The Pen Addict 177/transcript

The Pen Addict Podcast Transcript
Episode:	177
Title:	The Pen Type Brad
Release Date:	October 19th, 2015
Hosts:	Brad Dowdy Myke Hurley
Guests:	No guests this episode
Additional Information
Official page:	Episode 177
Audio File:	Audio Episode 177
Podcast page:	The Pen Addict 177
Length:	6262 min <br />1.033 h <br /> minutes
Previous Transcript	Next Transcript

Pen Addict Podcast

Myke Hurley: From RelayFM, this is The Pen Addict, episode 177. Today's show is brought to you by lynda.com and Fracture. My name is Myke Hurley, and I am joined, of course, by the one and only Mr. Brad Dowdy.

Brad Dowdy: What's up, mate?

Myke Hurley: Nothing, man. I'm getting ready to go on a trip tomorrow.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. Tell us all about what you're going to do.

Myke Hurley: I'm doing the keynote speak talk. Keynote speak. There you go. That's a really good start for somebody who needs to...

Brad Dowdy: You are a professional podcaster, so this ought to work out well for you.

Myke Hurley: Not only spend the next hour talking and then need to prepare to actually speak in front of people, I'm giving the keynote speech at a new conference called Release Notes in Indianapolis, and I should hopefully be meeting with the lovely Mr. Thomas Hall, who I owe an email back to as we speak currently, but we're hopefully going to go and meet for coffee one morning.

Brad Dowdy: You probably owe him some pens, too, knowing you.

Myke Hurley: No, I don't, actually, this time. Well, I think it's mainly because he probably won't ever send me any more.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. That's true. That's true.

Myke Hurley: That feels potentially more likely. So, yeah, that'll be nice, but I'm really looking forward to it. There's a couple of pen addicts that are going to be there. Doug's going to be there, of course, because Doug Beal is everywhere.

Brad Dowdy: He is. That's awesome. And I listened to your piece on Analog last night, and you were talking with Casey about getting prepared for it, and it sounds like you've got this down, man. I'm excited for you. You seem, like, confident about it. You're ready to roll, and I am proud of you and excited for you.

Myke Hurley: Thank you. I've been looking deeply at this presentation, thinking about it a lot, and I presented it to a few people. I did a dry run with Gray today, and if I can present to him, I can present to anyone.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah, but he'll tell you how it is. Oh, he did. I mean, he tells Brady how it is right on the show, so they don't care. That's good that you need someone like that. So, yeah, perfect.

Myke Hurley: So, yeah, I think it – I'm looking forward to it. I'm looking forward to it. So, it'll be fun.

Brad Dowdy: Good. Good. Well, are you flying with any pens? That's all we really care about on this show.

Karas Customs Inc.

Myke Hurley: Standard fare, I'm flying with a Karas Customs Inc., but the Retro 51 refill version. I have the NASA Retro 51, just because I have one in my bag, two Sharpies, and the Colt Pens Mechanical Pencil. Nice. It's a pretty good kit. Yeah. Pretty standard fare, and I've got a couple of Field Notes notebooks and one of the .dash Notco books.

Brad Dowdy: Nice. Nice, nice, nice. All right, and so in some of those books, you may have tested out your pen show in it. And, yeah, we still haven't verified that name, but we were talking last week about how we got those in, and you were disappointed in the colored leads that were available. And it didn't hit me until after the show and listening to the Erasable podcast with Anna on it talking about colored pencils. And then the same night, I got a Slack message from Edward's editor in the Pen Attic Slack Room that essentially said the same thing as Anna. So let me read this out to everyone, because it was not clear to me at the time when we were talking about different graphite hardnesses and the scale that pencils are measured on. So let me read this. It says the H, F, H, B, and B scale only refers to graphite and clay leads. The more graphite, the softer. The more clay, the harder. Colored leads are made of pigments and waxes, and each manufacturer has their own recipe. I'm not aware of any standard hardness scale, so you might just need to check with the colored lead community. That's not me, by the way, is what Edward's editor says. I can tell you about colored woodcase pencils, but I don't do much colored lead. So I thought that was a really, really good point. It's a completely different game, right?

Myke Hurley: Yeah, completely. I barely understand it.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah, so it's just a totally different material. Listen to the Erasable podcast with Anna. She talks about how some of these different types perform. But basically, it's going to be, if we're going to find something to suit you better, it's going to be a word of mouth reading reviews type of thing. Because just think of the colored lead by Uniball as Uniball's recipe. It's going to come one way, and they're going to make it soft, hard, you know, dark, light, whatever theirs comes out to be, and per color, right? Because each color has a different combination, right? So red could be soft and light. Blue could be hard and dark, right? So we're just going to have to get recommendations, read reviews, try to find out what's the best fit for any type of colored leads, whether it be, you know, the leads for the pen show or in a colored pencil, right? So it's going to be some trial and error. And I'm going to order some things and play around with it, because I want a good colored lead for the pen show myself instead of the standard gray graphite. So I will work on that and see what I can find out. So what was the composition you wanted? The red you have is way too soft, right? It crumbles?

Myke Hurley: Yeah, well, it doesn't crumble. It's just too soft. Too soft. Yeah, it's way too soft. Like I can't, I cannot keep it at a fine point.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. Yeah, so you would prefer it to be harder and probably maybe a little bit darker.

Myke Hurley: Yeah, exactly. Like the black one. Okay.

Brad Dowdy: So, yeah, I'm going to work on that because I want something for that too. And I started to order some things and then I started getting these emails and I was listening to Anna talk about this on Erasable. And I was like, oh, let me hold off and let me read a little bit more. And then we'll find something else. So Myke and I are open for suggestions for lead replacements for the pen show that will get us some nice colored lead refills for that.

Myke Hurley: Yeah, it's frustrating. But I get it. But it's like, ah, why can't physics be different? I don't know. Like I don't know what it is that makes up the, like how it works out.

Brad Dowdy: But, you know, this whole show has been one big learning process, right? I mean, you know, we're just learning about the grown-up coloring thing. And, you know, we're getting all the information about that. And now we're learning about colored lead hardness and how to determine what that is. And hopefully, you know, we're on a mission to find some answers. And hopefully we can share those with everyone, you know, what we find. And that's kind of a fun part about the show because the community will jump in here. You know, someone will have experience with this. And they'll say, hey, try this or look at that. And here's why you should do this. And then you get information like this from Edward's editor. It's like, oh, well, duh, that's exactly how it is. And it makes us smarter, even if we don't sound it at the time.

Brad Dowdy: All right, Myke, the next link's for you, buddy. Yes. Bic is on a mission to save handwriting. And did they email this directly to you?

