right. Which is a great pen, but you're going to get a smaller nib and a smaller size barrel. And they're translucent. So it doesn't sound like Zach is much of a translucent person. Like the 91 is a solid color with a smaller nib. But the 912, I know all these numbers kind of run together. There's a 91, a 92, and a 912. They're all similar. So the 912 is one of my most recommended pens because of the quality of that pen related to the price and related to the other pens that are around there. The 912 is the pen I want Pilot to go on the attack against the Pro Gear with and start doing some stuff with that pen. And make it into, you know, a little bit, give it a little bit more character. You know, they don't have to go full custom Pro Gear style. But man, it's kind of the perfect platform for that to happen. So I would love to see the 912 be that pen. That's like my pen to dream on for Pilot to do something interesting. And they've refused.

'''Myke Hurley:''' So I was actually going to say, I think this might surprise people. I would recommend one of the Pilots as well. I think the Pilot nibs are really interesting if you get a good one. And it's a very different experience. But if you like that classic black gold pen design, the Pilots look better than the Pro Gears do in that style. I think that the overall like rounded ends and stuff like that, and like the profile and like just the overall look of the Pilot, say the Custom Heritage 92 or the 823, I think they look better at that like classic style than the Pro Gear does.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Yeah, I think that's fair.

'''Myke Hurley:''' This one comes from Mark. I have a friend who lives in the far northeast corner of Australia. He told me recently he swears by cheap vodka for cleaning his pens because it's so humid where he lives. And he worries about moisture not drying. And the alcohol and the vodka dries very quickly. At first, I was alarmed to hear this. But then it occurred to me if it's safer for people to drink, it's probably safer pens. Curious to know what you guys think about this. I mean, my initial thought on this is like, well, yeah, it's alcohol, right? So like alcohol would be good for cleaning. But something that we learned early on in the pandemic is that alcohol disinfectants can erode coloring on pens, right? So I don't know if that would be something to be worried about here as well. But I understand logically why someone would want to use cheap vodka to clean a pen.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' It doesn't seem wild to me. Like, see, I disagree with that last part. And I agree with the overall sentiment. But I don't think this is logical at all. Like, I can drink a lot of things that I wouldn't put my pens in.

'''Myke Hurley:''' Yeah, but alcohol is a cleaning agent. It's like I wouldn't use Coca-Cola, right? But like cheap alcohol is still alcohol. Look, there's not my first choice. I would never come to this conclusion on my own. But now that I hear someone doing it, it's kind of like, I mean, I kind of get it.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' I mean, I kind of get it if you're the last person on Earth. Yeah. No, like, no, please don't do this. Okay. Like, and I'm like, you can tell me, like, someone can come up scientifically and tell me I'm wrong. Like, I'm willing to accept that. Please don't do this. This is a hard no for me. Just, you know, clean it with water, air dry it, dry it with a paper towel, you know, store it in inside, like in a closet, in a dark closet, you know, to try to get out of the tropical atmosphere you're in that's, you know, adding humidity and different things to the pens. And I would skip the vodka because I think you're just going to end up breaking down the pen sooner than you would otherwise.

'''Myke Hurley:''' I'm not advocating for it. I know. I just merely, like, I just wanted to stay for the record. I'm just saying I can understand how someone will get to this. Maybe that's part of the problem.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' I can understand why this is a question.

'''Myke Hurley:''' Okay. I'm going to try and pronounce an unpronounceable Discord handle here. Gixgly says, I'm looking for a hardcover, non-spiral A5 notebook with perforated pages so I can easily rip them out. Would you be so kind as to help me find it?

'''Brad Dowdy:''' This is an amazing question because, to my knowledge, this is a product that does not exist in its entirety, right? So you can get an A5 notebook pages that will have 20 pages in the back of the book be perforated. The Lamy, Lamy's new notebook, I think they do a fantastic job with the perfs in the back. And other notebook companies will have perforated pages in the back. You'll often see that in your smaller pocket-sized notebooks, rarely in the A5. So Lamy, I know, has them. But a full, completely through, the 198 pages A5 notebook bound, like a traditional sidebound A5 notebook that is fully perforated? I have never seen one. If you have, I'd love to be made aware of it.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' I'm trying to decide what I'm holding, and that's my answer to the question. What I'm trying to decide, Myke, is if this is a good product idea or a bad product idea. And I think it's kind of going against why those A5 hardcover notebooks exist. They exist because people already have other disposable pages in their pads and notebooks and smaller notebooks. To where this notebook, the theory that most people will take with this notebook is this notebook is made to stay together for consistency purposes, for context purposes. And, you know, journaling, diaries, planners, schedules, and not, you know, necessarily ripping them out. So that's where I'm thinking with this. So I understand having, hey, give me a few pages so when I'm talking to my friend, I can rip them out a note and not destroy my notebook. But the entirety of the notebook? Yeah, I'd be interested to know if this product existed at all.

