The Pen Addict 228/transcript

The Pen Addict Podcast Transcript
Episode:	228
Title:	Hashtag Snail Mail
Release Date:	October 26th, 2016
Hosts:	Brad Dowdy Myke Hurley
Guests:	No guests this episode
Additional Information
Official page:	Episode 228
Audio File:	Audio Episode 228
Podcast page:	The Pen Addict 228
Length:	5252 min <br />0.867 h <br /> minutes
Previous Transcript	Next Transcript

Myke Hurley: From RelayFM, this is The Pen Addict, episode 228. Today's show is brought to you by Harry's and Pen Chalet. My name is Myke Hurley, and I am joined by Mr. Brad Dowdy. Hello, Brad Dowdy.

Brad Dowdy: Hello, Michael Hurley. How are you, sir?

Myke Hurley: As a little preview for today's show, can you give an audio example of what we're going to be doing today?

Myke Hurley: Can you hear that? I can hear it. Do you want to do it again, just in case people miss it? And what is that, Brad Dowdy?

Brad Dowdy: That's me rifling through letters and envelopes, although a couple of them went flying to the floor. Let me grab them.

Myke Hurley: And you can hear me now, if you listen, listen very carefully, you can hear me scrolling up and down on the Dropbox link of some scans that Brad made for me. Because today is the Ask TPA Letters episode, where a few weeks ago we asked our lovely pen addicts to write in with their Ask TPA questions. And we got quite a few letters, and the thing is, they're not just questions. These are actual letters, so the letters are long, which is good. And we're going to read through some of those today. But I did have a follow-up item that I wanted to mention. My inks have come in. Do you remember I ordered inks recently? From Van S. I ordered Califolio Andronopole and KWZ Raspberry.

Brad Dowdy: Okay.

Califolio Ink

Myke Hurley: I am in love. I am absolutely in love with these.

Brad Dowdy: Those are good colors.

Myke Hurley: Especially the Califolio. My gosh.

Brad Dowdy: You know what I think about that one, right? I mean...

Myke Hurley: I think it's my favorite color that I have now.

Brad Dowdy: It's really good. We did a six-pack sample, a pen addict sampler, on Van S. pens a few weeks ago, and that was absolutely one of them. It's that good.

Myke Hurley: It is stupendous. And I have it in my twist pen, the mother of pearl, as I call it. And it is such a fantastic pairing.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah, that's a good setup right there. That's right. I remember you bought it for that, so that's perfect.

Myke Hurley: So I'm very happy.

Brad Dowdy: So good. We will talk more about how you have all these pens inked up and stuff. Got some new stuff. Got some new inks. I want to hear some further reviews as you get to use them more.

Myke Hurley: You bet. All right. Should we, without delay, we should probably start these things, right?

Brad Dowdy: Yeah, we have a bunch. And so I want to thank everyone who took the time to write in to us. If we don't get to your letter today, I 100% promise we will get to it in a future episode. We're just kind of time restrained today, and we don't know how long this is going to take us to go through, because we'll have some answering to do with these letters. And what I'm going to do is I'm going to start reading some of these letters. I'll read them pretty much verbatim. Some of them are long, but it's kind of fun to see what other people are writing. There's some I might jump around on and get straight to the Ask TPA parts of them. And then I scanned some for Myke, so he can read some too. And actually, Myke, I want you to read the first one, because this one has more to the story than the scan I sent you. So it's the first one in the scan. It's just essentially on a note card or postcard type.

Myke Hurley: Dear Brad and Myke, greetings from Capitol Hill. My hashtag, Ask TPA, is what is a pen you initially did not like, but eventually came back to it and ended up really enjoying. Mine is a Noodler's Nib Creeper, which I have come to love now that I put a regular non-flex nib into it. Thanks for a fun show every week. Sincerely, Gabe.

Brad Dowdy: So, funny story about this one, Myke. So, it says, greetings from Capitol Hill, right? So, I got the envelope, and I just flipped it over the back and started opening it. And on the back of the envelope is written that says, pen, Lamy Safari, ink, Noodler's Lexington Gray. And then also it says, note sent with personal funds. And I thought this was kind of a joke, like, you know how we have, like, disclosures on the blog? Like, if we write that the product was sent to us for free or, you know, those type of things, those disclaimers. I was like, well, that's kind of funny. Then I flipped it over, and the return address is U.S. House of Representatives, Washington, D.C., 20515. So, yeah, I'm wondering if he really needed to note that this was sent with personal funds. So, yeah, this is from the legit Capitol Hill. So, thank you, Gabe, for sending that. And like Gabe did on this, almost everyone tells us what pen and ink they wrote with. And he wrote his letter with the TWSBI 580 USA Edition and Noodler's Sequoias, which was really pretty green. I kind of like this shade. So, let's get on to his question, though. Do you have a pen you initially did not like but eventually came back to?

Myke Hurley: Yeah, it's actually a pretty similar answer. And I can't remember where this came from, but I have a Noodler's Flex nib pen. Somebody gave me this, but I'm a terrible human and can't remember who. And it's like a blue and red swirly thing. I can't remember where this came from.

Brad Dowdy: Yes, so that I sent you that. That was from one of our listeners named Penelope.

Myke Hurley: You are the best human being, like just flat out. Now, I had one of these a long time ago, and it was brown. And I put it in a JetPens order, and I hated it. And now, whilst I don't love this every day or use it every day, I enjoy it whenever I pick it up and play around with it because it's a silly pen. Right? Like it's one of these silly Flex nibs. It's not a fantastic quality one. And I just play around with it for fun but enjoy it when I viscerally hated it the first time I tried it a couple of years ago. I remember talking about it on the show with you a long, long time ago when I was in the old room with all the old equipment. I viscerally remember talking to you about that pen because I hated it so much. Right. But now, I actually really enjoy it.