Myke Hurley: Not yet. I'm waiting for it. I'm waiting for my personal tutor to arrive or something.

Brad Dowdy: So this is just a general piece. And, you know, if you listen to this interview, there's an audio interview on this page. We'll link in the show notes. It says, Bic is on a mission to save handwriting. Does it need saving? And it's basically an NPR channel reviewed. Pam Allen, who is actually employed by Bic for their Fight for Your Right campaign. And she is a literary, a literacy person. She operates an organization called Lit World and, you know, works on handwriting, you know, with underprivileged kids and underprivileged areas and travels around the world and espousing those things. And, you know, she was doing that before she was employed by Bic. And Bic got together with her to kind of spread the word about this campaign about Fight for Your Right. And basically what it is, is, you know, Bic wants, obviously, Bic has their own motives, right? So you got to take this with, you know, a grain of salt. But it's still a valid point that, you know, Bic wants you to embrace your technology, you know, and technology is a tool. But it's not the solution, you know, for everything and that there's a place for pen and paper and there's a place for writing, especially for the young, young kids. You know, I'm concerned being a father of young kids, a second and fourth grader, that they don't value. They don't understand how important handwriting is, you know, 20 years down the line. You know, everything's digital right now, it seems like. And even in schools, you know, they're getting pushed to more digital things, which, hey, I'm a computer guy. I want them. I'm excited for that. I want my daughter to learn how to code. But when she's, you know, 25 and looking for a job and she can't take handwritten notes in a meeting because she's, like, stressing about writing and she's so used to writing something digitally, I don't want that to happen. I think it's important that this campaign, you know, gets into the schools and, you know, gets into people and gets people writing. And, you know, it's based around stuff we have talked about ad nauseum, right? We are very big believers in doing this. So I thought it was a decent interview. I thought Pam left a little bit on the table, if you will. She could have locked it down a little bit more. The interviewer actually did a good job of pressing her about why he should trust her and BIC being an employee of BIC. I thought that was a fair question.

Myke Hurley: Because that's exactly what I thought when I saw it. I was like, of course you're saying this because otherwise you guys go out of business.

Brad Dowdy: Right. That's exactly right. And I didn't think she nailed that answer. I thought she kind of sidestepped it a little bit. And that's okay. I mean, I don't like to be put on the spot either like that. But it's worth a listen. And this isn't about the interviewer and Pam, but it's about, you know, BIC. I appreciate BIC putting, you know, their advertising dollars in a fight for your right campaign. So I think it's important. So I haven't seen anything about this, right? I would have never seen this if someone didn't email me this link. You know, I don't know where they're running these ads. You know, how they're trying to push this platform. I certainly haven't seen anything about it. But I'll keep my eyes peeled just out of curiosity and seeing how they're trying to deliver this campaign. Because right now I'm just seeing the talk about it and the launch about it. But I'm trying to figure out where the action is. That's what I haven't figured out yet. So I'll keep my eyes on it.

The Illusionist Podcast

Brad Dowdy: Related to that, I got a bunch of links to a podcast called The Illusionist. Have you ever heard of that?

Myke Hurley: I have heard of this show, actually. I've never listened to it, but I know the name.

Brad Dowdy: It's basically a show about words. You know, what different word meanings, things like that. I forget the lady's name who does it, but she was fantastic. Is it Helen Zoltzler? It's Helen. Yeah, that sounds right. Yeah. Yeah, she was fantastic. I really like her style. But they did a show on eponyms, which is, gosh, I guess you would explain it as, you know, the word has two different meanings kind of thing. It's, you know, where, like, they're taking, what's his name? Marcel Bick is his last name. And then Bick also is the company name. And Bick is also ubiquitous with a ballpoint pen. And same thing with Laszlo Biro, who first patented the pen. So they kind of go through the origin stories of how the ballpoint came to be. They have on, she has on James Ward, who wrote the book Adventures in Stationery, which I have not read yet. The team over at Erasable went through the book on one of their episodes. We'll have to find that episode number where they went through and talked about a lot of the pencil and stationery things in that book. I'll have to get that book to read. But it was an interesting little backstory that James gave about how Laszlo Biro came up with the idea of the ballpoint, patented it, started trying to make it, had a lot of failures. You know, and how he worked through all those failures into making, like, a really valid product. And then got into business with Marcel Bick, who licensed the technology from Biro. And how that ended up in a bunch of lawsuits. And then, you know, Bick ended up becoming, like, the most famous, essentially the most famous ballpoint pen company in the world, right? And probably still is to that. So it was interesting to see. It was interesting to hear a little bit of that background. I kind of knew the story a little bit. James Ward goes into it a little bit more detail than that. But it's like a 17-minute podcast, and there's probably, like, 10 or 12 minutes of this story. So it's worth it to jump in there, hear the story. James was saying that, to this day, the Bick Crystal, you know, the clear, the most famous Bick? Like, basically, it still accounts for half of all ballpoint pens sold on a daily basis.

Myke Hurley: It doesn't surprise me. Like, you know, if I think about me in my work life, my old work life, there was just every stationary closet just had boxes and boxes and boxes of Bick's.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. Yeah. There was an interesting point during the podcast where he was talking about how when the ballpoint started becoming really popular, they ran up against a huge community that felt they were actually going to hurt handwriting. So because they don't have the line variation and the flair that you could get with a fountain pen at the time because that was what everyone was using. You know, the ballpoint just generally had a straight fixed-width line. And that was – they were – you know, the complaints at that time were that, well, that's going to ruin handwriting because you can't get all this variation. And you can't – don't have, like, all the smoothness and all the flair that you get with the fountain pen. So they argued about pens back then just like we're arguing about them now, right?

Myke Hurley: Yep.

Brad Dowdy: Totally the same thing. But that's a good – check out that podcast. You know, like I said, it's a 17-minute long podcast. It was good to listen to. And the previous article is, like, a 10-minute interview. So you can knock both of those out, hear what they have to say. I think they both make some good points and some interesting things. One of the hot items in my Instagram feed and on Twitter, and it's something I should have spoken about earlier because I'm interested to see which of our listeners do this. And I know several of them do. And that's Inktober. Are you familiar with Inktober? I remember this.

Myke Hurley: We've spoken about it before.