'''Myke Hurley:''' It seems complicated. It's like a very, this is what you were saying to start, right? You can maybe take off a few of these. But like you might end up with like, oh, spiral bound, you know?

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Right. Yeah. So then you have spiral bounds and you have top bound pads and you have all these other solutions. It's almost like this is, these notebooks are made to solve different problems than the problem that Gixley's trying to solve. Not that that's not a valid problem. Like, but I'm just thinking that it doesn't exist outside of a few pages in the back of a notebook for whatever reason. I know it could be just a straight up cost reason, right? Like you have to perf, you know, 200 pages instead of 20. That's a little bit added cost. Probably not that much. But I don't know. I'm trying to decide if this product should exist. And I, I'd have trouble with it. Like seeing it be like a huge success. Say, oh, this is the product that I needed in my life. So I'd be interested to see what the use case is for Gixley if they wanted to reach out and, and we can talk this through up because I'm kind of interested in the idea of it, but I don't think it exists.

'''Myke Hurley:''' Okay. Chris May asks, today I carefully cleaned out two of my pens in the kitchen sink. Hours later, my wife found a surprisingly large amount of ink hiding on our counter. Is there a way you are able to protect surfaces throughout the fountain pen cleaning, filling a cycle? Yeah.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' So I think everyone's gone through this, right? There's stray ink drops just go flying. Sometimes you don't even see how or where or why. So that's why I bought like a 12 by 18 cutting mat. I think that's, or it might, it could be 18 by 24. It's a decent size cutting mat, which you can just get off of, you know, wherever you shop for any kind of supplies. Um, and that's my base for my workstation at the sink. And then I put like a microfiber cloth on top of that. So things don't roll away. So I kind of have those two layers. And if I'm working on that, I'm mostly going to capture anything that's going to go rogue on me while I'm cleaning. You know, you still end up with a random dot here, random dot there, but that's what I use as a platform or a base when I'm cleaning every time. Like it sits, this cutting mat sits with my cleaning stuff because they're all essentially my cleaning kit. They all work in conjunction, work with each other to, to get this done. So, um, yeah, that's what I use. Um, I like a towel is fine, but I would still have something under the towel first. And that's what I ended up on was the cutting mat.

'''Myke Hurley:''' I don't really have any in particular, I just like use a lot of like paper towel and stuff. Yeah. But, but yeah, it's good to have some, to at least understand that you're going to get it somewhere. So like really pay attention to where you're putting things down. Cause part of the problem that I find is like, this, as soon as you add water to the equation, because you, then you're like infinitely growing the amount of ink because the droplets of water then become droplets of ink. Like that becomes the issue for me. Like you're just, you could be getting it everywhere.

'''Myke Hurley:''' Uh, dot ketchup asks, as a Canadian, I was looking into Ferris wheel press as a way to help out a local business. Do you have any opinions on their ink and pens? I remember this company.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Yeah. I have never used campaign, right? Yep. Yep. They've had a couple now they've done a pin and then they've kind of leaned into the ink market. I've never used any of their products. I haven't really been compelled by the ink colors, right? The ink colors seem pretty standard or things that I already had, despite like the super nice packaging. But I think the gift stuff for sure. But I think the concept,

'''Myke Hurley:''' Harrods, Brad, how about that? No surprising.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' But I think the concept of this question is good. Like looking into Ferris wheel press. Yeah. They seem, you know, completely fine. You know, they're from your home country. They're in your home market. You can shop at, you know, Canadian stores like Ley Wines or Wonder Pens or, you know, there's several other ones throughout Canada that I'm sure stuck. Ferris wheel press. Ferris wheel press. You know, I think Anna.

'''Myke Hurley:''' Oh, God, it's all so beautiful. Like I'm just like scrolling through their website now. Yeah. It really is like packaging wise, I think probably the best.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Oh, it's great looking. So good. Yeah. But like when I see like ink swatches and samples, I'm like, yeah, it's fine. Like I just, it hasn't been, the inside of the bottle hasn't been as compelling to me as the outside of the bottle. Put it that way. But they keep doing new things. They keep trying new things. And that's the life of a new company too, right? They had to start somewhere. And now they're continuing and they're adding new inks. I saw some new inks come out recently. So, yeah. I mean, I would certainly, they're certainly worth checking out, especially if you want to support a local company.