Lamy 2000

Brad Dowdy: I think mine is actually kind of a surprise, and it's the Lamy 2000. And that's because I didn't like the nib on it when it came. And that's kind of what Gabe was saying. You know, he didn't like the nib on his and then got it swapped out, and now he loves the pen. Well, I got the nib worked on on my Lamy 2000. At first, I was like, what is all the hype about? I'm not digging it. Yes, it feels good. Yes, it looks good. And it's supposed to be amazing, but I'm not getting amazing performance out of it. I had to get that nib tweaked on the Lamy 2000. And then I came around to the feelings that I have about that pen these days, which is one of the best bangs for the buck on the market. And it's a fantastic pen. But it did take some time for me to actually enjoy that pen instead of fighting with it.

Myke Hurley: That makes perfect sense.

Brad Dowdy: All right. So the next one, I'm going closer over to you than me. This one came from Poland, and I had to share this on Instagram because the Poland stamp game is strong. So let's see. Sorry for all the extra noise, but I kept all these in the envelope. So I'll remember to keep them handy. So let's see here.

Myke Hurley: It's going to be a lot of foley in this episode. Yes, yes.

Brad Dowdy: So this is from Emil. I believe that's how we're going to say it. It says, Dear Brad, I only have three sheets of paper, and I should be working anyway. Plus, my handwriting is meh at best, so I'll be quick. Firstly, all postcards showing my city are terrible. The one I attached sucks the least. Sorry. So he included a postcard of his town, which is actually quite beautiful. Secondly, I hope I didn't misremember if you asked for questions for future episodes of Pen Addicts. So to my question, I've been using pens for most of my life, never thinking about it much. It was what I had handy. Never gotten too expensive pens. Two $100 pens I own gather dust. I hate almost everything about them. Do you think less about people who should know better, for example, that are knowledgeable, who use your standard $10 pens? Be honest. Do. Why the F would you use that daily? Never cross your mind. Many hobbies, pen addiction, for one, have a strong focus on buying things. I sometimes feel looked down on by all those people sporting Stallone's signature pen. I jest. Let me rephrase my question. Do you think then too much? Look what I bought in our community. He also says, do not read this verbatim. My English is not good. His English is spectacular. So is his handwriting. If he uses the words meh and jest and things like that in the proper context, your English is pretty amazing. So the gist of his letter, it's kind of twofold, but it's number one, do you look down on people for not using a quality pen when they should know better? That's an easy question. It's absolutely not. And I'm not one of those pen people who will always make a scene of pulling out my pen when someone hands me a pen to write with. That's just not how I operate on a personal level, right? That's different. Like you don't show up or show out someone who just, you know, is trying to do their job or trying to, you know, do something nice for you. You don't make a scene about that type of thing. Oh, here, let me use my Stallone Chaos pen because it is far superior to your pen. I would never do that in a million years, no matter the situation.

Myke Hurley: So what I would say on this is I don't, I wouldn't like look down on someone. Like if we were at a pen show and somebody pulled out like a really like cheap weirdo pen that like I wouldn't. And but I know this person is well into this stuff. I wouldn't look down on them, but I would question it. I would say, why do you use that? Like, why are you choosing to use that? Like when you're a person that I know understands or like cares about this stuff quite deeply and that is a $5 pen from Walmart. Like, why did you pick that? Like that's what I would be inquisitive about it because it wouldn't make complete sense to me. I also do think I completely agree that this community is completely focused around people showing off what they have. But I don't think that's necessarily a bad thing. What else are you going to do? Like I think you should, if you bought something, you spent your hard earned money on it and you're proud of it and you're excited about it, then you should share it with the community.

Brad Dowdy: Agree with that. And do I think there's too much of that? I really don't think so because, you know, we've talked about this and not to get business perspective on y'all. And you know this in the back of your heads. I mean, this is a community that generally has the extra money to spend on these things, right? So people just tend to show those things often. And I think it's pretty cool because I think the majority of the people that are into the Pen Addict and the Pen Addict podcast and the Pen Addict Slack and on Twitter and everything, they're sharing, one, to show cool stuff. But two, it gives a learning experience to other people who don't have those things and that gives them the opportunity to ask questions about that, gives them an opportunity to educate themselves about those projects. It gives them an opportunity to learn if the product is good or bad, whether it would fit their needs or not. So, yeah, there is a lot of that.

Brad Dowdy: But I don't think it's in an obscene kind of way, if that makes sense.

Myke Hurley: Should I go next?

Brad Dowdy: Yeah, go next.

Myke Hurley: So this starts off. Greetings. First of all, thank you for talking about the latest cursive writing brouhaha. I have a six-year-old, and so the whole learning how to write topic is a daily topic for us. He goes to a Montessori school, and they definitely teach cursive there, in addition to block printing. His teachers have discussed many of the reasons they prefer cursive, although, obviously, since I'm printing, I'm a little ambivalent about it. So this person is writing in print. They're not cursive not joining up. I can't think of the English-American mixing me up. I'm actually working through the cursive logic workbook right now to get my cursive writing back into shape. One thing his school mentioned is that it helps kids to see their parents writing at home, just like with reading. Second, my six-year-old has been working really hard on improving his handwriting this year. I don't think he's quite ready for a fountain pen yet, but he is really intrigued by my pens and, of course, my inks. I feel like a fountain pen might help motivate him to keep working on writing, i.e., once you get handwriting down with a pencil, there's a fountain pen waiting for you. The challenge is that it doesn't seem like there are a lot of kid-sized fountain pens available in the U.S. Do you have suggestions on what pens we should consider for him, or other tips on getting a kid started on fountain pens? Really enjoying the show. Thanks, Kim. Kim is at Kimu, K-I-M-U on Twitter. So I have lots of thoughts on this. When I was growing up, this was what was done in school. So it wasn't fountain pens, but it was pens, ink pens, just like whatever they were. They weren't ballpoints. They weren't rollerballs. They were those like plastic nib pens that you could write with. You know what I'm talking about? Yep. So we would have to write in pencil. Everything had to be written in pencil until you got good enough that you were allowed to use the pens. That was like a thing that was done in my school, and everyone wanted to use the pens. Right. And then once we got to use the pens at home, I was allowed a fountain pen. I was bought a fountain pen. So I think that it is a great motivator, especially if your child sees you doing it. They're going to want to do it even more. So I think it's a great motivator. And I would recommend, I think it's called the Lamy 123 for this?

