Editing The Pen Addict 719/transcript

{{Infobox podcast transcript
| name            = The Pen Addict
| number          = 719
| title           = The Parker Jotter Was an Explosive
| date            = June 4th, 2026
| hosts           = [[Brad Dowdy]]<br>
[[Myke Hurley]]
| guests          = 
| link            = [https://www.relay.fm/penaddict/719 Episode 719]
| audiolink       = [https://www.podtrac.com/pts/redirect.mp3/mgln.ai/e/613/clrtpod.com/m/pscrb.fm/rss/p/traffic.libsyn.com/thepenaddict/The_Pen_Addict_719.mp3 Audio Episode 719]
| length          = 55
}}

'''Myke Hurley:''' From Relay, this is The Pen Addict, episode 719. Today's show is brought to you by our friends Pen Chalet and Facto. My name is Myke Hurley and I'm joined by Brad Dowdy. Hi Brad.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' What's up Myke Hurley, how are you doing?

'''Myke Hurley:''' I'm good, I'm happy to be your guest host for today's episode.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Yeah, right? Like, what is going on, Myke?

'''Myke Hurley:''' I'm not here next week is the thing. Yeah, we're having some real scheduled disasters at the moment and so we're bringing in as many ringers as possible. Before we recorded, me and Brad were talking and he was like, I'm used to this, it's like your parental leave again. I was like, okay, it's not that bad, buddy. And not all me, alright? Sometimes it's you that needs to move.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Hey, settle down. We're not talking about me right now. We're not talking about me.



== Upcoming WWDC and travel plans ==


'''Myke Hurley:''' Settle down. Yeah, I'm going to California next week for WWDC, so I'll actually be flying home at the time we're recording, I think.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Yeah, Myke literally texted me just like, what did you text me? It was like Thursday last week. Hey, um...

'''Myke Hurley:''' Let's do it again.



== Recap of previous episode with Derek DeWeese ==


'''Brad Dowdy:''' Yep. So, I had Derek DeWeese from DWR D-Net Stationery feed last week. Great episode, always fun to talk to Derek. I've gotten to know him a little bit over the last year or two and really, really love his work and it was a great conversation. We had just hung out at the Atlanta Pen Show, so we had lots of topics fresh in our mind.

'''Myke Hurley:''' Yes, it was a great episode I listened to this morning.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Excellent, excellent. So, yeah, that was fun if y'all haven't listened to that. Go check that out because Derek is into things like typewriters and some other analog stuff.

'''Myke Hurley:''' Yeah, I like the typewriter talk. That's obviously not a thing that we get to do a lot of, so that was nice to hear about.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Yeah, and he does some cool stationery-related things with the typewriters, too. Like, when he's talking to me about it and he's doing, like, ink swatching cards, but he's taking the card first, doing the details on the card and the typewriter and then doing the ink swatch. I'm like, yes, like, yes, this is what we're here for, right? It's mixed media, baby. Yeah, it's mixed media. Speaking of mixed media, Myke... Oh, this is so sick. Have you seen the Lamy All-Star Disco?

'''Myke Hurley:''' Yes, let's go. D-I-S-C-O.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' What is happening?

'''Myke Hurley:''' They're doing it, man. They're just doing it. And what it is, is everything. They're doing it, and they're going to do all of it. And thank you, Uniball. You know, like, this is the word from high at Uniball is just make all of them. And they're like, I love it, goes, okay. And they do that.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' I am so angry about this. Why? Because it's great. This is what should happen. Okay. And it, because it took so long. Like, this is what we've been yelling at for years. Right? And I'm just, I'm like, laughably angry. I was like, it's a true finally type of situation. Right? Just lean into all the silly things that you can do every once in a while. Right? Just for context, I am not asking for every release to be like this. Nor should Lamy do this, nor does anyone want this. But every now and then, I want unicorn barf from Lamy.

'''Myke Hurley:''' Mm-hmm.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Because they can do it. And that's been my whole hang-up this entire time in the whole Hire Me Lamy era is because they can do it. And they finally did it with the disco where they just went, for them, honestly unhinged. Right? Like, this is, it's not a full outlier. Right? Just like, I don't talk about the recent neon colors safaris. Because they've dabbled in those bright color safaris, you know, in their history. You know, every few years, they'll come out with like a neon yellow pen. And that's why the neon yellow, as great of a pen as it is, I'm going to talk about that in a little bit. It didn't like move the needle for me because they've been adjacent to this product in the past decade, 15 years. This one is more of a departure for them in that it's just silly. Right? I'm staring, the whole time we've been talking, I've been staring at the Lamy Global when they're doing the pictures with all the disco balls and stuff on it.

'''Myke Hurley:''' Yeah.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' They've never done something like this. Behind the scenes, kind of like, not unfiltered or unedited. But yeah, it's silly. I mean, goofy. They have the product that can deliver this. They just never have. And that's what I wanted the whole time. And that's why I think, Myke, I'm going to go ahead and put this out there again. We're like one degree of Kevin baking away from the full Vista translucent lineup. Yeah. Like purple translucent Vista. It's got to happen soon. Like we're teetering on the edge here. Like I'm going to get what I want. Like this is something like I would do. The Hire Me Lamy era is in this image right here. Right? It's perfect. These pens are perfect. They couldn't do this in a Safari either, I don't think. They need this metallic look and they need to lean into something silly. And they did it. And I'm just thrilled with the whole thing. And that's why I was mad. I say I'm mad because it just took forever. This is what I've been wishing for for what the past five, eight years.



== Discussion on pen color combinations and preferences ==


'''Myke Hurley:''' Yeah. I'm bummed out that I bought that pink and green one now. I prefer these. I'm not going to get another two. Right. But I prefer these ones to the, the was like Alpine and, and they call it that. Flamingo was one. Flamingo and Pine. Pine.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Which like they're not, they're not, what are we doing? It's not related. They're great pens. I said how good the Pine, the Pine is like legitimately an amazing pen.