'''Myke Hurley:''' This is, as a collection, I think like the best looking collection. Because I remember they had a Kickstarter campaign is what I remember them from. They had, I think two. But I don't remember what the product was for. But I remember there was one particularly. Yeah.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' So the first, the one we talked about was for a pen that I thought was interesting.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' And then they had some ink with it. And then they've done, I think, ink Kickstarter six. And I'm not looking it up. I'm just reciting from memory. So, yeah. But I think they've really leaned into the ink side of the business. I don't see much about the pens anymore.

'''Myke Hurley:''' F Nordstrom asks, I like the Statler Tri Plus Fineliner pens. They're the best for coloring, in my opinion. But they are, of course, not made for filling larger areas. Is there a thicker counterpart with the same colors in the fact that you shouldn't be able to see the difference between the pens?

'''Brad Dowdy:''' God, I love this question. Again, I don't know that there's an answer to this. Because once you start getting into, like, the larger tipped fineliners, they kind of cap out around one millimeter. And then you're getting into, well, I guess there's some bigger than the one millimeter. I'm sorry. I misspoke. But then you start getting into outside of your brand. And the issue F Nordstrom has is, say, I'm using this blue fineliner, right? And it's great at detail work. But now I have a big area I need to fill in. It needs to look the same. And I'm either going to have a hand cramp or destroy this pen by the time I'm done. So what can I do to match? I don't know if Copic is the solution. I don't know. Like, I couldn't speak to how they would match up into those interior areas. But Copic at least has that range of all the way very tiny fine to all the way wide to cover big areas, including brush tips. And I would at least trust that those colors would be matches for each other.

'''Myke Hurley:''' That's the thing. I think if you really want to be able to have the same colors, like exact same colors and different thicknesses, you need to look at a brand where that's their business.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Right. Like, Statler does not do that. No. Secura does not do that.

'''Myke Hurley:''' The whole thing is, like, we have this color system. They're all numbered. And then you pick the pen size that you want. And, like, a lot of Copic, they have two tips, right? They have a tip on each end. And one is finer and one is wider. And so I would say, like, the Statler Triplus Fineliner pens, they're my recommendation because they're really good and fair priced. Copics are the best for coloring. They're just really expensive comparatively.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' So I think, now that I've thought about this, I think Tombow might be an option. Okay. So they do some, they don't have a wide range of narrow pens, but they expand into marker and brush tips that might be an option at less than Copic prices. But, like, Copic's popular for a reason, like Myke's saying. Like, you're buying into a system with Copic. Yep. And it's Copic's job to make sure that you're going to have that consistency. But you're paying for it. But you're paying for it. Where Tombow, they might make a fineliner and they might make a brush pen and they're both red, but are they the same ink? So that, if anyone, I would look at Tombow and at least do some testing. Because I think you could get the big and small options that you need and it might be good. It might be a match. So now that I've had some time to think about it, I think that might be a choice to maybe look at that.

'''Myke Hurley:''' Alright, let's do a final question for today. It comes from Bed Calligraphy. My friends are looking for a pen to use for their guest book at their wedding. Their stipulation is the ease of use, looks good, and won't smear. Do you have any suggestions?

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Do you know the answer to this question?

'''Myke Hurley:''' No.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' The answer is we don't have enough information, unfortunately. So this is one I should have reached out to Bed Calligraphy directly. And if you catch this and there's still time for me to answer this question, we need to know what paper they're going to use because that's going to determine what pen you can use. Because ease of use looks good and won't smear. That's, we might can get there, but none of that's going to matter unless we know what paper they're going to use.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Yeah, good point. That's a tough, that's, we can't just give a point blank definitive answer for this without getting more information. And that's my fault for not seeing this question when it was live to say, hey, can you, what's the follow-up is? Hey, what kind of, do you know what kind of paper they're using? Because that's going to matter.

'''Myke Hurley:''' So if you still need the answer to that question, please send the information in.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Sorry, Bed Calligraphy.

'''Myke Hurley:''' If you want to find links for this episode, go to relay.fm slash penaddict slash 435. You can find Brad over at penaddict.com. He's dowdyism on Twitter and penaddict on Instagram. I am imike, I-M-Y-K-E. Brad streams live on Twitch Tuesdays and Thursdays at 10 a.m. Eastern time. So does Myke. Twitch.tv slash penaddict. I sometimes stream at that time. I stream randomly. Go to mike.live, follow for notifications, and I will at some point make a schedule. Thanks so much to our sponsors this week, the fine folk over at PenchLA and ExpressVPN. And we'll be back next time. Until then, say goodbye, Brad. Goodbye, Brad.

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[[Category:The Pen Addict Podcast Transcript]]