Brad Dowdy: Lamy ABC. ABC. So close. You're on the right track.

Myke Hurley: The Lamy ABC is a great pen. I own one and love it. It's really lightweight. It's made of wood. The body is made of wood. The tip, sorry, the grip is made of rubber. And they have a pencil version as well, I guess, which you could use for training for the fountain pen. And the fountain pen comes with a little label that you can write your name on and stick it on the cap. It's a really, really great pen. And the end of it is like this kind of cube. And that's to stop it from rolling away. It's a really fantastically designed and made pen. And as we've known from the history of this show and people writing out, this stuff is used by everybody in Germany. So this is made specifically for this point.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah, it's essentially the school pen in Germany.

Myke Hurley: Yep. So I thoroughly recommend the Lamy ABC.

Fountain Pens

Brad Dowdy: So I agree with that. And I also agree with the process of learning up to the fountain pen. You know, my kids are 10 and 8 and they always want to use my pens and inks and things like that. So we sit there and we talk about, you know, here's what this pen does. Here's what you can use it for. Here's why you need to be careful with it. And as they went through, like, learning about rollerball pens and gel pens and highlighters and things like that, once I saw that they were committed to using them properly, I got them Pilot Cocoonos, which is a very kid-friendly pen. It's lightweight. It's colorful. It has a smiley face on the nib. So, you know, you're holding it in the right direction. Things like that. And they really enjoy writing with those. And, you know, they don't use it all the time. They tend to stick with the normal pens more because it is more of a challenge to write with a fountain pen nib. And that's something we need to sit down and practice with. But that's the pen I like for that. And I certainly agree with kind of the leveling them up to that point to where it's a reward. And then you can sit down and really practice with the fountain pen. So really good question.

Myke Hurley: Yeah, it's a great question. I like that one of the...

Brad Dowdy: All right. This next one, I believe this is Judith. I can't quite make it out, but that's what I'm going to go with. So it says, Dear Misters, Dowdy, and Hurley, I've been listening to your podcast for a few months now. I started with episode one and I've gotten up to 120 and I read the blog semi-regularly. As I was getting ready to go to the Colorado Pen Show, I listened to a few new episodes and checked the blog to see if there was anything I didn't know about happening at the show. That's how I learned you're looking for questions via U.S. Mail. I don't have any specific questions, but I would enjoy you having Ryder Carroll on the show again to discuss his bullet journal system. This week's Digital Divide from the Gentleman Stationer says, Things like the bullet journal have taken a life of their own where it becomes more about the journal itself and less about the information in it. At the pen show, I overheard another attendee asking, what was the right sort of fountain pen for a bullet journal? And here in town, there are workshops and planners taught at a craft store. I'm wondering if this is an example of the difference between product and process orientation. In the online knitting world, there are discussions of knitting because the knitter enjoys doing it versus knitting for the sake of making things. Process versus product. Personally, I do use the bullet journal system in some sort of A5 notebook with paper I enjoy using whatever pen is handy when I need to record something. I do not illustrate mine or add Snickers or use any color coding. I also knit. I knit a lot. Sometimes I finish something. Judith. So, number one, we've talked about getting Ryder on for his third trip through the pen addict ringer. And I think this would be interesting for the exact questions that Judith asks here, right? So, you see a lot of the bullet journal stuff and it's more about how fancy you can make it. The flair, the add-ons, the beauty as opposed to the actual process of getting things done, right? So, that's one of the hugest questions I would ask Ryder. And that's also why I don't necessarily do those types of things because it doesn't really fit the way I work. I don't bullet journal. I don't have any system. I basically have a checklist system because I need to write something down and I need to check it off when I'm done. I don't need to spend the additional time to go through any extra embellishments. There's nothing wrong with that. You just have to find, does that fit with your system? Do you have any thoughts on this, Myke?

Myke Hurley: More, really, just around bullet journal as a thing. I get people mention bullet journal to me as in like they're telling me something, you know? Like, oh, I use this thing. You should check out this thing. Like people that know that I'm interested in pens, every now and then I'll get a tweet about it. And so, it's funny to me because I think of our relationship with Ryder and the way that we helped, kind of with which he has acknowledged, which we're both very proud of, about kind of helping get the word out about the bullet journal. So, it's always funny to see these things come around, you know, to now people saying to me, hey, you should check out this thing.

Myke Hurley: But more than anything, I'm just really intrigued to talk to him about how it's taken off and become bigger than anything he can manage. You know, like bullet journal is a thing, not necessarily a product now. Like it is, that is a journaling system. It's like daily planning. Like it is a thing. And I'm very keen to talk to Ryder about what that experience is like in trying to continue to make a business out of something that's grown bigger than him.