'''Myke Hurley:''' Well, they're just, as I said at the time, they're just related because pink and green work well together, which is why they're doing it again. This is another pink and green pen. Like they're just completely different shades, but pink and green is just like a classic combo. Yeah. And yeah, I think these look amazing. It's funny that like one of the key things that they've done is like the whole reason I bought those two pens was just to switch the sections and the body. But yeah, I think these are fantastic. I say hats off to Lamy. I think they've crushed it.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Totally. Totally. So yeah, I'll get these at some point. Like I literally just got my neon pens in and just inked up my neon yellow again. We'll talk about that in a second. I'm not done talking about this. Um, so Lamy, to your point about the release time, they've been on this cycle for a few years now where before it was just kind of like the one let's really lean into the special release of the all-star and the safari early in the year. And that was kind of our, our big push. And now they do each of those like two or three times a year. Right. So this one just dropped out of the blue. Um, there'll be another one probably in the fall. There'll probably be a safari during the summer. Yep. Right. They're doing a little bit more, which, you know, there's a balance there that they need to manage. Right. Like I, I, you know, I don't want to see too much and have like the sailor problems of the past where, you know, it's every week, five new sailors. Right. You have to chill a little bit.

'''Myke Hurley:''' The prices of a safari though, or like, you know, it's less of an issue than, than when they're 200, $300 pro gears compared to like 50 bucks or whatever.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' I agree. I agree. Um, so yeah, these are great. All-star killing it. Um, this, this might put me on team all-star, which is crazy to say.

'''Myke Hurley:''' No, that would you, what was wrong with you?

'''Brad Dowdy:''' I'm not, I'll never do that. Like, uh, I, I, yeah, the, the aluminum barrels are never going to be my favorite over the safari, but these are, these rule.

'''Myke Hurley:''' You think they, you figure they've just got their like forecasting really down? Cause it's like, it's a lot, right? To, to keep doing these.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' I, I guess it's been several years. It was, this was pre Mitsubishi acquisition where they started. They started ramping. Yeah. Yeah. So we'll see. I don't know. Um, one bonus or probably one thing that they're thinking about is they do have those flagship stores now. Um, so I don't know if they're, and they do have other traditional retail displays, right? They're a little bit broader company. They're like, no, that's a good point.

'''Myke Hurley:''' Worst comes to worst. They can put them in retail and these things will work in retail and because they have that like that Lamy are everywhere. Yeah. Um, where some of the other companies doing these kinds of things don't necessarily have that, that reach.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Mm. Mm. Mm. Last thing on this one. And it's just more of a question. So they've done what? Six, four all-stars, two safaris, zero ink so far this year, which I think is interesting. Um, they're, they don't do a ton of ink, but there's usually one or two inks kind of dabbling in here. This would have been a good time for their first shimmer ink, um, to go with these, this pen. Yeah. But I mean, that's probably a lot. I mean, I get that's a lot. It's complicated.

'''Myke Hurley:''' It's much more complicated. Yeah. I bet. Like just managing that kind of inventory than these. Yeah.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' But like pine was the pine and flamingo were the perfect candidates for new, new ink colors. Yeah. Right. Yeah. Those are, those would be solid ink colors. And we just haven't seen any yet. Not, I don't think that's a big deal. I'm just now like, okay, we've seen a new ink by now in collaboration with one of the pen releases. So maybe that's just not their thing anymore. Their inks are so cheap. There's, I don't know. It's probably just not profitable.

'''Myke Hurley:''' Maybe they just got, they've just been, they've had enough, you know, like every time they released an ink, it just became a controversy over the last few years. That's true. No more ink.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' No more ink for you. You know who doesn't do fountain pen inks?

'''Myke Hurley:''' Who?

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Uniball. Mitsubishi.

'''Myke Hurley:''' Oh, really? Yeah. They don't have fountain pens. But like, you know, the petrol and the purple. Dark lilac. Dark lilac. Dark lilac. That was it. They just became a whole thing. And it's like, if I was at Lamy, I would be like, for the time being, let's not do this. Because every ink that we release is going to be scrutinized to a level that's just like past logic.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Where was the dark lilac? Was it New York Times or Wall Street Journal? It made it into one of those. It was like, that's not the shine Lamy was looking for necessarily. But the disco is the shine that they're looking for.

'''Myke Hurley:''' I just think if I was there, I would be really hesitant to putting out any kind of ink product right now.



== Neon yellow and neon pink pen designs ==


'''Brad Dowdy:''' I mean, they weren't going to do it with neon yellow and neon pink. So let's transition into that because I got mine in. Okay. Do we need neon yellow? Yeah, neon yellow. Neon yellow? Neon low. And I'm like a month behind on this. I know just because of how this release was so kind of botched. Lamy still has issues. Like they botched this release and they held disco on the down low, which is kind of crazy to me how this is the same company that did this.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' The yellow is fantastic. Neon yellow is fantastic. Even better in person with the black trim. So I got the pink and the yellow barrels. I got the pink to give away because I know I won't use it. Like I only have like as much as I love the Safari. It's maybe one of my top two or three favorite pens of all time. I have. I can actually see them from here. How many do I have? One, two. I mean, I have a lot. But one, two, three, four, five, six, seven. Seven Safaris. Is that too many? That doesn't seem like a lot. I don't buy all of them, but I acquire all of them to see them and then give them away. And then every now and then I'll keep one from a series. You know, like neon yellow I really wanted because I think the black works. They needed to go with the same black treatment on the pink. I think that was a missed opportunity there. Now that I have them in hand, the pink's individually great and uniquely great.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' The black works so well on neon yellow.

'''Myke Hurley:''' Yep.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' That I wanted to see it on neon pink. With the black. So the pink has a different shade pink clip and finial and then a silver nib. And where the Lamy is black clip, black finial, black nib. It just, it's clean. It's so clean. If you had to guess in my extra fine Lamy nib, what ink color would you say I inked it with?