Inktober

Brad Dowdy: God, yeah. And I can't believe it's taken me over half the month to get to the Inktober. But it's basically where people take the month of October. Artists, anyone, writers, sketchers, make an ink drawing, post it, hashtag it Inktober. And people try to do it once a day for the 31 days of October. So you'll see lots of numbers related. Yeah, Dan Bishop at Design Concussion on Instagram is doing Inktober. Brian Draghi, I know, is doing Inktober, is one of our followers and listeners. So if anyone else is doing Inktober, I would love to see your work. I don't know if Joey Feldman's doing it. He's a big listener and reader of the pen addict and artists. So there's probably tons of y'all that are doing Inktober work. And I would love to see it. I think Matthew Morse, hey Matthew, is doing Inktober. So send us your link. Send it to us on Twitter. Tag me on Instagram, whatever. I want to see your stuff. We have the hashtag for Inktober. And I don't know how long this has been running. I mean, Instagram does it for all time. But there's over a million posts tagged Inktober on Instagram. So I'd love to see it. And I'm looking through the feed now. And everyone's got a bunch of 19s on it because that's today's date. So they're doing their 19th drawing to mark the 19th day of Inktober. And it's just kind of cool to see all these drawings, see all the tools that people use. These are the kind of things that fascinate me. Even though I don't participate in it myself, I can't stop looking at this type of stuff. Do you enjoy this type of thing, Myke?

Myke Hurley: It's nice to see beautiful artwork, right?

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. And it's nice to see even like the most simple basic stuff. And I'm like, oh, maybe I should do it. No, I can't do it. Oh, my artwork's terrible. And, you know, it's not about that. Just do it, Brad, right? Do it, Brad. But, yeah. It's pretty cool. And I love seeing all this stuff. So if you're an Inktober participant, shoot us a link because I want to check it all out. All right, Myke. Hit me with this next spot.

Myke Hurley: So I saw this a little while before we began recording today.

Brad Dowdy: So I didn't see it before I pulled up the document. So that's why I want you to hit this up.

Myke Hurley: So this is something that we've known about for a while that Nixon, the fashion designer, clothing brand, watchmaker. I think they're mainly watches, right? Yeah. I think that's what they're mainly known for. But they do some other stuff, don't they?

Brad Dowdy: Right, yeah. I think they do some backpacks and stuff that I was looking at maybe. But I don't know. But they're definitely known for their watches. That's how I know them from.

Myke Hurley: They have commissioned – they do a lot of skateboarding-y type stuff as well, I think. Yeah. They have commissioned their own field notes, three different colors. They look like they've got quite – one of them at least looks really interesting paper-wise. And they're selling them, which is interesting because I didn't know you could do that. But they are. So these have been rumored to be coming along in kind of the wings for a while.

Myke Hurley: And they are available for sale now on nixon.com. I don't know how long they will be around for. But they are U.S. only. So you can't buy them outside of the U.S. However, I have a hookup. Ginny at Three Staples is helping me out, which I'm very happy about. So I'll be able to get a pack or two. But, yeah, you can buy these. The link will be in the show notes. They are available.

Brad Dowdy: This is a change in what Field Notes has done in the past. I don't understand it. Number one, they've never allowed people to make a custom book and resell it.

Brad Dowdy: Number one. Number two, they're charging $15 for it, which is out of line with Field Notes stock pricing.

Brad Dowdy: Number three, I'm just pretty uncomfortable with this all the way around.

Field Notes

Myke Hurley: Why?

Brad Dowdy: I mean, it's a good-looking pack. I think I'm getting a little burnout with the ancillary issues that are floating around. It's so much stuff that the next new thing doesn't get me excited like it used to when it used to be a lot fewer new things. Does that make sense?

Myke Hurley: Yeah.

Brad Dowdy: Like, I mean, I've totally blown out the budget, like, on pens in the past month. And I'm like, well, the last thing I need is another pack of Field Notes that's going to sit there unused. And so I'm not even going to order this one just because I don't need it. I love it. It's cool-looking. I just don't need it. And I'm super concerned if this is going to be the new business model for Field Notes. And that's fine. If that's their new business model, that's great. They just need to say it because in the past, you've never been allowed to sell Field Notes as a thing. So I don't know. They're talking about the Cole Field Notes in the chat room. That was in conjunction with Aaron Draplin. So I think there were some considerations made there to have that as an option to sell individually. But if we're going to start seeing every shop carry their own branded Field Notes, that's cool. I mean, and they can do some cool stuff. But it's just like, I mean, I just don't need it, right? I mean, it's too much. It's too much. And, you know, that's fine if Field Notes wants to do it that way. But just from my perspective, I just don't need that many more Field Notes. I am loaded for bear with Field Notes. So we'll see. It's just a sea change for the brand.

Myke Hurley: Yeah, yeah.

Brad Dowdy: And totally fine. I'm not against it. It's just not for me. Because now I'm going to see every cool shop with their own Field Notes. And, you know, it'll be good for those companies' brands. And it's good for Field Notes. They can get their brand into new hands. But, you know, I'm good with the colors.

Myke Hurley: So, like, were they J.Crew or JCPenney? Were they never sold?

Brad Dowdy: The J.Crew ones were in the store. I do remember that. The JCPenney ones I actually bought off the website. So, yeah, they've had some or they've sold in the past. So I don't get it. But if you ever wanted to order some, you know, for a project in the past, I mean, the rules are always you cannot sell them. So there have been exceptions in the past. I'm just wondering if this is an exception or if this is the new standard. Yeah. So, anyway, I mean, it doesn't matter to me in the end. It's just I've only got so many dollars to spend, you know, and I'm way over that. So then seeing something else new pop up today is like, oh, man, that's the last thing I need. So I'm not even interested in the least in ordering these.

Myke Hurley: Well, I'm going to order them.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. They're awesome. They're great colors. I think they're super cool. But I'm just whatever. I think they're blank on the inside, too. Are they blank?

Brad Dowdy: Doesn't even say. Oh, no, it's a mixed. It's a mixed three pack. I got you. Graph rule playing. That's cool. I like it. I think it's good for Nixon. It's good for field notes. It's just not necessarily good for me. I mean, I just don't. I've gotten a little bit burnt on the eight million special editions.

Myke Hurley: There's a lot right now. I wonder if it's just coincidence that there's so much right now. I don't know.

Brad Dowdy: I have a feeling it probably is. And believe me, I'm not. I feel notes should absolutely do it. It's only it's a good business decision. It's just as a customer. I just this isn't this is not a Pokemon thing for me. Right. So, yeah, I'm good with not owning every edition. So, there's certainly the price point is what I think was what's hanging me up. Why do they get to charge a premium? That's my biggest hang up, I think. Yeah.

Myke Hurley: Yeah. Yeah.

Brad Dowdy: So, we'll see. I think not.

