The Pen Addict 113/transcript

The Pen Addict Podcast Transcript
Episode:	113
Title:	The Pen Whisperer
Release Date:	July 1st, 2014
Hosts:	Brad Dowdy Myke Hurley
Guests:	No guests this episode
Additional Information
Official page:	Episode 113
Audio File:	Audio Episode 113
Podcast page:	The Pen Addict 113
Length:	6464 min <br />1.067 h <br /> minutes
Previous Transcript	Next Transcript

Myke Hurley: Hello and welcome to this week's episode of The Pen Addict on 5x5. This is episode number 113. The Pen Addict is a weekly show where we discuss pens, paper, and the analogue tools that we love so dearly. My name is Myke Hurley and today I am joined by Mr. Brad Dowdy.

Brad Dowdy: You totally forgot what episode number it was, didn't you? And you had to look.

Myke Hurley: Kind of. I think I would have said all of those things anyway, however I did forget and did have to look.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah, because you usually drop it in on the first line and you dropped it in on the second sentence. I was like, Myke forgot what episode it is.

Myke Hurley: Sometimes I like to just shake it up, keep you guessing.

Brad Dowdy: That's cool, keep me guessing, except I knew what it was because I'm actually looking at the doc on you apparently.

Studio Setup

Myke Hurley: So I was saying to you before we started today that I've moved room and I've kind of upgraded my studio. Yes. Now, my desk is currently a lot cleaner than usual. So I'm currently looking around and I don't have anything that I can fiddle with while we're recording and that is upsetting me greatly.

Brad Dowdy: Well, see, I am not at my normal desk where I'm normally fiddling too much for you and making too much background noise. I am actually on vacation at my parents' apartment and this setup is like all new to me so I have even more stuff to fiddle with. So is that going to bother you if I could fiddle a bunch during this podcast?

Myke Hurley: No. Well, yes. Yeah. I think you're the only podcast that I know that records when they're on vacation.

Myke Hurley: It's... I don't recall you ever taking a week off the show when you're on holiday.

Brad Dowdy: It's fun. I mean, I don't know what to tell you. I... I don't know. I... I never thought of it any other way, I guess. Like, if I was physically unable to do it, I would tell you, Myke, I am physically unable to record this week and we would find some other way. But when I'm going to somewhere, I'm fortunate enough to, you know, go to my parents' house where I can throw my microphone and headphones in my backpack and have a real internet connection instead of a hotspot like at my house. I'm more than happy to take an hour away from the day and get the podcast going. But I will say it does get into the show planning as my Twitter followers found out this week.

Myke Hurley: Well, I want to thank you and also apologize to your family for you being here today.

Brad Dowdy: Believe. Believe me, they are happy to get rid of me.

Myke Hurley: Hey, Brad, what time are you recording a podcast? It's next Tuesday. Oh, okay.

Brad Dowdy: They are more than happy to lock me away in a room for an hour. It's no problem at all. You can ask them.

Myke Hurley: So I have a little story. Yes. So I am known in my office as the pen guy. People know me as the pen guy.

Brad Dowdy: There's always one of them.

Myke Hurley: Yep, and I am that one. And the co-worker came up to me and said, Myke, I need your help. I have a pen. And he used to work for an advertising agency. And that advertising agency was one of their clients was Jaguar. And he said, they gave me a pen. He showed me. Well, he didn't show me initially. He told me about it. He says it's got a black body and the cap is metal. And instead of a clip, what would be in place of a clip was the Jaguar mascot, right? Like a jumping Jaguar. And he said, I have searched for years for a refill. And I cannot find one.

Myke Hurley: And I was like, okay.

Myke Hurley: I said to him, bring the pen in for me and I'll take a look. And I'm pretty sure that I can fix this problem for you. So then later on in the day, he brought it in because his girlfriend works in and around the area. And she'd been carrying it around in her bag because they'd been going into pen stores or anywhere that sold pen supplies to try and find something to fit. Wow. And he gave it to me. And I kind of looked at it and I knew I was in for a task. Then he said to me, I think I remember the brand name was Schmidt.