'''Myke Hurley:''' I mean, okay. Neon yellow. Yes. No, the obvious is, the obvious is some kind of yellow or like I have the Pelican highlighter ink, which would be a nice, but then you can't read it. So I'm going to say you went with something green.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' That would be my second choice. Okay. I just went with straight up black in it for the first run. Which, yeah, that O is exactly right. That's kind of even for myself. Like, oh, because I couldn't commit from the jump to do something super bright. I kind of wanted to just go in with like the black trim theme.

'''Myke Hurley:''' I mean, it does have the black like clip and stuff. So that actually, you know, thematically does work.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' The nib is black. So I just used a Lamy black ink cartridge. I said when I was inking it up, my second choice would be Ackerman number 28, Huff-Guardier Grown. And I think kind of a bright yellowy green is my second choice. So we'll probably do that next once I play around with it in this black cartridge. But I literally just inked it up yesterday. I am down to one fountain pen inked, and it's currently this one. So after vacation, I came home and I hadn't used my pens for like a week. And some of them I hadn't used for like maybe a couple of weeks. So I was like scorched earth and we went down to zero to kick off June. So this is my first inked fountain pen. And we'll see how long that lasts. Not very long. I know that. But yeah, I love the Safari. Safari is a great pen. Safari is better than the All-Star. It always will be for me. I'm getting the discos though. Like that might be. I have no. The only All-Star I use is a ballpoint. I don't use any All-Star fountain pens. So these will be my first. And those I will not ink up with basic blue or basic black. You know, we got some fun opportunities with the disco ones. So we'll get those coming in here soon. So test them out. But yeah, fantastic. Well done, Lamy. Love it.

'''Myke Hurley:''' You want to know a place where you can buy these Lamy's when they become available?

'''Brad Dowdy:''' If you didn't say it, I was.

'''Myke Hurley:''' Our friends over at Pen Chalet. Well, I said the new ones are, but the neon yellow, neon pink. They're long gone. But that's where you've got to go. When these new pens pop up, you've got to take yourself out to Pen Chalet. Because they're always adding new products. They're right now. Right now. Every single month you can go there. Every couple of weeks. Every day you can go and find new products over at Pen Chalet. They have your favorite brands like Lamy, but also Pilot, Pelican, Sailor, Kaveco, many more. That list is growing all the time. And they're an authorized dealer of everything that they sell. They have fast and reliable customer service. They do free shipping on orders of over $100 in the US. With great shipping rates internationally as well. Pen Chalet has low prices on high quality pens. And they offer a 100% satisfaction guarantee. One of the reasons that you should always go to Pen Chalet when you see these new products come available for order is that you will get 10% off anything because you listen to this show. Just go to PenChalet.com slash Pen Addict and you'll get the code that you need to save 10% on anything. As well as to see some exclusive offers because you listen to this show.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' All right. These offers. I just pulled them up. And one of my... This is a super underrated pen that I happen to love because I like smaller pens. The Estabrook JR Pocket Pens. Or they call them pocket pens. They're not technically like a short Kaveco. They're just a smaller... They're like Pilot Pereira sized pens. I love, love, love these pens. They have a couple of them on the Pen Addict podcast page. The Pocket Paradise which is a bright blue. And then they have a sparkle blue called Fantasia on there as well. And then they have some regular Estes on there. Oh, wow. Yeah. Estes usually don't hit this price point. So if you've ever wanted an Estee, they have a couple of colors on there. The Tortoise, Maui. The Maui is awesome. Yeah. Really, really good. Oh, boy. Oh, Myke. They have the Tiger King of Pens on special offer. I just scrolled into that. We're getting... All right. We'll get that when the show's over. The show's over today. This is a pen I've been wanted. The Delta DV Original Midsize Orange Primary Manipulation 4.5.

'''Myke Hurley:''' We were just talking about this.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Yeah. We called it the Tiger King of Pens. Yes. Because it's ridiculous. And now it's on sale on the Pen Attic page, which means I need to buy it. So I'll be doing that. Yeah. For a great deal. So there you go. Brad got got live on the podcast. He's been waiting for that pen. I want to mention one other thing that I never mentioned. The new Visconti Homo Sapiens Nebula Fountain Pens. These are not on the product page. These are just getting ready to be released. Absolutely gorgeous. Like, this is not my kind of pen, nor in my price point. But Lamy, excuse me, Visconti does, like, high end as good as, I think, like, Pelican, right? As far as styles go. Yeah. Like, styles that I really, really respect how they look but will never own. Yep. So there's one called Eagle, and there's one called Orion. They're really good looking. Yo. These are crazy. I just saw these since we were on the page. So, yeah, go over and check out everything over at Pen Chalet like I just did, and now I'm going to be buying a pen. So there we go.

'''Myke Hurley:''' P-E-N-C-H-A-L-E-T dot com slash penaddict. Our thanks to Pen Chalet for their support of this show and Relay.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' All right, Myke, we got our shout-out of the week. Shout-out of the week. Designed in California, an Apple history podcast. What is happening, Myke Hurley? This was a surprise to me.