Brad Dowdy: Right. Because where my disconnect now is the difference between the visual aspects and the functional aspects of what the bullet journal has become become in the larger sense of, you know, what you see on Instagram and things like that. So, yeah, it's kind of fascinating.

Myke Hurley: Because it started off as an idea. He turned it into a product and a business. Now it's gone back to being an idea again. And I would like to kind of see what he thinks about that.

Brad Dowdy: All right. I'm going to hit this next one. All right.

Myke Hurley: I'm going to take a break first though.

Brad Dowdy: Okay. Go.

Myke Hurley: This week's episode is brought to you by Harry's. Harry's have an amazing deal for you. And it's an amazing deal that they're happy to give because they are so confident in the quality of their shaving products that they're willing to give them to you for free. That's how much they are confident. They are confident to give you their stuff for free because they are so sure that you will become a Harry's customer. Their amazing free trial set comes with a razor, five blade cartridge and a shaving gel. It's free for you when you sign up for one of their shaving plans. All you need to do is pay $3 for shipping. Harry's amazing products have kept getting better and better over time and their costs are staying exactly the same. When I talk about the confidence in quality, Harry's backed that up with a complete guarantee. You will get a full refund if you're not happy with any of your Harry's products at any point. They have high quality razors, high quality shaves that they will give you at about half the price of other big brand blades. On average, an everyday shaver saves $150 each year on blades using Harry's. All of these blades are made in Germany. Their razors now have a soft flex hinge. They have a trimming blade on them, a lubricated strip so it's easier to hold. Maybe when you're in the shower or something, if that's where you like to shave. Sorry, that's the textured razor handle. Lubricating strip doesn't help that. Lubricating strip makes your face feel nice. The textured razor handle is for what you want to do when you're in the shower. I'm getting so excited, Brad. I'm getting ahead of myself. Textured razor handle for when your hands are wet. Lubricating strip to make your face feel good. Brad Dowdy, save me from this.

Brad Dowdy: The only thing I can save you from is how awesome their handles are because when we went on our trip, my wife, of course, uses Harry's razors and handles as well. And she saw my razor sitting on my side of the sink with the orange handle and threatened me for stealing her razor with the orange handle. I was like, let me explain the difference between these handles. You have the original Harry's orange handle with the smooth plastic finish. Mine is the new softer dimpled rubberized finish. So slow your roll. Don't steal my razor. And Harry's orange handles are awesome.

Myke Hurley: I think it's time for you to upgrade Mary Beth.

Brad Dowdy: I should.

Myke Hurley: For the sake of your marriage, get her the good one. Go to harrys.com right now and use the code penaddict to check out to claim your free trial set. And because you're a listener of this show, you'll get a bonus post-shave balm added to your order for free. All you need to do is pay the shipping. That's harrys.com. Code penaddict to get your free trial set once you sign up for a shave plan and get your free post-shave balm. Because you listen to this show. Thank you so much to Harry's for their support of The Pen Addict. And Relay FM.

Brad Dowdy: You're up. All right. So this next letter is from Diana. And it cracked me up. So a lot of these letters have different embellishments on the envelopes and things like that. And people broke out their fancy tools and toys to, you know, write these letters to us and show out a little bit. And hers was especially funny. So on the back of her envelope, it says, and I laughed so hard because I found this out the hard way myself. Apparently, fancy envelopes don't have lickable flaps. Wish I had fancy wax seals. Scotch tape will do. So sometimes when you buy these envelope kits, the envelopes aren't sticky on the inside. Huh. They're just paper. So you have to have something extra to stamp, like your fancy tape or your wax stamp. That's amazing. So I read that on the outside. I cracked up because I've done the exact same thing. I'm like, oh, I don't have anything to seal this up with. Then I pull out the letter, what I think is the letter. And it's like, psych, ooh, a double envelope. Fancy. So there's like a layer, a protective layer inside the fancy envelope. That's another fancy envelope also with no sticky stuff. So this is all before I'm getting to the letter, which that just totally cracked me up. So thank you for that, Diana. All right. Let's see what she's got here. I guess I can't even remember. Thank you so much for the excuse to use my new pad of writing paper. I probably wouldn't have otherwise bothered to ask this question, but I just had to write a real letter. And here it is. For us fidgety white writers, what are the top five mid-range $100-ish posting fountain pens? My lammies are fantastic, but the cap of my TWSBI eco has made many a flying leap over the boardroom table. It's deceptive. It seems to post, but the first twitch of the fingers and off it goes. That is very true. I have large hands, so I need to post for good balance and not to lose the caps. So please help. Many thanks. Big fan, Diana of the twitchy fingers. P.S. Do you hashtag snail mail? Why not? Hashtag ask TPA. Hashtag currently inked Lamy Safari EF with Lamy Turquoise. So number one, you do absolutely hashtag snail mail. I do it all the time. You have to. You have to. Yeah.

Myke Hurley: Otherwise, how is it going to be searchable?

Brad Dowdy: Yep. I can't ever search it without it. So posting fountain pens in the $100 range is a tough one.

Myke Hurley: I am completely useless in this because I do not post.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah, I do not post either. But even in that price range, the pens I've used, pens I can think of, like the Sailor Regulus Post. It's a nice steel nib sailor pen. It's a little bit thin, but it's got good length. The Pelican M205 you can find for under $100 if you shop hard enough. It's not always that price, but I found them for under $100. If you have large hands, it's a smaller pen, but posted, it works really well.

Brad Dowdy: I find the Kaweco AL Sports to be a very good posted length pen as far as size and weight goes, even though when it's capped, it's really like a pocket pen. It's a shorter pen. It's clipless unless you add on the clip.