Myke Hurley: So I unscrewed my Retro 51, unscrewed his pen, dropped the refill and screwed it up and put it back in his hand. And he was like, oh my God.

Myke Hurley: I literally was standing in front of him with my Retro 51 in my hand. And then I fixed the solution and found some Schmidt refills on Amazon. And he's now bought some. And I hope in a couple of days that they'll be the right ones. And let's look them up.

Brad Dowdy: That's amazing. That's hilarious.

Myke Hurley: So I must look like some sort of pen hypnotist or like a pen whisperer. That's it. That's what I'm looking for.

Brad Dowdy: I'm the pen whisperer. So that's like, yeah, it's like this superhuman ability you have to just look at a pen and drop in the right refill. You know, make it appear out of thin air.

Myke Hurley: The one that's actually in my hand.

Brad Dowdy: It's like David Blaine. He's like, hey, I got a trick for you.

Myke Hurley: I said to him, I said, you're very lucky. This is actually, in my opinion, the best refill you can buy. Yeah, really. And I have been, I mentioned this last week, but I've been using one of my Retro 51s. And man, I'm just in love. I'm just in love with it again. Like, that pen is so good. You know what I have realized though, Brad? Those refills dry up.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. So it's funny you say that and have the same story about your Retro 51 and the refill. Because my sister, who I usually only see once a year at my parents' house during the summertime, last year I gave her my orange Retro 51, the Tornado, the lacquers edition. And she loves it. She uses it all the time. She uses it so much, she's running out of ink. So we had the very same conversation about what refills do I need to go purchase? Because I love this pen so much and I love how it writes. And I need some more refills to put in it. So we had the exact same conversation. And it's funny. My sister is into pens and things like that. So it was a good fit. And I even put out a picture on Instagram last night. I called it the Vacation Pen Show. Where me and my sister and my dad were the only ones that care about the pens laying around. So I brought them a bunch of stuff.

Brad Dowdy: Brought a bunch of stuff to my sister to give to her. Brought a bunch of my pens for them to try out. And, you know, my dad had some of his knock cases loaded up with all his pens. And then he was telling me about new cases he wants us to design for knock. He's like, I need this and you should make it. And I'm like, okay, chill out for a second.

Myke Hurley: But mine have dried up just having not been used.

Brad Dowdy: Really?

Myke Hurley: Yeah. I haven't had them. I had a couple in one of my pen holders and sort of pulled them out and they're not working.

Brad Dowdy: And it's like the, it's the, the Tornado refill, the P8127 or is that right? Yes.

Myke Hurley: This is the other problem is when, because they custom brand them. So I just, just to keep things simple, I found on Amazon, I think they called the R, R, E, F, 5, P or something like that. Okay. Or it's like, it's something 5P, R, 5P, something along those lines.

Myke Hurley: That's what Retro 51 rebranded them. So I was like, let's just get these ones because I know they fit because I've got one in front of me. So I've bought the Schmidt ones before after doing a bit of searching, but I was like, I'm not going to spend all day on this. Let's just get in these. Gotcha. Gotcha.

Brad Dowdy: So I want to put a link in the show notes since we're talking about this. Our friend Anna from the Well Appointed Desk did a great post earlier this week. It's called the Epic Refill Reference Guide, Rollerball, Gel, and Ballpoints. So this is going to be a good resource for everyone. And I will add this to the show notes, Myke, and you can put that in there. And it talks a lot about those, you know, which ones fit the Retro 51 and, you know, other pins of that ilk and things like that.

Myke Hurley: Oh, Anna, we can always rely on you.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. And it is an epic post. The title is not misleading. It's very thorough.

Myke Hurley: She did quite a lot of research here.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah, this is hard work. I've been very impressed with this article, and it's a very good reference point.

Myke Hurley: Excellent work, Anna.