Myke Hurley: I guess they're charging. I mean, I don't know how much it's costing. It might be costing Nixon like seven or eight dollars per pack, right? We don't know how that works out, I guess. Right. Right. Because Field Notes will naturally put their markup on that they wouldn't usually need to do. And then, I mean, I'm not excusing it. But that's why they're more expensive.

Brad Dowdy: Well, and this is why Field Notes has always had that policy in the past. Yeah. You can't sell them. So, is this a new thing? They're going to charge for this. And this is the new retail price of these books. Or. That's the confusing part.

Myke Hurley: Or.

Myke Hurley: Nixon just selling them.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. It's Nixon. Very well could. Yeah. Like, they're just doing it. Right.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. I mean, I don't think it's that big a deal. I'm not trying to make drama out of it. I just find it. I just have more questions. I have lots of questions about it.

Myke Hurley: There is a part of me that wants to not be able to buy limited editions. They're more fun when you can't buy them. Right? Sure. That's kind of the fun of it all. Like, you have to fight for them.

Brad Dowdy: Right.

Brad Dowdy: And who even says this is limited?

Myke Hurley: Doesn't it say it's limited on there? I think it does.

Brad Dowdy: It says special edition.

Myke Hurley: Okay. Well, yeah. Maybe I just conflated that in my mind. Oh, no.

Brad Dowdy: It says limited edition and special edition on the belly band. It says both things.

Brad Dowdy: So, yeah. I don't know if it's when they're gone, they're gone. Or they just print more. So, it just opens up a lot of questions. I mean, in the end, I don't totally care. I honestly think it's a good business decision by Field Notes. They can get their brand in front of more people. Right? I'm just saying it's different than how they've behaved in the past.

Myke Hurley: Yep.

Brad Dowdy: And the price is what's really got me questioning things. Like, what is this? So, anyway. Moving on, sir.

Pen Chalet

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. Should we take a break? Yeah. Let's take a quick break. I need a drink. And I want to hear about our awesome friends at lynda.com.

Myke Hurley: They are great. We love lynda.com. They are the online learning platform of over 3,000 on-demand video courses that are there to help you strengthen your business technology and creative skills. You can get yourself a free 10-day trial by visiting lynda.com slash penaddict. lynda.com is for people that want to solve problems. People that are curious or who just want to make things happen. Maybe you're looking to master Excel. Learn negotiation tactics. Build a website. Boost your Photoshop skills. Learn how to do some viral marketing for your business. Maybe you want to start a new business and learn how to bootstrap it and think about it that way. Maybe you then need to think about doing tax stuff at the end of the year. No matter what it is, lynda.com is there to feed your curious mind. You will be able to watch and learn from top experts who are super passionate about teaching and stream any of their thousands of video courses on demand, allowing you to learn on your own schedule and at your own pace. All of their courses are broken down into bite-sized chunks, allowing you to consume them and watch them really simply from start to finish or in any order that you want. You can also save them to playlists so you can maybe watch different types of courses in different orders and then you can share them with friends and colleagues and that sort of stuff afterwards. If you watch on a web browser, you'll be able to browse along with each course transcript so you can follow along and you can search for answers in those transcripts and skip to that point in the video. Or you can even watch and download courses to your Android or iOS device as well to learn on the go. Your lynda.com membership will give you unlimited access to any of this training, any of these training materials, these hundreds of topics, these thousands of hours. For just one flat rate. Whether you're looking to become an industry expert, you're passionate about a hobby, or you just want to learn something new, go and visit lynda.com slash penaddict for your free 10-day trial. Thank you so much to lynda.com for their support of this show.

Brad Dowdy: All right. Thank you, Linda. Real quick, back on the field notes thing, the chat room's got several more examples about them selling through retailers like the Starbucks one, which is a big example, right? But it's just sold through one physical shop in Seattle. You can't order them online.

Myke Hurley: The online sale makes it different.

Brad Dowdy: Right. Well, and it's the non-standard retail price, right? The Starbucks ones, I think, were whatever the regular price of that size field notes were. Either the arts and science ones were more, you know, they had a higher base price. And then the roastery editions were, I think, the same, $9.95. Punky sent me some of those, by the way. Yeah, I got some from one of our listeners as well. Pretty cool. And I will admit that the big size, the first roastery edition is one of my favorite editions yet. All right. So the reason why I did not purchase, pay the $15 for the Nixon is because I have also, I have recently purchased the 2015 limited edition MENA group buy from Edison Penco. So every year, Brian Gray at Edison does one pen, well, one style of pen, usually two different colors, or he'll have a vote. And whichever color wins the vote, he'll make, or the top two colors, whatever. So he'll do, he's got a couple different acrylics. Well, actually, one acrylic, one ebonite in the MENA shape, which is a barrel shape that I do not have an Edison pen in, and the acrylic is really pretty.

Brad Dowdy: And it comes with the, he's doing these new nibs on, on the pen. I'm also interested to try that. Visually, they don't speak to me that well, but I want to give them a try. And it doesn't, it didn't stop me from ponying up for it because the blue denim ebonite looks killer. And I have never ordered one of the, one of the group buys from him. I actually have one, but I had traded for someone who, after the group buy, wasn't crazy about their pen and wanted to trade it. So I have the Beaumont Stealth limited edition group buy pen, which is a great pen. But this is the first one I've actually ordered, you know, straight through Brian. I'm getting the standard MENA in denim ebonite with an extra fine on whatever this new nib he's trying. It's a very pointy, straight kind of nib as opposed to like a flared out standard fountain pen nib. It actually looks like the shape of the pilot Falcon nib or the Elabo nib. Although, but it's not flex. Don't get me, don't confuse what I'm saying there. I'm just talking about the shape in general. So it's interesting. I will, I'm interested to see what this is like. And I have a pen. I'm wondering if it's matches the ebonite pearl that I have. I'll have to pull up an old picture for you, Myke, and see how close it matches. It's a real close match to an ebonite pearl I bought at like the 2013 Atlanta pen show. I actually have it in my hand. I actually inked it up last night because it's such a good, it's also an ebonite barrel pen. And it's such a good looking pen that I, I'm lusting after this MENA already. So I had to ink up the similar looking Edison pearl that I have. So what, what do you think about these pens? I know I'm assuming you're probably not in this group buy. Um, it doesn't necessarily seem like your type of pen to, to jump on, but, uh, what do you think?

Myke Hurley: I think it looks very pretty. Um, I haven't seen a pen that I can recall like this where it kind of mirrors to the middle, um, and it tapers in like that.

Brad Dowdy: Right.

Myke Hurley: Um, at least that's how it looks to me. Maybe the lighting, but it looks like it's, it's thicker at the ends in the middle.

Brad Dowdy: I think it is. I believe it is.