Myke Hurley: So I would say, I know that we're going on the short side and just getting shorter and shorter as I'm about to say this. But something like the Kaweco Lilliput, that screws on, right?

Brad Dowdy: Right.

Myke Hurley: That might be a good idea.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. That's too thin. And if you have large hands and you're writing a lot, I wouldn't recommend that pen. I'd use the AL Sport. Even though it doesn't screw on, it posts very securely and it posts to a full-size pen.

Myke Hurley: You're seeing where I'm going with this though, right? If you can screw it on, it's not going to fall off. Right.

Brad Dowdy: Right. So the other ones post deeply and post tightly. Obviously, that's a weird price point. Always has been. Anything between $50 and $100 is a very strange price point. Like the Pilot Pereira posts wonderfully. It's just a smaller, lightweight pen. You have to decide if you like that. It's under $50 and it's a great pen. Writes wonderfully. So that's maybe something to look at.

Pen Searching

Myke Hurley: I just had one of these great moments, just a classic pen-addict moment. I was searching for those pens as you were talking about them. And in the top two results for all of them is your reviews.

Myke Hurley: That's how I roll. It makes it so easy for me. I will just point out, I found a Kaweco AL Sport EF Nib review. And it's a matte black Kaweco. My gosh, that's good looking.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. All those Kawecos are good looking. That's why I have so many of them.

Myke Hurley: It's like you took the picture on your couch. It's on some gray leather. Nice. I'm going to assume you put that on your couch and took a picture.

Brad Dowdy: Sure. I have no idea. I can't remember those. All of them. And I'm sure I'm forgetting some in that price range, but it's not an easy price range. We've discussed this lots of times.

Brad Dowdy: All right. You go next. You go next. And then I have one I really want to read.

Myke Hurley: All right. This one's a little bit trickier. Okay. The handwriting's small.

Brad Dowdy: I was wondering to send this one to you or not, but I think it came out okay.

Listener Email

Myke Hurley: I think I can do it. Howdy, Brad and Myke. First of all, thanks for all of the awesome podcasts. I only found you all around episode 200 earlier this year and have since started at the beginning and have 10 more to go to get to the current, to get current with the whole show. Thank you, Travis, for saying that. And I wonder when you're going to hear this. Who knows? Although I have enjoyed the pen content immensely, I have found I'm gravitating more and more towards the conversations discussing your business practices and the philosophies underlying the choices you'll have made during your respective careers. I love the fact that Travis writes y'all in his letters. I like saying that.

Brad Dowdy: Where is he from? Yeah, he's from Texas. So that's perfect.

Myke Hurley: I think that's amazing. A friend and I are in the process of starting our own business and I have on more than one occasion stopped to consider how to handle a choice and thought back on one of your discussions of how you handled something similar. Many of these being best practices for sponsors, advertising or receiving free items for review. So even outside of the pen world, you have an impact upon my life. Myke, congrats on the engagement and the new domicile. Please don't congratulate me yet. We're still not even close. I don't even want to talk about it. Don't make me. Also, I really enjoy your editing style on the newly minted vlog. Thank you, Travis. Keep up the good work. Questions for you. Do you have a recommended podcast starter pack for equipment and software?

Myke Hurley: No. But what I will do is I gave a talk at an Apple store like nearly 18 months ago, but I kind of went through like a basics and I think a lot of that still applies. So all of my equipment's changed, but you don't need to worry about that. But the basics, they remain the same. I'll put a link to that in the show notes. I am part of the PC crowd. Hopefully you will forgive my non-appilyness. I can do that. Don't worry. Also, during one of your numerous podcasts, have you or any of the other hosts spoken about the more technical aspects behind the scenes routines of producing a podcast? Not really, but I am going to make a vlog about that at some point because people keep asking me, even though I think it's a boring topic to show on video, like how I make a podcast. Enough people are asking me that it's on my list to do at some point. Now, Brad, I've got questions for you here. Brad, it looks like you have another killer Kickstarter project on your hands. My question for you is, how do you store your spare nibs? I have a complete range of Lamy nibs, but do not have a satisfactory way of storing them. I saw a pouch Franklin Kristoff makes, but it only has four slots. Have you or NotCo ever considered producing something similar with more capacity? Again, thank you all for everything from Travis.

Brad Dowdy: So I store my nibs in one of the NotCo chimney top cases, which is just the pouch. And all those nibs individually live in either little small containers that they shipped in, little small plastic baggies that they shipped in, like in the way Lamy nibs ship. There's just a little plastic baggie. And I just keep all those in a chimney top because there's no universal storage mechanism for that. It's hard to do something very, very specific. So I just use a pouch and put those different things all in one pouch. So I know all my nibs are in this one location. So I can go in and grab them. That's the best thing I've found to store my nibs. And yeah, sometimes I still have to like dig through that pouch to find the ones that I want. So it's not perfect, but it's the best way. And I want to go back to what Travis said about talking about our individual businesses and things like that. That's something I really enjoy talking about. But I'm also really cognizant of I don't want to talk about it too much, right? So I think it's good when we dedicate half a show to hammer out all the new changes and things that we've gone through and are able to talk about it. I'm glad you can get some information from that to help you with your own business. We try to make the best decisions possible. We're not always right. And, you know, we just try to do the best that we can and make the best decisions for us and our respective companies. And I know I can speak for Myke on that.

Myke Hurley: Yep. Travis, if you don't, I recommend that you listen to another show of mine on RelayFM called Cortex, where this is all I talk about. So if you don't listen to that, then you might enjoy it.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. And if you ever have specific questions, email me directly. I don't mind one bit.

Myke Hurley: You're so kind.

Brad Dowdy: Always.