Brad Dowdy: And then it also gives people to come up and mention in the comments section other additional things that they've tried that work. So this will be a very frequently visited post by myself. And I'm sure lots of other people, too. So that's very cool. I wanted to add that in there since we're having all the refill fun.

Myke Hurley: Good stuff.

NotCo Launch

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. So since we last spoke, kind of some big things have happened in my life. One of them, well, the main one, being the launch of NotCo. Congratulations. Thank you, sir. And I am, you know, I'm normally not like the totally self-pimp guy. But, you know, I thought I would take an opportunity here to mention that to everyone since because it's my one of my main tasks getting the store launched was getting the newsletter ready for, you know, everyone to know that the store is coming. The store is coming. And, you know, we've got this huge mailing list and everyone's anxious to get the store going. And, you know, I had one job to do, Myke, to get the launch of NotCo to happen last Tuesday. And what did I do?

Brad Dowdy: You screwed it up. I screwed it up. I had one job to do. And I totally botched it. So I wanted to apologize for anyone who hasn't already yelled at me for messing up the date of the launch.

Brad Dowdy: I'm very protective of my inbox. So I'm very protective of our newsletter subscribers' inboxes. So I wasn't going to re-spam this newsletter again five minutes after I did it the first time. So I just decided to eat it and correct it on social media and Facebook and, you know, Twitter and everything as I could. Most people got the news. Some people didn't and they weren't happy with me. And I just apologized profusely. But I'm real sorry about that. But despite my glaring gaffe that just, I mean, I don't know. I hit the button and within like two minutes it was like my world just ended. I'm like, oh no. The one thing, I could typo a curse word in there. That would be a lot better than missing the date of your store launch, right?

Myke Hurley: Yeah. Yeah. I'm sorry, buddy. It does suck that that happened.

Store Opening

Brad Dowdy: It does suck. But I was really against resending another email to correct that. Luckily, everyone caught on it. Then we had a good time with it at my expense, which was well deserved. But...

Myke Hurley: I could tell the tweets that were from you and the ones that were from Jeffrey.

Brad Dowdy: I was definitely more... Yeah, I was a little... I don't know. I was the sacrificial lamb. So I just... I took it. I took it like a man. So... You did well. We'll see. We'll see. But anyway, the launch went really great. And I thank everyone who has supported us for all this time. You know, I put up a post on the Pen Addict. Jeff put up a post on the NotCo blog. And we're just really appreciative of everyone who supported us and helped us, you know, with the Kickstarter. Without the Kickstarter, we couldn't get to the launch of the shop. And now that we finally turned it on, which is what everyone's been waiting for, we're finally, you know, amped up and ready to go. And things are only going to move forward for here. So I wanted to mention that quickly and tell everyone thank you. It went pretty darn well, I think. You know, I was mostly nervous about, like, the back end stuff. Is the, you know, or is the shopping cart going to work with the payment processors that are going to work with the shipping? And all this stuff, is that all going to work? And you know what? It did. It did. It worked really well. So I was happy about that.

Myke Hurley: That's good. That's good news. Yep. I must say, I was, I came to the store late. I don't know why. And was upset to see that the limited edition Flutterstack was sold out. Yes. Simply because I just want limited edition things.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah, so let me talk about a couple things. Two things. One, I'll touch on that limited edition thing. We wanted to do something for the shop opening. And, you know, we only had a very, we were trying to build up our normal inventory as much as possible in the few weeks that we actually leased workspace, got everything up and running, and launched the store. I think it was a span of three weeks. So we wanted to commit as much time to building up the regular inventory as we could for the launch. But we also wanted to mix in just a little bit of something of a taste that, you know, you might, okay, you're seeing this now, and you might know that we're going to maybe do some special things in the future. So that's what I don't want anyone to be disappointed that they missed out. You know, there's going to be other things in the future that we're going to do. We just wanted to kind of do that just for a little opening launch type of thing.