Myke Hurley: It's how it looks. It might be, maybe, maybe I'm not seeing.

Brad Dowdy: No, I think it's, it's correct.

Myke Hurley: It's very, very pretty. The nib looks very, very interesting. Um, it's just not, I just don't want to put them. I just don't want to put the money in right now. I don't, I don't, I don't need to do that. Uh, I don't, I don't need another fountain. Even though it looks very, very nice. Um, I was wondering though, and you might know, why did they do this? Why does Edison do this?

Brad Dowdy: It's always been Brian's way to get some, get people into a, um, uh, signature line pin for a lower price, right? So he has production line pins, which are the Beaumont, the Perlette, um, the one he just discontinued. So he makes the production line pins that go out to all the vendors, right? They get the same shape, the same colors, the same everything. And then he has barrel designs like the Pearl, like the Mina, like the Menlo that you can only custom order. You can't get those from any retailer. And so he offers once a year, one of the signature line pin barrels in a unique color for a lower price than you would if you were just custom ordering a pin from Brian. Yeah. So it's his, it's his way of getting people into a signature line pin for a little bit better price because he can sell, um, more, you know, if he does this group buy his costs come down and things like that. So it's his way of, uh, of offering up, um, the opportunity to get a signature line pin when you may not, um, may not have been able to in the past. Um, because normally I don't know what these would normally run, but like the Pearl I have would have been at least, you know, probably 200, $250. Um, yeah, I said the normal retail retail price for these pins would be 200. So they're 175 and for the ebonite and 170 for the acrylic. So it's just his way to, to kind of, uh, get more people into his signature line offerings that have only used the production line pins before.

Myke Hurley: I'd love to know how successful they are.

Brad Dowdy: Well, we'll see how they, they, they'll come numbered. So we'll know how many that are made.

Myke Hurley: Well, there you go.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. Like the, uh, the Beaumont I got was three or four years ago and it was only like 40, um, only like 40 of them or so. It was mine's number, I don't know, X of 40. And, but then like the last two years I haven't bought them because I didn't like, I either didn't like the design or I didn't like the, uh, acrylics or ebonites that he was using. So I just didn't order them. Um, this is the fracture, the first one I'm ordering because, um, it looks like a pen I would enjoy. So that's my take on that. Bunch of people have been asking and, uh, yes, I am in.

Brad Dowdy: I did get another question. This is totally changing the subject from a high end fountain pen to a pencil sharpener, but I took a picture of my desk with the, uh, the, the uni KH 20, um, hand crank pencil sharpener, Myke, because I've been using a woodcase pencils more often. And I just finally decided, well, I'm just going to leave my sharpener on the desk instead of keep, I, I have a bunch of stuff in a, in a closet and you know, I'll use my pencils at my desk. If I need it sharpened, I'll walk back to the closet, sharpen the pencil and come back. And I was like, well, this is dumb. Let's put the stupid sharpener on your desk. So I took a picture of it and I got an interesting question and I, it kind of made me go, huh? That's a good question. And so our good, good Twitter friend, Chi Roho, uh, says, I see you have a Mitsubishi KH 20 on your desk. What's the benefit of that over something like the Coom Longpoint manual pencil sharpener? And I didn't have an answer for that. There is no benefit to having the big honking pencil sharpener on your desk than a small hand sharpener like the Coom. Um, it's a, is a little bit matter of convenience. You know, the point is easier to put on with the hand crank and you know, it's an easier, um, more consistent sharpen. I believe it's less messy, uh, self-contained sharpening. Although the Coom has a small little, um, little, um, holder for, for, uh, ledge for wood shavings. But I don't know that I said there really is no benefit to have it. It's just a nice to have kind of thing as opposed to, you know, a small portable hand crank. I mean, a small portable sharpener that you just, you know, hold on your hand and sharpen their pencil with. And it's just kind of a cool desk display. And then that brings up the other question. I've raved about the classroom friendly pencil sharpener. That's the one with the super stabby points, right? But it also leaves the teeth mark in it when you sharpen it. By the way, it grips the pencil and holds it into the sharpener. The Mitsubishi KH20 doesn't do that. And it makes a point just the tiniest bit duller than the classroom friendly. I mean, it's close, but the benefit of not having the barrel marked up, um, is more important to me than the, the little bit of sharpness and the stabbiness of the pencil, um, that I get. So I don't know. That's, I wanted to answer that question. Cause I didn't really have an answer as to what's the benefit over that sharpener over this sharpener. And because I don't think there is one, um, it's expensive. It sits on the desk. It's not portable. Um, but it's very, very well done. It's very refined. It's very consistent. So that's why I like having it on the desk as opposed to a, uh, a handheld sharpener.

Myke Hurley: Any specific reason why you go hand crank and not electric?

Brad Dowdy: Yeah, because both the KH20 and the classroom friendly, I like the, a very long, uh, sharpened area. Does that make sense? Like whatever the length is from the tip of the lead to the paint of the, um, pencil, um, whatever that sharpened area is called. I don't know if they're for whatever that measurement is in the KH20 and classroom friendly. That's a very long. And I like that style as opposed to a very short, like exposed wood section, which most of those electric sharpeners, um, aren't going to give you the same type of, uh, elongated sharpen, if you will. I, I don't know the proper words for that. Do you know what I'm saying?

Myke Hurley: So like, if you sharpen, you mean like the wood part that is shown that is not covered in the wrapping of the color.

Brad Dowdy: Yes. Yeah. I like that to be very long and pointy as opposed to short and stubby and these hand crank sharpeners. And plus that coom long point manual that Chi Roho, uh, mentioned, um, has, gives you that very long tip at the end as opposed to a shorter, either average length, probably the electric ones give you like an average length, average length, uh, sharpen. And then some of the handhelds give you an even shorter one. It looks like a golf pencil type of, um, tip on the pen. And I'm kind of putting together in the background and maybe I'll get one of the erasable guys to come on. I'm going to do a pencil show, a wood case pencil show. I've been taking notes on this off and on, and I haven't had the time to like sit down and, and, and go through all the pencils that I have to, to be able to talk about them. And maybe we can get someone to come on and, uh, talk about them with us. What do you think?

Myke Hurley: Yeah. I'm waiting for that thing to push me over the edge.

Brad Dowdy: Yep. So you, you've gotten a, uh, you've gotten a, uh, uh, a pencil, pencil hookup from one of those guys, right? No. Yes.

Myke Hurley: Uh, yes, I have a, you know, I do. I have a bag of wood case pencils that I was like, I remember at the time I was like, it's a very nice bag. I'm going to use these things. Pencils. And now look at me.