== New podcast project on Apple's history ==


'''Myke Hurley:''' Yeah, so Jason Snell and I have been working on a new project, which is essentially telling stories over Apple's 50 years. So Jason has been writing about Apple for 30 years. We've been working together for over a decade. And we did an episode of Upgrade in the beginning of April, which was essentially like this. Me and Jason absolutely adore the rest of this history. It's our favorite show. It basically looked at world history across all time and do a bunch of research and turn it into an engaging and entertaining story. We wanted to take that and do it for Apple for their 50th anniversary, which was on the 1st of April. So we did an episode of Upgrade in this style, absolutely fell in love with it, and then did everything we possibly could to try and make it into a podcast. And we decided that Kickstarter was the right call for this project because of the amount of work required for every episode, the amount of research, the amount of writing that Jason has to do. Yeah. And then also all of the editing and stuff that we need to do afterwards really to make this show the best that it can be. And so we didn't want to just launch it and see if people would want it and then kind of like, you know, week by week try and grow the show. So we wanted to feel confident that no matter what we would be set to make it, like we could make it a big chunk of the work that we'd produce. And so we decided that Kickstarter was the avenue. We had a $40,000 goal, which we met in less than two hours. And we're, as of recording, getting close to passing $125,000. Yeah, that's good. So people want it. We're really excited about it. We're doing, you know, like basically if you back the campaign, you will get a year of membership to the podcast, which means when the show launches in July or August, we need to just nail that down. But it's going to be kind of soon. It'll be even the next couple of months after the campaign, you'll get a year of membership, which means you will get ad free episodes. But also, you know, we're going to be producing the show weekly now, which was one of the stretch goals that we made. And so let's say we have a topic and we have four episodes on that topic. They will roll out week by week. But if you back the Kickstarter campaign and become a member through that, you get all of those episodes at once. So instead of waiting for a month to get the full story, you'll get it all on day one. And that will be the case of every time we release a new series, which, you know, maybe will be every month, maybe every six weeks, depending on how long the stories we've got to tell are. We also have some physical rewards to posters, pins, all that kind of stuff.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Can I just interrupt you? This artwork is awesome.

'''Myke Hurley:''' So that's not actually going to be the podcast artwork. It looks good, though. So this is an artwork. This is artwork that we have made by our wonderful designer, J.D. Davis. But we're actually commissioning an illustrator to produce something else, which we will be showing very soon. And we'll be revealing who that illustrator is. They're a very accomplished person in the world of illustration. And so we're working with them. And we have some fun stuff to show as the campaign goes through. This is like one of the weird things for us of like usually when we launch a project, all of these things are done. But that's not the case. Like we just got kind of the first version of our theme music yesterday. Nice. Because actually throughout the month of June, we are releasing a second episode of Upgrade Every Week, which is designed in California. So this is part of our marketing. So you can get a feel for what the show will be like. So thank you for letting me talk about this for a moment.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Yeah, for sure. I wanted to give you a shout out and say congratulations because I saw how well it was doing.

'''Myke Hurley:''' It's been a bit of a wild couple of days.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' You're a little bit busy right now. Yeah.

'''Myke Hurley:''' Which is good. It just, we had a plan and that plan all happened too quickly. Yeah. Which is wonderful. Wonderful problem to have. But it just means that we have to just think about, you know, like Kickstarter campaigns, people can too often overcommit and offer too much. So we're just trying to find the right balance. Yeah. Trust me. That's great.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Yeah. That's great. Always fun. All right. Live update. Not that I wasn't listening to you, but I did order the Tiger King of Pen. Sick. Because there was only one available. All the rest of them had sold out. There was just one with a fine nib available. Well, it's gone now. It's gone now. Also, I wanted to give you the opportunity to yell at me live. I did use our discount. Do you have anything to say?

'''Myke Hurley:''' No.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Yeah. That's what I thought.

'''Myke Hurley:''' Well, because Dan from Enigma wrote in and said it was fine. Yeah. I'm going to say that maybe Rome will say it's fine too. Plus, I've used the pension like one.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' I just wanted to give you an opportunity. Just, you know, full disclosure here.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' All right. We got a great video from Jacob over at Food A Fan titled, Sailor Finally Fixed the Rialo, but made it weird. Did you get the opportunity to look at this video?

'''Myke Hurley:''' Yeah, I watched it today.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Have your thoughts changed from when we initially discussed this a couple weeks ago?

'''Myke Hurley:''' For me, not really.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Okay. All right. For me, it made it worse. Yeah. Like, before, I was like, eh, maybe I don't like it. It's kind of weird looking. Now, I, like, actively dislike it. I have never seen such a poor looking piston in such an expensive pin before.

'''Myke Hurley:''' I will agree that the piston design is not awesome. But, again, I go back to, I can see why they've done some of it, and it means that this product is, the thing that I find interesting in this product, this is a result of that. I did like the fact that Jacob came to the same conclusion as me, which is, they should just offer the body of this pen.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Yeah. Or sell it with a steel nib from the jump. Yeah.

'''Myke Hurley:''' And then you have your old kit. It's a good thing, because they've made so many decisions and compromises in this product to build the piston system so it can be interchanged, but then they always sell it to you with an expensive nib. So, I don't understand why they've done that part.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Yeah. If they just made that mechanism black instead of white, I'd have less of an issue.

'''Myke Hurley:''' Yeah.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' It is, like, when it pulls back into the back end of the barrel, like, it's like, do you know how much I spent on this pen? And I can't stop looking at these little bits here? Like, it's just, I'm aggrieved just looking at it. God, you do all this design work, and then that was a decision? I just, it's crazy. So, Jacob's price that he paid for it was 66,000 yen. The conversion rate right now is so off-kilter that that makes it, like, a low 400s US dollar pen, but we're not going to be able to buy it for that. Like, that makes more sense in that price range for this pen. But it's still, like, when we were looking at, like, Stilo and Stile, it's still, like, 640 euro, which is, like, a little over $700. And I think that's actually going to be the price of it. I think the yen is just, like, it's doing yen things right now. So, it's a lot different pen at 425 versus 725 for sure. So, interesting. Y'all go check that out. It's, like, a five-minute video. Jacob's videos are wonderful. He goes through the whole thing. And I did also, I think he kind of mentioned this.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' I don't like what they're doing with the nib stamping now. It's a little bit less sailory. It's a little bit more looks like their steel nibs on their gold nibs where it's a very kind of flat-looking nib as opposed to, like, the more, like, engraved look that they've had in the past. I just, not, it's just not clicking for me. So, we'll see.