Myke Hurley: You're going to go next or do you want me to take another one?

Brad Dowdy: I'm going to go next. I'm going to make sure to get this one in. This one's from TK.

Myke Hurley: Hi, TK.

Brad Dowdy: All right. Dear Brad and Myke, firstly, I would thank you both for the wonderful blog and podcast that you share with all of us. A few months back, I first got into fountain pens when I was reminded of my favorite teacher in undergrad who used fountain pens exclusively and gave some of his gifts to students who won academic awards that he made himself. I first tried to pilot Metropolitan I found on Amazon. And while I didn't love the pen, I fell in love with writing by hand again because of it. I learned shortly afterwards about the pen addict and listened through a large portion of your podcast and read much of your blog as well. It has been a wonderful journey of learning to love one of my favorite things all over again, coming out of a long stint of suicidal depression. Fountain pens and the entire stationary community has given me new life and something to be passionate and excited about after a lengthy period of struggling to get by day by day. And you both have had a big part in that process. And I really wanted to thank you for sharing your passion for pens and paper with so many people. As for a question, do either of you play any tabletop games, board games, and RPGs? As that's one of my hobbies. Sincerely, TK.

Myke Hurley: So I just want to say, hells yeah, TK. We didn't do it. You did it.

Brad Dowdy: That's right. That was on you. So good work.

Brad Dowdy: I'm really proud.

Brad Dowdy: Of you, TK, for writing this down and sending it and understanding that you've had a struggle and you fought your way out of it. And you should be proud of that too. And when I read this letter, I had had about a stack of 10 letters that day I was going through. And it's coming again because you know how I am. I stopped. I just started crying. I just stopped. Of course you did. Because that's how I am. I just, you know, I couldn't read anymore right then. I was like, I was, that, this fun that we have affects people in a way that's very helpful and beneficial to them. And can make a, even just like the tiniest little bit of difference. That's a big deal. And I really appreciate that. And I hope, you know, I hope we can give everyone a little bit of enjoyment and a little bit of fun. And I just want to say, TK, for someone who's just gotten into this, your handwriting is impeccable. And your choice of paper and fountain penings is staggering. So you've done really, really well. And you can write to me and Myke anytime.

Myke Hurley: On that note, I don't take my job for granted. And, you know, this isn't the first time that I've been lucky enough to have a letter like that written to me. It's happened a couple of times. I think it's happened for me and you before as well.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah, yeah, it has. We've gotten to meet lots of emails around this topic or around, you know, saying these things.

Myke Hurley: I take what I do very seriously because I know that it makes people happy. And I will always continue to do that. And at the point where I think I can't do that is when I'll stop doing it.

Brad Dowdy: Which is going to be never.

Myke Hurley: Which is going to be never. You pry it from my cold hands.

Brad Dowdy: Mm-hmm.

Myke Hurley: All right, I'm going to go for one now.

Brad Dowdy: Yes, I need to compose myself.

Fountain Pen Care

Myke Hurley: I think you do. I think you do. Dear, don't get the letters wet. You're going to run the ink on them. I did mess up one of them, kind of. Of course you did. Dear Brian and Myke, I'm writing to you using my Schaefer Snorkel Statesman fountain pen. I found it several years ago in an old secondhand desk. I thought it looked interesting, so I kept it around on the chance that it might hold some value. I had no idea how to ink it up, so it sat unused on my desk drawer for years. One of your podcasts gave me the idea to dip the pen in a bottle of ink and try writing with it. And it's been one of my favorite pens ever since. Thank you for inspiring me to try new things. The Schaefer Snorkel is a vintage pen and sometimes gives me thinking about the history and evolution of writing instruments. I would love a coffee table book on the subject. Do you know if any such book exists? Sincerely, Doug.

Brad Dowdy: So I loved this question when he asked it, and I didn't have time to research it. And I don't own any specific ones like that. The one that I do own is from Andy Lambrough. It's the Pens of Japan book, but it's not necessarily a history book. It's more of a visual coffee table style book. So I would open that up to the listeners. If anyone has any great recommendations for books, I think we can do some follow-up on this because I would like to know that myself, especially with the holidays coming up. If we can find some good history books that would be very cool for our listeners, for myself and things like that.

Myke Hurley: If you are like me and you've never heard of or seen a Schaefer Snorkel before, check the link in the show notes. This is one of the most bonkers things I've ever seen. Yeah, it's a cool pen.

Brad Dowdy: What on earth? I keep telling myself I need to buy one of those, and I just don't because it's such a cool filling system.

Myke Hurley: It's a literal snorkel. It looks like a ballpoint extends from out of the fountain pen nib. That's what it looks like. It's like this rod comes out, and then you dunk that in the ink, and it fills it. How peculiar. How peculiar. People don't make weird stuff like this anymore. You know?

Brad Dowdy: Oh, gosh, no. Can you imagine? That's why Brian Gray at Edison Pens, he likes to try to recreate some of the old filling systems, just because no regular pen company is going to be able to afford to do that in any kind of scale. So, yeah.

Myke Hurley: Because I assume it's horrifically unreliable as well. I can imagine that thing just spitting ink out all over the place.

Brad Dowdy: Yep, yep.

Myke Hurley: Hey, should we take a break?

Brad Dowdy: Yeah, take a quick break, and I definitely have more I want to get to, so I'm trying to narrow these down for today. We're definitely going to have another segment of this going forward.

Myke Hurley: Oh, I have no doubt that now we've done this, people are going to want to write in even more than ever, so we'll talk about that at the end of the show.

Brad Dowdy: I just want to make sure to get everyone who did it for this show in. Yeah. Even though it's not going to happen today, but I guarantee it's going to happen.