Myke Hurley: Hey, for the people that were paying attention, that got the cryptic message, and were there ready, you know, they deserve some sort of reward.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. People that can read, you know, I did have a bunch of people that's like, oh, I didn't even notice that. I didn't notice it.

Myke Hurley: I was like, when I saw it, I was like, oh, Brad launches a store in two days. Yeah. Completely didn't notice that it said, which is weird, right?

Brad Dowdy: Yeah, totally. I mean, any other two months, it would have been an easy catch when I was proofreading it. I mean, you know, I read that thing 10 times before I sent it out. And if it was any other months besides June and July, you know, if it was July and August, there's no way I'd make that mistake. Or if it was May and June, there's no way. But those two months look so similar. So, yeah, it was kind of idiotic, but oh well. Anyway. These things happen. Yep. So aside from the limited edition thing, the second thing I wanted to mention is our regular inventory. So we built up as much as we could during the span of leasing the shop and turning it on. At some point, we just got to turn it on. So going forward now, you know, we sold out of a bunch of items, but they're going to constantly be refreshed.

Brad Dowdy: You know, Jeff's updating inventory at noon more than two or three days a week. It's sometimes every day we're updating the site inventory. So just keep checking back if there's a particular case you want and get in touch and we can kind of give you a time frame when it's going to be ready. So other than that, it went super well and was well received and a bunch of people are starting to get their products and the knock shots are flowing. So it's really cool. Now, while I was away, literally about 30 minutes before we started this podcast, Jeff pings me or sends a tweet that I see from the knock co account. Thanks. Our friends, our friend Dan at Kara's Customs sent us a gift as a congratulatory gift for opening the knock shop. And we will have this in the show notes, which you can find at 5x5.tv forward slash pen addict slash 113.

Myke Hurley: Oh, my God.

Brad Dowdy: What? So good. Yeah, you have to see this picture. So Dan, I know this is Dan. This is only Dan's doing. Only Dan could pull this off. Wow. Dan sketched out Jeff and myself, headshots of Jeff and myself and sent us each a pen. And I knew as soon as I saw it, I know exactly which pen's mine because I've been clamoring for this pink bolt forever. He sent one to Aziza.

Myke Hurley: Why are we talking about this? Oh, yeah. That's why.

Brad Dowdy: I was like, why are we talking about this last week? Yep. Yep. I think it's like the ultimate bolt color because I was saying this is the bolt is like the hardcorest pen. And, you know, it's like this real totally serious business machined rough and tumble looking pen. And it's got it's anodized in hot pink. And I said, there's nothing more perfect than this heavy duty pen in hot pink. And I need one. And lo and behold, what shows up today? So Dan sent me a bolt and he sent Jeff a two-tone Render K, which is just slick as all get out, with a blue cap and then a silver aluminum barrel, which it looks really, really great. So thank you, Dan. And your images were spot on.

Myke Hurley: I totally want a caricature now.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. I really want one.

Brad Dowdy: That's so good. We'll have to get Dan on caricature commissions. Yeah. He did an excellent job. I actually look way better in my caricature than in real life. So I'm happy with mine.

Brad Dowdy: So, yes, y'all go to the show notes and check it out. And then one more thing you're going to have to go to the show notes and check out. Right before we got online, Andy Wellflee, our former guest and current wood clenched writer and erasable podcast host, has been talking with his other host, Johnny Gamber, about making a... Somehow this came up yesterday. They were talking about making a podcaster cocktail. So that is live now. We have a... We'll have the link to it in the show notes. You can get the recipe for it. I'm going to raid my parents' bar tonight. We need... All right. So what we need, Myke, is two ounces of Wild Turkey 101.

Myke Hurley: What is that?

Brad Dowdy: It's a bourbon whiskey.

Myke Hurley: Oh, okay.

Brad Dowdy: So it's like a Jim Beam Maker's Mark type of thing.

Myke Hurley: Okay. Yeah, yeah. No, I like bourbon. I've never heard of Wild Turkey.