'''Myke Hurley:''' It looks, yeah, it looks very shallow. The engraving is very shallow, which looks cheap. And it looks this way because steel nibs tend to be engraved this way, right? Right. And gold nibs tend to have a more deeper engraving. And so, it's purely an association based on how things have been produced in the past. But I agree. It makes this gold nib look like a steel nib. Yeah. Yeah. Strange. Strange.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' A lot of weird decisions in this one. So, we'll see how it goes. All right. Next up, new release, Pilot Kaplish Vanishing Point Digital Tech. Digital Tech. I did not think we would get a five-pack release of the Vanishing Point again. They've done this in the past. They did the Metallic series many, many years ago. They did red, blue, orange, green. I can't remember the fifth one. And they were good. Like, you know, very popular. They did, like, the brighter metallic colors with the black trim. And that's what these are with the black trim. You know, the clip, the nose cone, the knock, the barrel bands, et cetera. I mean, they look great. They look great. But you did a little bit of the more translation work than I did.

'''Myke Hurley:''' Yeah. I was. And I actually have questions. I didn't understand what digital tech meant, honestly. Like, I was like, oh, they put a stylus on this? You know, like, what have they done? And no. So I did a translation on the Pilot Corporation caption. And again, these are machine translations. But it says, the concept is digital tech. Keep it simple. Keep it smart. Computers, smartphones, et cetera. Fashionable matte metallic color that blends with digital tools. The special alloy pen tip matches the metallic color body. It's nothing. It means nothing.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Yeah. So that translation actually doesn't work because it doesn't match. Yeah. Right? Like, the way it's listed as special alloy tip and the price, I'm wondering if this is a steel nib vanishing point. I'm not sure. So, like, it's 17,600 yen, which is, like, low hundreds, I think. I'd have to redo that one. Which, again, to my point just with Jacob just a second ago, that's the current stock vanishing points are, like, two something?

'''Myke Hurley:''' Yeah. That's, like, 81 pounds. Yeah. 110 USD. Yeah.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' This is steel. It's either, yeah. So, like, this is...

'''Myke Hurley:''' Because also, one of the things I found curious, and I didn't put this in here because it didn't make any sense to me. How does that? It doesn't... They are referencing specifically university lectures. And, like, I read it and I was like, that doesn't make any sense. University students aren't buying, like, a vanishing point. Well, they might if it's less than 100 bucks or whatever. Right? Yeah. So, that's weird.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Yeah. So, this is interesting. I want to continue to track this one to see if they're going to do a full series with steel nibs, which is fine. Like, I have no issue with that. Because it'll bring the price point down and you could... Again, like the Sailor Reality, if you're a vanishing point user, you could just swap in your gold nib and you get the barrel. So... But I think this is going to be kind of a... Not a regular release, but a small, limited release. They're calling the purple... This is a little bit strange. I think the purple is limited and then silver, copper, ash blue, and deep green are standard. Yeah. Which is... It's a little bit confusing. So, I don't want to say definitively anything about, like, the price or the style or the nib material just because it's unclear. But they're coming this month. Yeah. So, we should be able to see.

'''Myke Hurley:''' I cannot understand why they're called digital tech. Like, it doesn't... I don't either. It doesn't make any sense. And I know that these things don't have to make sense and this one doesn't.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Yeah. And that's not a translation. That's on their image. Which digital tech is not translated. It just says capless digital tech. So, interesting. Interesting pen. I want to learn more about that one. Because, you know, Myke, I do love a retractable pen. But I can no longer love the Platinum Curious, Myke. RIP Platinum Curious 2020 to 2026. Let's take a moment of silence on the podcast. It's perfect. Yeah. Let's do it. Come on in. Let's do it.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Okay. Thank you, everybody. Thank you, everybody. Yeah. Thank you. Thank you.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Yeah. This was not unsurprising in the least. And this still, I still, like, I've really leaned into this. Because I've always had a lot to say about the Curious. And I'm a little sad it didn't become what I hoped it become. But I also understand why. Because this is difficult. I haven't seen, like, a pure Platinum release from this. But I also haven't gotten yelled at Pilot. Excuse me. Yelled at Buy Platinum. To stop saying that it's dead. Because, like, a retailer in Japan got the notification. Like, you know how companies will send out the price increases, the additions, the discontinuations. And the Curious was on there. They posted it publicly that it was on the discontinuation list. So I ran with it. So what was funny about the timing is about a month ago, maybe six weeks now, for Pen Addict members, once a month, I grade a pen. And I have a grading system that I use. And I'm a well-known Platinum Curious lover. But that doesn't mean it's a good pen. And out of my rating system, it got, like, the second lowest score to the bottom. Like, I rated it very poorly. Because that's accurate, right? It's an accurate rating of what I think about the pen. It's not a recommendation rating. It's, like, a personal rating. And one of the keys when you look at these ratings that I do, or I should say specifically the keys that I look at, is if I have the two pens on a table, and one of them is the Platinum Curious, and one of them is a different pen, whatever you want it to be. It doesn't even have to be the same retractable category. It could be a Vanishing Point. It could be a Safari. At what point am I going to choose the Curious over any of these other pens? And that's pretty much never going to happen. Yeah. Despite, when I ink it up with its fine nib, it's really fun for a minute or two, right? But what happened with the Curious is they got off to a rocky start, and they fixed, like, the technical issues.

