Editing The Pen Addict 618/transcript (section)

== Notebook Debris ==


'''Brad Dowdy:''' We just have a level of S-tier questions for Ask TBA that I can't even handle today. Yeah. Between the nib question and this question that Nick asked because I am very much with Nick on this. I can hear you like giggling over there. But like this is a real thing, Myke.

'''Myke Hurley:''' I don't doubt it. But what is funny to me is I love the, and I don't mean this in a bad way. I mean this in a, you know, we're all in this together way. The general neuroses. Yeah. Right? That like a lot of our questions have had today. And also just the entire episode, just me and you. You know?

'''Brad Dowdy:''' This is literally what we do. These are the type of things I think about. So Nick, let me, I'm just going to have a conversation with Nick here real quick.

'''Myke Hurley:''' This is talk directly to Nick.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Yeah. Um, I hate anything on my notebook, even the tiniest bit of dust, debris. I can see this stuff. Right? I don't have great eyesight, but I can pick out the randomest little dot on a page that doesn't belong there. And it will bug me and I have to make sure to get it off. The nib debris that you kind of should be worried about is more paper fibers than actual like real life, like food, dust, those types of particles. Because those are going to eject pretty quick. You're going to see that and you're going to be able to wipe that off with like a paper towel, rinse it under the sink, whatever. Like that. I don't really think that's going to be your big problem. Getting into your filling system. They're going to be particles are going to be too big to actually be drawn up into anything. I believe. Um, if you, if you even have like a modicum of fountain pen maintenance, right? Like if you even like, it sounds like if you're worried about this, that you actually care about cleaning your pens. So I don't think that type of thing is going to be an issue. You do, however, have to, um, think about paper fibers. And I would recommend you getting a loop. If you don't already have this, you know, it's a little magnifying glass, little one lens magnifying glass and looking at your nibs from time to time and seeing if you have fibers stuck in the tines. Now those aren't going to damage your ink or in there, but they could be like a clogging situation. They make the nibs not right as well. I think that's more of a concern than getting any type of like food debris or even like dust or particles in there. Because those pieces are going to generally be so big, they're going to be noticeable and you're going to be able to remove them. That's not going to be something, um, like that's going to be small and you would miss it. Um, miss cleaning it out before putting it in an ink bottle.

'''Myke Hurley:''' Would you worry about contamination of the ink?

'''Brad Dowdy:''' No. Uh, in this case, no, because I don't, I genuinely don't think you're going to get that far. Right. Right. Like if you happen, if you happen to run your ink through something wet, let's something viscous, like I don't like he's, he's mentioning breakfast. So I'm only thinking breakfast. If there was a drop of honey. Yeah. There's like jam or honey. You're going to know before you do anything else that you need to rinse that off. Right. I'm saying what my point is, you're not going to have the opportunity to contaminate because you're going to catch it beforehand. So I think you're actually being a, Nick is actually being excessively cautious in this because I don't think you're going to get that far.

'''Myke Hurley:''' Yeah.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Now, if you, if you happen to get that far, you probably have other problems than whether you're, your, your nibs are probably in worse shape than whether you accidentally got something stuck in there. Does that make sense? Yeah. Right. Right. Like I feel like you're going to catch any issue beforehand. It's good that you're cautious because I'm obsessive about the tines of my nibs being clean. I keep a loop at my desk and a brass shim to clean them. Right. If I get paper fibers stuck in there, I will sit here and inspect it. Like you can tell, especially as someone who likes fine lines like myself, sometimes the fine line gets wider and you don't know why. And then all of a sudden you see some paper fiber stuck in there. Right. So they're absorbing more ink, making the line width wider and something has changed. Your expectation has changed about the line on the page. So I get out the loop, look at them. I was like, oh yeah, there's some stuff stuck in it. Grit the brass shim, you know, clean it out and go back to writing. Right. Like if I had something else, something bigger than that, I'm like, I'm going to notice immediately and never going to, I'm never going to get that in an ink bottle. And you're certainly not going to draw it up into a piston or back filler. I'm 99.9% certain of that.

'''Myke Hurley:''' Also, my kind of feeling on this is you would just be able to clean it. And like the worst, you know, like this imagine worst case scenario. If you have somehow missed the cream cheese that you've accidentally got into your ink, you would lose a bottle of ink. And the rest you can just clean, you know.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' So here's one concept along those lines that I used to worry about that I no longer worry about. Okay. Is if I had to clean out an ink converter, right? Let's say I'm at a pen show and I don't have my cleaning supplies, but I'm really liking this new ink that I got, but I don't have an empty pen. I don't want to buy a pen or new converter or anything like that. So you can go to your hotel room and I've done this and you clean out a converter, right? And there's still water in it, right? Like you're not going to be able to air dry that unless you spend, you know, 30, you know, time with your hair dryer jamming in there. The percentage of water left behind in the converter is so minuscule compared to the ratio of ink you're putting in. It's not going to affect how that ink looks or performs. So I've gotten over like, hey, if I have a couple of drops of water in my converter, it's not going to change hardly anything because the ratio is so tiny. Now you obviously don't.

'''Myke Hurley:''' If it could, right? Yeah. Then that ink's maybe not very good.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' But you also, I mean, you also don't want to have perishable goods in your ink bottles because that's not going to go well, right? So like, I think you'll avoid that ahead of time. I don't think you're going to find yourself in that situation.