Brad Dowdy: Yep. A splash of soda, a splash of maraschino cherry juice, stir together, perhaps with a pencil, and serve in a pint glass.

Myke Hurley: I don't get the pint glass part. That's a little large. Everything else I'm totally on board with.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. So, um... Could be a little bit more fruity, but... It could be a little more fruity, like official show mascot, Kanuni Rennishin, tweeted me right after I saw that. Right after I saw the hot pink pin, she's like, well, do you need a fruity drink to go along with that? Or do you need a girly drink to go along with that? And I said, absolutely. I'm on vacation. So, yes, bring it on. The girlier, the better on vacation. That's right. The girlier, the better. So, that's kind of been my week so far. You know, the vacation is going good. We got in the launch of the Knock Shop before I was able to go, and I was really nervous about that. Like, you know, do I need to delay my vacation? Is everything going to work out? And I was just really happy with how we handled the launch. And everyone who helped us out, and I bet they don't even listen to the podcast, but Ashley, Dino, Shane, and Amala, who all help us out at the Knock Shop. We'll really appreciate them. And, of course, Mr. Jeffrey Brookwicky, who is the glue that keeps us together. So, it's been a busy, busy week for me since we last recorded. So, a lot going on. So, I'm happy to get in this episode so we can talk about all this fun stuff.

Myke Hurley: Really proud of you, man. Thank you, sir. It's amazing. Really, really awesome.

Brad Dowdy: It's really cool. It's, if you think about it too deeply, like, it doesn't make sense. Right? It's like, did this really happen kind of thing. Sure. But, it's happening, and it's upwards and onwards.

Myke Hurley: You're a real business owner.

Brad Dowdy: Yes, it's crazy. Crazy, crazy.

Brad Dowdy: Speaking of real business owners.

Myke Hurley: Oh, our friends. Yes. Time to talk about some friends. This week, joining us again to sponsor this episode is our friends over at Penn Chalet. Let me tell you about Penn Chalet, but keep listening because they have an incredible offer for you today. So, you know Penn Chalet. They sell authentic, amazing roller balls, ball points, fountain pens, mechanical pencils, and so much more. Like, if you want to take a look at pen carrying cases, pen holders, maybe you want refills or fountain pen converters. Well, they've got it all. Penn Chalet sells limited edition pens, as well as all those fantastic accessories. And they have pens from your favorite brands, like Pelican, Monteverde, Pilot, Lamy, Namiki, Sailor, and Kaweco. And they are, of course, an authorized dealer of them all. Brad, have I got all of them?

Brad Dowdy: Have we got any more today? I think you got them. I don't think there was any new additions, but I'm also on vacation, so I haven't been totally tracking it. But I think you're in good shape.