'''Myke Hurley:''' Well, I just said, the start was rocky because it was imperfect, right? Like, the product, not even before it broke. The product was just imperfect. Like, it was actually kind of uncomfortable to hold for a lot of people. I really struggled with that. But it was like, okay, you know, like, this is version one. Maybe they can tweak it. Then they just started failing. And at that point, it's like, it's done. Like, they tried, but it's done now.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Yeah. So I held out hope to hopefully see a version two. And then they did it, and they didn't change anything. Yeah. And that was the kicker. That was, like, the kick that I didn't need, right? They just did a barrel, you know, a rubberized barrel. Yeah. Didn't change, didn't address any, like, the issues that people were having with, like, the shark fin on it or just the width. The whole thing is just big and chunky. And then they did a third edition that was iridescent. I was like, yeah, these are cool. And they didn't change anything on that either. So I was like, you know, at that point, it's my problem because I keep buying them. But it wasn't a good pin. And now Platinum is finally just, they've just pulled the plug on it. Because this has to be very costly at this price to make this pin. And to, I can't imagine what the prototypes look like for this. Trying to do something different to improve it. And then it's just got to be, like, a drawer full of failures, right? Because this, they had an idea of a concept of a plan. And they went with it. And I was like, cool. Let's go. Let's go, Platinum. And then they couldn't figure out what to do next because it wasn't great. And then they couldn't iterate on that platform. And it probably just cost too much money. And they just had to pull the plug. Because this is not an ex. I mean, they're only selling these for, like, around $100. And this is a pretty complicated pin.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Pretty complicated pin to manufacture. Especially with the amount of failures they had in the beginning. Just absorbing some stuff. So, it's a loss. But we will move forward. Hopefully, Platinum learns something along the way. And we can maybe see another attempt another day. But, yeah. Platinum Curitus. RIP.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Man, I don't know if I can continue the podcast. Are you still upset? I'm so upset, Myke. Because now I don't have anything to talk about. That was a long-running. Myke, I don't know. Newer listeners. Myke went to, like, a grand launch party. I went to the launch event in London, yeah. In London, yeah. Got all kinds of swag from choosing keeping. It was hilarious. It was a big deal. It was a big deal. It was a big deal. All right. Hey, thank you for trying, Platinum. Yes. I wasn't hating you. Thanks for trying. I appreciate that. It was an attempt. So, thank you, Platinum.

'''Myke Hurley:''' It was a great idea. It clearly just could not be executed in the way that everybody wanted.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Yep. You know what was executed nicely, Myke? Tell me. The Midori carton opener. Okay. So, we talked about that. So, April raved about this product on her podcast when she joined me a few weeks ago. And I mentioned I'd never heard about it. And we talked about it because I'd never heard about it. And we also talked about, God, I keep forgetting the name of, what's the Studio Neat one? The Keen. The Keen. Yeah. The Keen. Not similar products, but we were talking about just like these little box cutters. I got mine. I get it now. Like, I didn't know these ceramic blades could be so sharp. It's kind of crazy. So, yeah. I didn't really have much to say other than I said I was going to buy one and I bought one. And I'm impressed. I see why it's April's favorite product. I can see why you could travel with this. Like, especially someone who does like trade shows to open boxes and things like that. This is, I mean, I'm, you know, don't take your TSA agent advice from me. But I don't see how this would ever get dinged if you're carrying it. But, you know, wear like a pocket knife or blade wood. Anyway, that's all. I didn't have much to say other than I get it. I get why April loves this so much. And I'm already fascinated by it. And it's magnetized. You can just magnet it up on something. I think the Keen is as well. I'll eventually get a Keen just because I am constantly opening boxes. Yeah, the Keen has a magnet door.

'''Myke Hurley:''' It's all magnets. There's lots of magnets going on in there.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Yeah. But does the Keen have a business frog sticker on it yet? So I already put a business frog sticker. I mean, it could if you put it there.

'''Myke Hurley:''' I mean, this didn't ship with one.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' No, but, you know, it's on my desk. And it now has a business frog stacking cash on the Midori Carton opener. So I'm just saying. So anyway, shout out Midori Carton opener. I'm going to get a fancy aluminum one next. Because, you know, that's what I need. More box cutters.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' But I ended up using it for other things on my desk, like opening smaller packages and things like that. It's just pretty convenient. So anyway, shout out Midori Carton opener. Thank you, April, for opening my eyes to this wonderful product.

'''Myke Hurley:''' Love it. All right. Should we take a second break?

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Let's do it. I'm hungry.

'''Myke Hurley:''' All right. Oh, well, then I've got the sponsor for you. And that's our friends over at Factor. Because it may be a long day for you. And then hunger strikes. There could be something healthy in the fridge that you could be making. But you want a good meal and you want it fast. Eating healthily isn't always a willpower problem. It can be a setup problem. Which is exactly what Factor helps with. With Factor, you can hit your nutrition goals this season without all the planning, grocery runs or cooking. Factor has meals built around your goals. Whether that's weight loss, overall nutrition, more protein or GLP-1 support. And for strength and workout recovery, check out Factor's Muscle Pro collection. Factor meals are fresh, never frozen. There are over 100 rotating weekly meals, including globally inspired flavors like Mediterranean and Asian. So there's always something new to look forward to. Already in just two minutes, Factor shops, preps, cooks and delivers straight to your door. So you have more time for everything you love this spring. Brad, tell me what you love about Factor.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' All of it. And including my kids into that. They also love all of it. So that's always the topic I talk about when I talk about Factor. Because I'll get six meals or so. And I'll pick out all my favorites. Like last time, out of the six, I ordered two salmon, one shrimp, two chicken and one beef. And I was like, if I want this salmon, I got to eat it the day it gets home. Because the kids are home for summer and they're hungry, Myke. So it looks like I'm going to need to double up on the Factor orders here in the next month or so. But yeah, it's easy and it's good. Like it's so easy to talk about Factor because you don't have to say much. It's simple and it's quality. And like it respects my time and my stomach, Myke. It's really good.

'''Myke Hurley:''' What more could you want in life? Head to factomeals.com slash penaddict50off and use the code penaddict50off to get 50% off on free daily greens per box. With new subscription only while supplies last until September 27th, 2026. See the website for more details, which is factomeals.com slash penaddict50off and use that code penaddict50off. Our thanks to Factor for their continued support of this show and all of Relay.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' All right, you want to hit some Ask TPA?