Brad Dowdy: I know. Right. So it's, it's becoming part of my routine and I don't like to leave home without them, even if I'm not using them there in my backpack every day. And, um, I, I definitely have two or three favorites that I'm leaning towards. So we're going to do, we'll do a full wood case pencil, um, episode here, you know, maybe in the next month or so. I just, I need to put some more, uh, thought into that. That's a, that's a, that's a big planner for me. I need to spend some time with. So, um, one more quick thing before we, uh, get into our next sponsor and the pen type B talk is how do you store your ballpoint and gel refills? Myke, um, this is from Willa four on Twitter says, or am I just weird to keep swapping them out? So do you actually have extra pen refills and how do you store them?

Myke Hurley: I don't have extra pen refills.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. So I only have extra pen refills. If like, if I've re I've replaced a lot of refills, like if I get a TI two tech liner, for example, it ships with a 0.7 millimeter. 207 refill. I'll swap that out into a 0.38 millimeter RT one refill. So I have an extra 0.7 refill laying around. I have a bag. I literally have a Ziploc bag full of refills. I don't think there is any rhyme or reason to refill storage. Um, they'll die eventually, you know, after several years, some of them just aren't going to perform consistently and you just have to chunk them, but it's not something I'd give a lot of consideration to. Um, I mean, I do store them in a, in a dark closet, but I mean, that's not necessarily on purpose. You know, I'm not trying to keep it, uh, climate controlled. It's not like a, you know, it's not like a walk-in, uh, wine, uh, cooler. Right. You know, it's not temperature controlled and all these things that keep the humidity, humidity, right. It's just a refill. So I throw them in a Ziploc bag, uh, in a closet. So, and you know, I'll dig through there when I need something every now and then, but, um, I don't think there's any particular thing you do, but they will go bad after a certain amount of time. It's usually years, but, um, they're, they'll just lose their consistency. They'll start writing and they'll stop. And then sometimes you just have to pitch them and that's okay. It's a pretty cheap refill. So, so what I'm saying is mostly I store them in the garbage can, but I don't use them.

Myke Hurley: Yeah, obviously.

Fracture

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. I need a pen pencil humidor. That's exactly what I need. All right. Let's talk about our good friends at fracture because I keep forgetting to get my holiday fracture order prepped and I'm running out of time, Michael.

Myke Hurley: Oh, you are. And that's what I need to tell you about today. You've, we've mentioned fracture before. They are the fantastic company. It will take your favorite images and print them directly onto glass for you to proudly display or give as gifts. And one of the great things about fracture, one of my very favorite things is they hand assemble these things, which speaks right to the pen addict and all of us, right? They have a fractury in Gainesville, Florida, where they will get the pictures that you upload to fracture me.com. You choose the size that you want. The order goes down to the lovely people there in Gainesville and they print them out and they hand check them and they make sure that they're all good and they're all hand assembled, put together, put in these lovely boxes, which are fantastically packed. I've had them sent to me in the UK from Florida, not a scratch on any of them. Remember, these are pieces of glass that have your beautiful pictures printed on them. Because they are hand assembled, they get super backed up at the holidays. So much so that they want us to tell you guys right now, you've all been so awesome to be buying all of these fractures. You're making it super busy over there in the fractury. So they need to let you know that if you want to get prints for the holiday, which you definitely should because these things make fantastic gifts for family and friends. You want to get that order in as quick as possible. Start making plans now because that queue will get full. So I think if you think, oh, you know, I want to give my family or friends a lovely image of my, that I have of, you know, the family of the kids, of a big, you know, a big occasion that's happened in your life or you want to get them for yourself even. You want to make sure you get that order in quick. Also, I love that people send us pictures of their fractures when they receive them. I think that's really awesome. And I know the Fracture account loves it too. So you can tweet at us, tweet at Fracture, send us images of the images that you want to put on your walls. We love Fracture. Their stuff is so great. Your photos will never look as good as they look in a Fracture. Yeah. I'm looking forward to when we move here and I'm going to get a ton more because I have a bunch. I have like seven or eight Fractures. But when we move, me and Nadine move into our own place, I'm going to get all of the RelayFM artwork and put it in my office.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. So you should put a link to Stephen Hackett's. He just recently showed a picture. It came out really good. And, you know, I was like, I was looking at that. I was like, oh, that's really cool.

Myke Hurley: Yeah. See, I have a bunch from some of my older shows. Like, so I have all of the 5x5 artwork that we had back in the day. I have all of those as Fractures. And at some point I'm going to want to get all of them. Well, I would like them now, but I have nowhere to put them. So as soon as we move, me and Nadine, then I'm going to pick up some more. But you'll notice the RelayFM one on Stephen's wall. That was a gift from me for his birthday. Oh, cool.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. Very cool. Very cool. And, yeah, I haven't gotten the Pin Addict one yet. I mean, that's just ripe for a Fracture. But I have gotten, like, some personal images in Fractures. And they look great. So very cool. I need to get on it. Like I said, I need to get on it. Running out of time already.

Brad Dowdy: All right. You ready, Myke? You bet. All right.

Myke Hurley: Oh, do that again.

Brad Dowdy: Hang on. Let me put it back in.

Myke Hurley: Oh, I haven't actually told people where to go to get their Fractures.

Brad Dowdy: Oh, sorry. Sorry.

Myke Hurley: Head on over to FractureMe.com. We just started chatting there. Go on over to FractureMe.com to learn more and get started. You want to use the code PENADDICT to get 15% off your first order and also support this show. Once again, massive thank you to Fracture for supporting RelayFM. And I want to apologize for Fracture that we just completely just started talking about our next topic.

Brad Dowdy: Well, that's when you know you love a product, when you can just talk about them like they're part of the family.

Myke Hurley: Yeah, which they really are. So if you have images, photos that you like, go to Fracture. FractureMe.com.

Brad Dowdy: All right. Now, are you ready?

Myke Hurley: I'm ready again.

PENTIPE B

Myke Hurley: Gosh. That's the PENTIPE B, right?

Brad Dowdy: So that's the PENTIPE B.

Brad Dowdy: Sewe and Taylor from CW&T sent me a pre-production sample. They had a run from the factory that is making the PENTIPE Bs. And this is essentially the final version. And it was their machining test to make sure all the everything was, you know, the design came out good. The tolerances were tight. And I mean, this is not anywhere near like a prototype level. This is like a final version, although it's like their pre-production sample. So they sent me one out to review. Oh, well, I mean, they didn't ask me to review. But I chose to review it. They sent me one, though. I had no charge to get into my hands.

Myke Hurley: They did send it to you as a review unit. Whether you do anything or not is your choice. But that was a review unit for you. It wasn't like a gift.