Myke Hurley: This week's episode is also brought to you by the Pen Chalet. We have a big, big offer today, Brad. Go check it out. Uh-oh. I'm going right now. They sell authentic, amazing roller balls, fountain pens, ballpoints, mechanical pencils, everything you are looking for. They have all the brands that you want as well. Monteverde, Pelican, Lamy, Pilot, Namiki, Sailor, Kaweko, and an authorized theater of all of them. They believe in providing the fastest and most reliable customer service, which is why they give a 100% satisfaction guarantee on all of their high-quality, low-priced pens. They do great discounts all the time. They have sales all the time, and they're adding new styles of pens every single month. They have free shipping on orders of over $50 in the United States. They sell internationally with very reasonable shipping rates. I will mention this as always. If you've heard us talk about a pen today in this episode that you're interested in, go to penshaulet.com first and see if it's there. Because if you click the podcast link at the top of the website and use the password penaddict, you will get a code to save 10% on anything you find at the Penshaulet, including this week's special offer. You can get 10% off the 30% discount, so you're getting a huge discount on a Pilot Vanishing point in the black carbon-esque finish in broad nib. You get 30% off plus that 10% discount on top. What an offer this week. A vanishing point. And I will say I've used a few of them. And again, while it's not my favorite pen because I don't like the clip, but I know basically everybody else on the planet does. The broad nib on these is amazing.

Brad Dowdy: That is true. It's a Japanese broad nib, so it writes probably like a Western medium. But it's still, you know, it's a little bit firm and really, really nice line. And can we say the price? We can't say the price, can we? I'll say the price. It's really good. It's really good. Excuse me. Yeah. Anytime you can get anything, any percentage off on a vanishing point, it's a good deal because that rarely, rarely happens. So yeah, wonderful, wonderful deal.

Myke Hurley: You're going to go check it out. Thank you so much to Penn Shelley, as always, for supporting this show and RelayFM.

Brad Dowdy: All right. So this one, like all the letters are interesting, so I should probably stop saying, oh, this one's very interesting. This one's from Joseph. And when I opened up the very traditional envelope, out popped this very unique green gridded and blank engineering paper. Like I've seen this paper. I was like, wow, this is really cool engineering paper. And then like you kind of have those thoughts before you start reading the letter. And then this happens. It says, dear pen addict. I've been listening to and reading your blog for over a year since finding them in a quest to improve my handwriting. Your request for handwritten as TPA has inspired me to take the time and write in. I found your recent discussion of the handwriting doesn't matter article interesting. The subject has come up periodically over the years with most articles proclaiming the end of handwriting as nigh. The problem is they all ignore the role of handwriting in math. I work as a mechanical engineer and use math constantly. For me, a pen and paper is an important part of my job. It is cumbersome and time consuming to do my work solely digital. The combination of numbers, symbols, letters, characters, and subscripts make it difficult even to create the most basic of formulas. This shortcoming becomes even more evident in a classroom setting. Part of the need for handwriting in math is that at the core of how math works and how it is taught, math is still very much about working things out on paper. You need to see your work from beginning to end. Working through a problem may involve going back a step, crossing things out, writing new things, erasing them, and rearranging them. It is time that the computer makes the computational aspects of math faster and in many cases possible. It should not be forgotten that the computer is a tool, just like the pen. The inclusion of one does not mean the exclusion of the other. Sincerely, Joseph. This is a wonderful point that I had not considered before. And I'm a huge believer in math and science are the keys to education these days. And I was terrible at math and science. But I keep telling my kids, these are the things you should focus on. Because no matter what you're doing, those things are in the background somewhere, right? Yep. In one way or the other. Whether in your computer programming or research or really, gosh, I mean, even if you're a lawyer, math and science plays a huge role in how you're coming to decisions. So, I thought this was a great letter and something to think about. I don't know that I necessarily have an answer other than I absolutely completely agree with what he's saying there.

Cursive Writing

Myke Hurley: I think it links back to the cursive discussion, right? Not letting these things go away just because there's other things that you can do. They're still valuable.

Brad Dowdy: Right. Right. Speaking of which, I'm about three quarters of the way through the book. So, I'll get that done and get Mr. Trebek scheduled. Hopefully sooner rather than later.

Myke Hurley: Now, I have one more. Do you want to go and then I'll do my last one?

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. I have a short one reel here. This one came on like a little card. Some of these came in cards. And I love this one because it has stickers all over it. It's got like a little spaceship and it's got an ATPA and a sticker. And the card says, you are my favorite, which I mean, duh. And then I open it up and there was a sticker, like a spaceship rocket taken off.

Myke Hurley: That one must have been meant to be sent to me, right?

Brad Dowdy: Nope. Nope. That's fine for me. So, it's from Carrie. She says, hi, Myke and Brad. Love your podcast. I look forward to it each week. I've only used my, I've used my Lamy Safari broad nib for years, but I like to venture out and try some other pens. What pens would you recommend I try next? Thanks so much and take care. So, that's actually a question we get a lot. And our question, our answer is generally the same. It's generally one of the Twisby's, either the Eco or the 580. 100%. I would hold off on the 580 right now because it looks like they're getting ready to change it again. So, I'd wait and see what they have next. But the Eco is such a fun pen and it's right in the price point of the Safari. I would go for that. It's a piston filling fountain pen. So, you have to have a bottle of ink to use with it. If you're not, I know Lamy makes the turquoise cartridges, which looks like what you're using now. So, if you don't have a bottle of ink, you need to buy a bottle of ink. And that's always fun to get into your first bottle of ink. Yeah. So, I would totally do that. So, thanks so much for the stickers and the cool letter. All right. Hit it, Myke.