Myke Hurley: But they're always adding more over time, so this will always keep changing. It was Kaweco, right? That's just been added? Lamy. Lamy. That was it. Lamy. Penn Chalet have very fast and reliable service, and they run special discounts twice a month, including closeout specials every two weeks. And they're always adding new styles of new pens every single month. You'll get free shipping on orders of over $50 in the continental United States, but they also sell internationally with very reasonable shipping rates. And don't forget, they are based in the United States, so if you are in the UK or in Europe, you're going to benefit from the exchange rate. Don't forget that, and that's always really important. So you can kind of take, I mean, if you're in the UK like me, it's like 75% of that price, so it's good. So Penn Chalet has low prices on high-quality pens, and they offer a 100% satisfaction guarantee. I ordered from them myself recently and had forgotten to include a gift note. I sent an email to Penn Chalet, and they responded within about 10 minutes to say, yeah, we'll put one in for you. I was blown away because of just how quickly their service was, and they put the little gift note in that I wanted. So this is what you need to do. Go to PennChalet.com, and you want to use the code PennAddict, that's P-E-N-A-D-D-I-C-T, to save 10% on your order. Or this is the important part. Click on the podcast link at the top of the website. That's PennChalet.com, P-E-N-C-H-A-L-E-T.com. And you want to enter the password, PennAddict, for even more savings as well as your 10% off. And you're going to see, when you go there, you're going to see a bunch of really cool special deals that you can only get as a listen to the show. But we have an extra special offer today from our friends over at Penn Chalet. So go to PennChalet.com, hit the podcast link at the top, enter the code PennAddict, and you're going to be getting a special offer on the Pilot Falcon, F-A-L-C-O-N, Falcon Fountain Pen. Now, this is only for listeners of the Penn Addict. This is a complete exclusive because of these fantastic savings you're going to get. So the pen is discounted at 30% off. That's at $126. But then you can also use the code PennAddict at checkout, and you're going to get another 10% off. You're going to get free shipping in the United States. So the final price of this pen with shipping, if you use the code PennAddict, as well as going in through the podcast link, you're going to get it for $113.40. Penn Chalet have warned us. They have quite a few on hand. But if it's anything like how you guys have previously been with them, they're going to sell out. But you can continue to order because the guys over at Penn Chalet, they are making sure they've got some coming in. So you'll be waiting a couple of days, maybe a week at the very most, and they'll get that order out to you. So you want to check this out. This is a Pilot Falcon. It's a special for Penn Addict listeners. And Brad is going to tell you all about why this pen is so awesome.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah, I don't think I can explain how good of a deal this is without me telling one of my patented long and rambling stories. So are you ready?

Myke Hurley: Totally ready.

Brad Dowdy: All right. So a friend of the show, Mr. Thomas Hall, who has loaned me a vast majority of his collection of pens to test out when he found out, you know, when he found the Penn Addict blog. And I was starting to get into fountain pens. And he saw the types of pens I liked. And we kind of had a lot of the same taste. So he sent me a bunch of his pens that he had that he thought I would like. One of the first ones he sent to me was actually the Pilot Metal Falcon. That's not what the deal is today for the Penn Chalet. They're selling the resin Falcon. And let me tell you why. It's even awesomer than the Metal Falcon. I love the Metal Falcon. But it's about $220.

Brad Dowdy: So I was like, you know, I love the nib. The Falcon is a flex nib pen. Okay. It's not a traditional nib pen. It's got a lot of flex in the nib. It allows you to get this crazy line variation. And so I like the Metal Falcon, but I really wanted the resin barrel, which is what this is.

Brad Dowdy: At the time in the U.S., and this is probably two years ago, the only option for the Namiki Falcon was the black resin barrel with the gold trim. And, of course, I'm not a huge fan of that style. So I held off. And then Thomas emails me, like, I don't know, maybe six months after I've reviewed his Metal Falcon. He said, hey, Pilot in Japan just came out with the silver-plated furniture on the pen. And I guess it's rhodium-plated. Sorry, I should say that.

Brad Dowdy: You know, the style that I like with the rhodium clip and the rhodium band across the barrel. And just all the, you know, the rhodium-looking trim instead of the gold trim. And I was like, yes, that's the one I want. And let's do it. And so what we had to do was we had to order them from a company in Japan because they were not available in the U.S. At that time, I got what was a good deal from Japan. Ordering Pilot pens is generally cheaper. You take a little bit more risk. And, you know, the shipping and the companies you're dealing with, you may not know them as well. And I was happy to pay, I think I paid $140 for mine to get this pen. It might have even been $150. And I was more than happy to pay that price. Now the rhodium trim is available in the U.S. from the U.S. pen vendors. And it's not some crazy price like you would expect a lot of the pens that are mainly originated in Japan and then brought into the U.S. market by Pilot. Sometimes they're really, you know, 30 to 50% more expensive for whatever reason. Reasons I don't know. I love this pen so much. This is, I'm on vacation. My sister asked me to bring some pens for her to check out. This is one of the six fountain pens or seven fountain pens that I brought for her to look at. I love this pen so much. And it's, you're going to get it for about $30 or $40 cheaper than I paid for it from Japan when it first came out just because I had to have it. And I couldn't wait. I didn't know at that time it was going to come to the U.S. So for Pen Chalet to offer the Falcon, the resin barrel Falcon, and the gold trim or the rhodium trim for $113 shipped is ridiculous. It's crazy. I, I, it's crazy.