Brad Dowdy: Right. Yeah. Exactly. Yeah. It's hard to put those types of things in words. I stumble on that a lot. You know, it's like they're like, hey, I'm going to send you a PEN. I'm like, yeah, cool. Please send me a PEN. And, you know, the underlying is that, hey, you're going to review the PEN, right? But that never comes up in the conversation.

Myke Hurley: Yeah.

Brad Dowdy: You know, kind of thing.

Myke Hurley: It's implicitly expected on all sides, right? That's. I don't know. Well, I mean, so they expect that if they send you a PEN, you're going to write about it. And you expect that if it comes, it's expected that they want you to write about it.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah, pretty much. Pretty much. Yeah. Yeah. That's a correct statement. So I got this PEN.

Brad Dowdy: It's making me like all googly eyes at it.

Myke Hurley: I read your post today about this. And your post is misleading to me. Oh, yeah? How so? Because you don't seem that into it. Really? And then you conclude and you're like, this thing's amazing.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. I don't know.

Myke Hurley: As I'm reading it, like, I don't know. Like, I'm just reading through and it doesn't really feel like you were like really, really gung ho on it. And then at the end, you're like, this thing is like super incredible. Yeah. You know, like you're saying that like it's super, it's like it's pretty heavy and, you know, stuff like that. And I don't know.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. Just trying to say all the things that, you know, come into my head when I get the PEN, you know, there's, I want to tell people that there's all kinds of good things about the PEN. And then here's what your concerns are going to be.

Myke Hurley: See, I think actually what you were doing was a cautionary tale.

Myke Hurley: That's that. Now that I'm, now that you said it like that and I'm kind of glancing over it again, it seems like, you know, you're just explaining why it's probably not for most people. Mm-hmm. But yeah, I can tell you love it. I was very interested to see about the fact that this is going to be their last pen.

Brad Dowdy: Mm-hmm.

Myke Hurley: Do they feel like they, do they feel like that they perfected it?

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. I mean, that's their thought. They said they've been using this for three or four years, this design, and they, they're not coming up with anything better than this.

Myke Hurley: I can appreciate that as an artist, like not, not, not that I'm saying I'm an artist, but like as they are artists, like I can, I can really appreciate the thought that like we have made the best. I like that. I like that.

Brad Dowdy: Right. And they're not saying they made the best pen ever. They're saying they've made the best pen for them. Right. This, they're not saying this is the only pen you will ever, right. They're saying we have perfected what we want to accomplish in pen design and the pen type B is it. So yeah, my, I mean, I try to keep all my posts. I mean, I want them to be, and I didn't think about that at all until you said it. I mean, I just write how I feel, but I do want to try to touch all the bases. I want to give people the information to make decisions on their own. I don't want to tell people, yes, you should buy it or no, you shouldn't buy it because that's not my place to say, right. I can only go off my opinions, my preferences. Um, I'm going to have opinions. Um, I'm not going to sugarcoat things. I mean, when I picked up this pen, I was like, holy crap, it is heavy. And, um, you know, that's going to be an issue for, for people. You know, if the pen they're carrying in their pocket, like if you were carrying it around in like nylon baggy shorts, this thing is going to be bouncing around. Like you had a iPhone in your pocket, right? It's, it's that dense of a pen. And if you're not familiar with the pilot high tech C refill, sometimes it doesn't start up the second you start writing with it. That's a frustration for people. So I want to be clear on these things, right? There's no sense in me like going super crazy, you know, cotton candy, happy sugar world on this pen, you know, or any pen for that matter to give a false idea of what the pen really is. But on the other hand, it is personal opinion. You know, I don't come at it from a generic standpoint. Does that make sense?

Myke Hurley: It does. It does. I'm sorry. I put you on the spot like that.

Brad Dowdy: No, it's no spot. I mean, I'm no spot at all. I just, you know, I like to be very, very clear and I try to be. So I'm, I'm happy to give my opinion on things.

Pen Design

Myke Hurley: You?

Brad Dowdy: Me.

Brad Dowdy: So, yeah. And if, and I didn't link to the exact post and Myke, Myke and I talked about it before the pre-show. If you dig in enough of these posts, you'll see a very strong opinion I had related to this pen and what, what happened in the, in a little bit of a side, side game to that. But I didn't want to bring any, any eyeballs to, to that one particular company. But anyway.

Myke Hurley: So you were going to ask me a question.

Brad Dowdy: I was?

Myke Hurley: Yeah.

Brad Dowdy: What was it?

Myke Hurley: I don't know. This was ages ago. I just want to do that again. I think you said, I want to know what you think. And then I just railroaded you.

Brad Dowdy: Oh, no. Actually, I don't care what you think.

Brad Dowdy: I'm just kidding. I want to know.

Brad Dowdy: I didn't really think I had that. But what do you think about it? Because there is no way that this is a Myke Hurley pen. I mean, this is 0% chance that Myke Hurley is even remotely interested in this pen. Right?

Myke Hurley: Yeah. There's, there's nothing about it that works for me. Well, okay. Let me rephrase that. It's beautiful. Yes.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. That's separate. Right? It's literally like a design piece. Like a design museum type piece. It's so close.

Myke Hurley: Right? Mm-hmm. Until it gets to the end and I can't, I can't take it. Right. Like I could accept the refill, but I just don't like the way the end looks. Mm-hmm. It feels very strange to me because I mean, I look at it and I think it looks inelegant. Oh, really? Yeah. But I guess most people look at it and think that it is beautifully utilitarian. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah, inelegant would have never been a word that would have come up for me, right?

Myke Hurley: It looks, this is, it seems, this is such a very, this is such a very strange way to say what I'm going to say. And I don't mean it to sound mean because this is way better than anything I could ever do. And I think it is beautiful. Mm-hmm. But it's like what I imagine a pen to look like in George Orwell's 1984. Mm-hmm. Because there, I know that sounds so strange. It's such a weird thing, but it's like what pops into my head is it's like completely straight. Mm-hmm. And stark with no frills. Mm-hmm. And then you can imagine somebody's gone, this is the end of that bar. There's this tiny bar that slides in, like such a cut, slide in, pen goes in. Like the refill goes in. Mm-hmm. Like it's just so like clean, flat, straight. That's all you get. Which some people like really, it's a very, very, it's like it's the pen for minimalists. Mm-hmm. Right? And artistic minimalists because you get the brass thing around the outside. Right. And I love, I adore the way this pen looks when it is inside the sleeve. I just don't, I just really don't like the end of it. Yeah.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. Like, but the end of it, you mean like the tip? The tip. Yeah.