Myke Hurley: Dear Brad. Dan wants nothing to do with me.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah.

Myke Hurley: He knows I have no help for him. And it's true. The cap threads of my Noodler's Ahab and a few other pens are very stiff and make it difficult to unscrew the cap. Any suggestions on how to make the threads smoother? From Dan.

Brad Dowdy: Some people, and I say that because I haven't done it, some people will add the smallest amount of silicone grease to their threads. No way. I would never do that.

Myke Hurley: I'm not dealing with the greasiness on my hands.

Brad Dowdy: I don't either. But I've heard people doing that. Otherwise, it's just an effect of the material used for that pen. So, the threading's not clean on that. You're barely even going to have the time to even wear it down to wear it smooth. I have some pens like that. And that's just, unfortunately, part of the materials used in the finishing process for that pen. There's nothing you can really do. I've heard people adding that on there. But I wouldn't do it. I'm not interested in that. I hate doing eyedroppers as much as I love using and filling eyedroppers. I hate silicone grease because I feel like I can never get it off my fingers. It bugs me. So, there's that.

Myke Hurley: There's one thing that I will add to this. See, I hope I can provide some good advice here. Make sure you've soaked the pen just in case you've gotten any ink in there. It happens. It's happened to me. You know, you might have had a small ink explosion at some point. And there might be some dried ink in the threads. Make sure you've given it a good clean. Look at that. Look at me. Fair enough. I'm adding value. I know you're just brushing that off. But... No, you've got some smarts.

Brad Dowdy: I'm not just a pretty face. All right. Let's hit one more. And then we'll wrap it up for today. I think we maybe got through half of them, which I'm surprised. I thought we'd get through more. So, I apologize if I didn't get to you today. And I feel guilty about it. So, I promise you we're going to get to them all soon. You're like at the front of the line. All these handwritten-ass TPAs. That I can guarantee you. All right. Brad and Myke. First off, thank you for the excellent podcast. I'm not much of a pen addict myself. I found everything I need in the Muji 0.38 gel ink pen. That's a good pen. I thoroughly enjoy hearing two gents talking about them so passionately. I'm more of a stationary fan, as you can probably see. My ask TPA is this. Do you think the current fascination with analog tools, snail mail, stationary, is due to people's tendency to take a step back? Remember the Polaroid surge when digital cameras became a thing? Or do you think it's more deeply rooted than that? Thanks, Brittany.

Pen Nostalgia

Brad Dowdy: What do you think?

Myke Hurley: Little column A, little column B. Yeah. I think that there are people like us who have just always been into this stuff since they were kids. And that now they have the money to actually spend on it. They will. Right? I think me and you were both in that camp.

Brad Dowdy: And then we have the internet to find those crazy things that we didn't think were possible when we were younger. Like the pens I dreamed about when I was a kid I didn't think existed. Mm-hmm. And hey, guess what? Now that I can see what other people are using around the world, it turns out they do exist. And you know what? I can buy them too. Yep. So I fully believe analog is here to stay. The fascination is here to stay. People do use it as a respite from their daily lives. It gives them a mental break. That's why we don't want to see handwriting go away. I fully believe in that. And I also think it is deeply rooted when people can see letters that their grandparents wrote to each other. And it invokes a different feeling about things than seeing that email you wrote that one time.

Myke Hurley: But people love nostalgia. And it's a nice nostalgic thing. And it's a cool thing. You know, like the Polaroid comparison is a very good one to make. Yeah. But yes, I think it's a little column A, a little column B. But even if some of the coolness of it goes away, like the planner stuff and the coloring stuff and all that just dies off, there'll still be people like me and Brad who will never refuse to let go of their pens.

Brad Dowdy: That's right.

Myke Hurley: Someone asked me on Analog if I had to choose between giving up my pens for a week or giving up Twitter for a week, which I'd choose. And I would give up Twitter every time.

Brad Dowdy: Not close. Yeah. Every time.

Myke Hurley: I could give it up easily. I mean, look, I could not use my pens for a week, but I don't want to do that. Right. So there you go. Right. This has been a resounding success for something that just came to us randomly as an idea halfway through a show one time. This has been great fun. I have really, really enjoyed it. I like getting the longer questions and the letters for this show. I think it makes more sense. So we have obviously more to do. So we should do this again in a few weeks time so we can finish these off. But I want more of them now. And I hope that the listeners do too. So I'm sorry, Brad. There is a link in the show notes to Brad's email address. The email address is the Pen Addict contact page. Send them in. I want us to have more written as TPA than we get tweets. That's what I want because I think that's the right thing for this show. So keep writing them in and we'll keep doing them.

Myke Hurley: All right. I think that's about rounded off for this week, Brad. Yes, sir. If you want to find our show notes, you can head on over to relay.fm slash penaddict slash 228. You can find Brad online. He's at nokaco.com. Congratulations on the Kickstarter, by the way.

Brad Dowdy: Thank you, sir. And the retail launch on top of it. So it's been busy times. We'll have an episode coming up soon where we'll talk business stuff. So yeah.

Myke Hurley: We've been doing that a bit recently. So we're giving you all a break. But now we'll do it in the last minute of the show. Yeah. I've seen some people tweet in their beautifully purple Sinclairs. It's so cool. So congratulations on all of that great business stuff. Thanks. Thanks. You can also find Brad on Instagram. He's penaddict on Twitter. He is dowdyism. I am at imike, I-M-Y-K-E on both. We'll be back next time with a very special episode. We have a couple of really exciting guests, which I think you're all going to love. Until then, say goodbye, Brad.

Brad Dowdy: Goodbye, Brad. Goodbye, Brad. Goodbye, Brad.