'''Myke Hurley:''' Yes, I was about to try. I was gearing up for a song there. Oh, man. That's not how that works. So it's like there was something about the end of the ad and you saying all right. And then it just sounded like I was about to do Shout Out of the Week again. Gotcha, gotcha. First question. I actually got two questions for you, Brad, that are relatively similar but different. First one comes from Gary who says, I've been listening for many years and I recall you mentioning graduation pen related gifts, but I couldn't find anything like relatable links or whatever, which I understand. There's a lot of episodes. Our son Cameron will graduate with a first in artificial intelligence from Liverpool Hope University in July. Now, Brad, I don't know if you know what a first is. Basically, it's the top grade you can get for a degree. Nice. As a pen geek, I'm looking to find him something suitable as a gift. Cameron is a lefty and is not so interested in fountain pens even though I've tried. Any ideas?

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Man, that's pressure. That's pressure for a non-fountain pen gift for a first, which I have to think a little bit about this. So, my first initial thought, I didn't look at this before, so I actually was writing down some ideas while you were talking. The Rotring 600 ballpoint might actually be a pretty good option. That's a really nice pen. So, I want to caveat all this for Gary and say, you're not going to spend a lot of money on this. You're only going to spend a lot of money if you're buying a fountain pen. There's not a lot of elite rollerball ballpoint fountain pens that are going to cost hundreds of dollars, which is a good thing.

'''Myke Hurley:''' Or products that are worth it. I mean, you can do it. That are worth it. Yeah, yeah, yeah. You can do it.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' You're paying for name. Yeah, that's not worth it. Like, a fountain pen that's $300 or $400 is probably going to be worth it.

'''Myke Hurley:''' When you start on Rotring 600, I did think you were going to go where I was thinking about, which was a mechanical pencil.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Mm-mm.

'''Myke Hurley:''' But, no, you don't like that idea?

'''Brad Dowdy:''' I would actually, no. I would do the ballpoint or the multi-pen. With the Rotrings, I do prefer the single cartridge over the multi-pen. But there is something to be said. Second one I wrote down is something from Tactile Turn, where you can get a cool machine pen in a lot of different styles and materials.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' That's really cool. Actually, if you do want to break the bank for, like, a ballpoint pen, I would look at Makar Tools. We need to put a link in the show note to that, Myke, on Instagram. They're based in Poland, I believe. Holy cow. That actually might be your tier one.

'''Myke Hurley:''' How are we spelling that, Brad?

'''Brad Dowdy:''' M-A-K-A-R. Okay. Tools. You've seen them before. I've shared them with you before. Yeah, I've seen them before. That might... And they do some non-fountain pen versions. If you want, like, something, you know, befitting the first level, you might want to look at Makar Tools. So that's kind of my list.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' I mean, of course, there's always the Zento Signature, if you can find one.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' I mean, you know. But no, I would go with... I like the Rotring. I like the Tectal Turn. I like the Makar Tools. What else?

'''Brad Dowdy:''' I think that's kind of, like, the cool pen list, I think. You know, if I'm thinking about these products. That's kind of where I would start. And, Gary, feel free to email me, you know, if you have any, like, more detailed questions. Like, when you're trying to pick something out for someone who doesn't know, like, or you don't know exactly what they want, it's a little bit more difficult. So I think these are some good options at some different price points. I think, you know, Makar Tools, very expensive. Tactile Turn, Moderate. And Rotring 600, it's not very... It's like 50 or 60 bucks. It's not very expensive.

'''Myke Hurley:''' I think Tactile Turn's a really good suggestion. Because they have a lot of different designs. So you might find something that is, like, befitting of their personality.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Yeah. And they do some cool materials, right? Either if it's not in the barrel, it could be in the clip or in the mechanism.

'''Myke Hurley:''' And, yeah, and you've got ball, switch, clip. You know, they've got a bunch of different mechanisms. So maybe you can see one and think, oh, they would find that to be, like, interesting or fun. Yeah. So there's a bunch of options there.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Yeah. Like, the switch is a really neat mechanism. Yes. Right? Just kind of... It's like a light switch, flips on and off. So very cool. So, yeah. I think that's a good starter list. All right. What's the next one?



== Gifting pens for graduation and recommendations ==


'''Myke Hurley:''' Gregory writes in and says it's graduation season. If Brad has to gift a pen to a new graduate, what does he gift? For fun, it would be nice to hear a choice from classic gift brands like Parker, Cross, and Waterman. Based on those brands' websites, they lean into pens as gifts hard in their marketing. So this is a two... There is a... This is like a 2.5 questions from Gregory. So I'll give you one and a half. There's one more question, but we'll come to that in a minute. So if you had to give a gift to a new graduate, there was a graduate in your life and you wanted to give them a gift, what would you give them? And would you... And is there any world in which you would give something from one of the classic brands?

'''Brad Dowdy:''' There is a world. It's... There is a world. But like, if you don't have to, it's okay. Yep. That would be okay. Parker's done some modern variations. I want... Let's... Let me rephrase that. Potter... I can't speak. Parker. I was going to say plotter. Because I'm reading... Plotter. Well, I'm looking at Parker Jotter. Yes. And I said... That will move to plotter. Yes.

'''Myke Hurley:''' I accept that completely.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' So, Parker has done a nice job modernizing some of their classics. Like, they've done... I don't really see them right now, but they've updated the dual fold and made a $200 or $300 dual fold and they've done some nice jobs. I would not hesitate to buy a Parker fountain pen. They've all seemed like in good quality. Waterman's the same way. And I think Schaefer's the same way. While I don't have any personal, like, individual, you know, one product from that line, you can get a classic like the Waterman Corrine. I don't even know if that's how you say it. It's just like a classic inlaid nib.

'''Myke Hurley:''' In the UK, the Parker Jotter would be a good gift for someone. Because it's classic.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' The Parker Jotter's a ballpoint. It is, but it's a ballpoint.

'''Myke Hurley:''' Well, they also do a mechanical pencil, but yes. Okay.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' But I was looking at fountain pens. I know. I'm just... I was just looking on their website and was like... The Jotter's awesome.