Myke Hurley: I feel bad because I really am not trying to disparage the work that these people have done. Oh, that's. But you know what it is, right? If this came from Mont Blanc, if this came from a bigger company, it wouldn't bother me. It bothers me because I know that there's these two people sitting at the other end of it.

Brad Dowdy: I see what you're saying. Right? Yeah. But, I mean, you can't not have an opinion on it. I mean, it's, what you're saying is perfectly valid. I mean, there's no, nothing wrong with perfectly valid criticism at all. I mean, it's, this pen is not for everybody. This is one of those pens where I feel like I am so far on one end of the spectrum for this pen that I have to be careful. Because there's no way that this pen is for the vast majority of people or even a small slice of people. It's obviously for a lot of people. It's got a ton of backers. I mean, they're like 130 grand so far or something like that. I mean, they're, they're blowing this one out. But me personally and the people that read my site and that listen to this podcast, I have, I don't know that I've really heard many people that are in our community say, I'm all over this. I'm a, I'm a huge outlier on this one, I believe. I'm just way, way, way on the edge in love with this pen. And so it's hard for me to, I feel like I have to be careful. I don't want people to go out and buy this pen on my recommendation. And I say that a lot, right? You have to, you have to understand your likes and your needs and the way you use products and what you believe in, in, in products before you make purchasing decisions. You should never make purchasing decisions off what I say or what Myke says or, you know, what my blog says. But, you know, we want to provide that type of information where you can make your own decisions. And on this one, it's hard for me because this one is like 11 out of 10 for me. It's such an outlier that it's hard to kind of communicate the things I need to communicate about this pen. But I don't know. I'm in love with it.

Brad Dowdy: Really in love with it. And I don't know what else to say about it because it's really simple, right? I mean, there's nothing aside from like the piston tolerances that it, that causes the sound and the recapping of the pen is pretty amazing. It's a very straightforward, simple pen, right? It just is. And the materials are fantastic. The style is fantastic. I carry it in my jeans pocket. I have wrote like four pages of notes last night when I was listening to the two Bic audio things we had just so I could use the pen, you know? So, yeah, I just wanted to get that out there.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah, that's it. That's an awesome pen. I'm all over it.

Myke Hurley: So, you're using the Hi-Tec C in this, right?

Brad Dowdy: Yeah, the 0.3 millimeter. That's the only refill that I like in the Hi-Tec C, really. Well, that's my favorite. The 0.25 gets a little bit too dry for me. And the 0.4 is a little bit wide. The 0.3 is just money. It's like deadly perfect for me. That's the other reason why I enjoy it so much. But, you know, there is a link that I put in the review to where if you have used spacers, you can put other refills in it. But, yeah, this is such a – back when they did the pen type A, the Hi-Tec C was at its peak. And, you know, lots of designers, artists, engineers, architects were using that pen. And they've kept it built around there.

Myke Hurley: Do you – what do you think would happen to the brass?

Brad Dowdy: I think it's going to get dinged up and dented and scraped and more beautiful. Yeah, I already have a scratch on the flat side of it. I don't even know where it came from.

Myke Hurley: Didn't know there was a flat side. That is, again, beauty in utility.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. Yeah, so it doesn't roll away. There's a flat side. I took a picture of it on the review. It's hard to totally capture. But you set it down and it doesn't roll away. Okay.

Myke Hurley: And this is something that I think I'm seeing in your pictures that I haven't seen before. Is there like a Phillips screw head? Yeah. Like not head but slot. I don't know what you'd call it.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah, so that's how you get out the refill. Right, right, right. So you just back that out. Yeah. And, you know, that's how you get to it. And there's a few other pen designs with the screw. I can't think of one off the top of my head, but there's definitely something that'll do. But I'm actually interested to drop this one on the floor to see if I can like dent the brass, like on the round tip or something. I'm just curious how it's going to hold up because it's a really dense piece of brass. And I think it's going to hold up amazingly and it'll look pretty good with some dents and dings into it. So, yeah. I'll take some pictures as I use it because this is going to be a heavy rotation pen for me. It's just, they might have just called it the pen type Brad.

Myke Hurley: I'm wondering how big a thing you need to get in this thing where you can't put the pen back in the sleeping wall.

Brad Dowdy: You can't, you can't do it. It's the wall.

Myke Hurley: It's too strong?

Brad Dowdy: Yeah, the wall is, just picture the wall has to be thick enough for them to shave out the flat part while keeping the internal round. So you can picture how thick that wall is. It's never going to, you're not going to do that unless you run over it with a car.

Myke Hurley: Yeah, you're not going to do it to the point where the rest of the pen would survive anyway.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah, this is not a thin wall sleeve. It's thick.

Measurements

Brad Dowdy: Thick. I don't have calipers or anything. I need to get calipers and I need to get a scale. And I keep saying that like every review I do and I never do. So I'll work on that.

Myke Hurley: All right, cool.

Brad Dowdy: All right. So, yeah, we're going to, I'm going to keep carrying this bad boy. I love it. And yeah, check it out. It's an interesting pen to say the least and certainly not for everybody, but it's all about me on this one. So, ha.

Myke Hurley: Well, I'm happy you found something you like.

Brad Dowdy: I really like it. I do. I genuinely, truly like it. And then what's funny is we're going to get to next week and we're going to have Mr. Dan Bishop on and we're going to talk about his new design, the EDK. And I'm just going to rave about that pen too. Good. So it's like there's so many good freaking pens out there right now. It's like both of these pens I carry with me that I have them on me pretty much or on my backpack since I've gotten them both. So, you know, I'm going to be saying the same things about the EDK next week. It's like how can you be so effusive in praise over every single pen, you know? And we love good products. I don't know what to say. They're very different pens, you know? That's why I have fountain pens right next to these that I love equally as much as these. You know, we're just – we're stationary nerds. We love this stuff and, you know, we love good products. And it makes it easy to rave about them, right?

Myke Hurley: Yep.

Brad Dowdy: That's what we love. Indeed. Indeed. All right. So get us on to next week.

Myke Hurley: If you want to find the show notes for today's episode, head on over to relay.fm slash penaddict slash 177. If you want to find Brad online, he's over at penaddict.com. Knock.co.com? Knock.co?

Brad Dowdy: Both.

Myke Hurley: I thought so. Good. And he is on Twitter. He is at dowdyism, D-O-W-D-Y-I-S-M, and on Instagram at penaddict. I am at imike, I-M-Y-K-E, on Instagram and on Twitter.

Myke Hurley: Thank you so much for listening to this week's episode. Thanks again to our friends over at Fracture and Linda for supporting this week. Until then, say goodbye, Brad.

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