'''Myke Hurley:''' Well, they do a Jotter fountain pen, but it's not what they want. Yeah. It's not the same style. No. It doesn't... No, no, no. Yeah, okay. No, no. It has the same kind of clip and stuff. Like, it's taking design cues from the Jotter, but it's not as cool as the Jotter.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Gotcha.

'''Myke Hurley:''' Gotcha, gotcha.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' The Waterman Corrine is probably the best out of those Parker Schaefer Waterman list. But...

'''Myke Hurley:''' I think the Parker Jotter was in a Bond movie.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' The ballpoint?

'''Myke Hurley:''' I think so. I think it was...

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Probably.

'''Myke Hurley:''' I think it was Goldeneye.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' They probably shot something out of it. Yes.

'''Myke Hurley:''' It was a dart from a pen. Yeah. Yeah. I'm sorry.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Well, that was probably a fountain pen. Hmm. We'll have to look now. I have... We've actually... We've talked about this before. It rings a little bit of a bell. So, if I'm going with those brands, I'm looking for the ones who keep up to the modern you know, like...

'''Myke Hurley:''' Yeah. ...types of products. It was the Parker Jotter ballpoint. Interesting. I... And I can see here. I found a webpage at Bond Lifestyle. James Bond Lifestyle.com. They released a Goldeneye version of the pen, which I owned. Like, seeing this packaging, it's like, yes, I remember this. I remember buying this. Yeah. I'm sorry. I'm completely derailing us from something we're not even supposed to be talking about.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Nah. So, Gregory listed Parker, Cross, and Waterman. I'm probably starting with Waterman, looking there. And then I'm probably going to Schaefer. And they do some currently up-to-date products. Then I'm looking at Parker. And then Cross is probably last. I don't think Parker and Cross are doing as much as Waterman and Schaefer are in, like, the good fountain pen gift range for, like, say, like $100 to $200. I think you want to look at Waterman and Schaefer. So, that is my gift.

'''Myke Hurley:''' I believe that the Parker Jotter was an explosive. And it was, if you clicked it enough times, it would blow up. And there was a- Nice. One of the villains had a bit of a, like, a pen twirling habit. Yeah. That'd be a problem. And that was how he ended up getting them to explode.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Yeah. I think we'd have a lot less listeners if that was a real product.

'''Myke Hurley:''' Yeah. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Yeah. All right. Part two. Now, Brad can gift any pen based on his vast stationery knowledge. What does he choose and why?

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Pilot 823.

'''Myke Hurley:''' Okay.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' That is just, that could be someone's one and only pen for the rest of their life with, you know, proper care. It's, like, $400 and something dollars now. It's definitely gone up in price. It's got a great filling system. It's got a great nib.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' As a gift, it's cool and it's safe, right? Like, someone's going to, no one's going to go, oh, yeah, I really don't like this one. Like, it's a pretty, you have a pretty high hit rate with, if you gave an 823, someone's going to be pretty happy about it, right? Whereas, you know, you could pick a million different just random color pens and random styles of pens and who knows if you're going to like it. I think the 823 is pretty classic looking.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Trying to think if there's another option I would jump straight to. Pelican 600 is probably the second option. It's a good mid-size. I want to say mid-price. It's very, it's expensive as well. But compared to Sailor's other offerings, it's a good size. And you can get some classic colors. It's a classic.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' I think that's probably my top two. The Pelican 600 might actually be number one. That actually might even be a safer pen than the 823. Just from a style perspective. If you, I'm thinking about this as someone who's not that experienced with fountain pens, that the Pelican might be a safer bet. Like a Pelican 600 in one of many, many colors or styles.

'''Myke Hurley:''' Yeah. It comes in many, many, many, many. It's the M600, right?

'''Brad Dowdy:''' M600, yeah. Or 605, whichever. The M6 series of Pelican I think is the best gift range. But you're going to spend a lot of money on that. That's, you know, again, $400 or $500, $400 or $500 probably.

'''Myke Hurley:''' Well, I figured that was the point of the question.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Yeah, yeah. Like I'm not going, like I could say, you know, some crazy Nakaya or some wild Montblanc or a pen with abs or something like that. But I'm trying to be, like, realistic and think about gift giving to someone who would appreciate a wonderful writing instrument but doesn't know a lot about it. Like the Pelican 600 might be.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' It's a little bit more classic looking than the 823.

'''Myke Hurley:''' I also think Pelicans are really beautiful, nice, great pens that you might not necessarily buy for yourself.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Yeah. Also, buy them an extra fine nib because it's going to write very, very wet. Don't buy, like, a medium nib. It's going to be, like, a marker and they might not like it. I will definitely go down. You want to know what you're doing if you're getting a Sailor medium or broad nib because it's going to write, like, a Sharpie if you don't. You're not careful. An extra fine. Did you mean Pelican when you said Sailor? Pelican, Pelican. Sorry, sorry, sorry. Too many brands. Like, I have a disco to attend, so. Of course.

'''Myke Hurley:''' Well, I'm going to let you go do that. If you would like to send in any follow-up or questions for a future episode of the show, go to penaddictfeedback.com and you can send those in. I would like to thank Factor and Pen Chalet for the support of this episode. If you would like to find Brad online, go to spokedesign.com, penchalet.com. You can find Brad's Dreaming Live at twitch.tv slash penaddict. For me right now, I would say go to designed.fm and check out the Designed in California Kickstarter campaign. I won't be here next week. I'll be in California attending Apple's WWDC conference. Brad will have another wonderful guest. I promise to come back after that. I'm not going anywhere for a while.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Not for long. Well, I am.

'''Myke Hurley:''' Actually, there might have to be another guest, but this is my fault.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Yeah, two guests in June is the plan. So, we'll see.

'''Myke Hurley:''' Thank you so much for listening to this week's episode of The Pen Addict. Until next time, say goodbye, Brad. Goodbye, Brad. Goodbye, Brad. Goodbye, Brad. Goodbye, Brad.

[[Category:Podcast Transcripts]]
[[Category:The Pen Addict Podcast Transcript]]