Myke Hurley: Do you suggest the fine nib?

Namiki Falcon

Brad Dowdy: So I have the extra fine nib. And the people who I've let use this pen, they always say, I wish it had, I wish it had more flex. Or I wish the line width was wider. Because the benefit of flex is to see that line width variation. Right? So my only experience has been with the extra fine. And I love it. But just as a writing pen and with a little bit of flex, it gives me a little bit of line variation. But I think, you know, maybe with more very, a wider nib, you're going to get a little bit wider line. You're going to see that ink really pop off the page. The shading of the ink pop off the page more. And then get a little bit wider width variation. I don't know. With, with the extra fine, you can write so fine with it. It's probably a, how would you say it? It's probably a greater percentage in line variation. But the maximum width of the extra fine is still reasonably narrow. Does that make sense?

Myke Hurley: Yeah. I'm just asking before I complete this checkout process.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. I would go with fine or medium probably if I got another one.

Myke Hurley: I think I'm going to go with fine. I've been enjoying fine, fine lines recently. So is that what you suggest? You think, do you think I should go with a fine?

Brad Dowdy: I think you should go with a fine. Okay. Well, that's, although this is, this is a Japanese fine.

Myke Hurley: Oh, so what should I do now then?

Brad Dowdy: I don't know. You could, you could go for a medium. I wouldn't go broad though.

Pen Nibs

Myke Hurley: No, I wouldn't go broad either. What do you think? Fine or medium?

Brad Dowdy: If you think you're going to flex it, then I'd go fine. If you think you're just going to write with it, I'd go medium. But if you want it for flex, give the medium, I mean, give the fine a shot.

Myke Hurley: What do you mean like for flex?

Brad Dowdy: So this, you're getting this pen for a reason. This is not a stiff nib pen, right? So when you write with this pen, the more pressure you put on the nib when you're writing, the more the tine spread and the wider the line gets. Does that make sense?

Myke Hurley: Yeah. I mean, that sounds like fun. I don't have any pen like that. So I'm going to give that a go.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah.

Myke Hurley: Go with fine. All right. Well, it's on the way. So I could just hearing you talk about it. I'm like, cause then I went to the page and I remembered you reviewing this and I was like, yeah, I want that. But then I looked around at the time and it was going to be a fortune for me to get it.

Brad Dowdy: But yeah. This is, this is a better deal than the 205, the Pelican M205, which was an extraordinary deal. So this is a better deal. I love this pen with, with all my heart. No, it's, it's a really good pen. This is one of those pens that's always inked up. This is, this is the pen I use my very shading, shaded inks in, you know, so I can get that really wide range of color in the ink because you can go from a very fine line to a very wide line. So it's good.

Myke Hurley: Sounds like fun. I'm excited to receive mine. Yeah. You should be. Believe it or not, this is still the sponsor. Thank you so much to PenchLA for their continued support of this show. That's P-E-N-C-H-A-L-E-T.com. I love it when a sponsor also then becomes a topic.

Brad Dowdy: I told you I would ramble. I mean, if anyone can ramble. I wanted you to. Yeah. But still, you know, I just, yeah, sometimes I can't stop.

Myke Hurley: You should definitely go check this out. They've still got fantastic deals on stuff like the Pelicans and all that great stuff. But you want to go and get these quickly. The quicker you get there, the quicker you're going to receive it in the post, especially because me and Brad might buy them all first.

Brad Dowdy: So yeah. And just know that Myke has already stolen one before our listeners. Just keep aware of that.

Myke Hurley: Yep. That's how I roll. Sorry, guys.

Brad Dowdy: No problem. All right. So we have a pen blog of the week, which is not a strict pen blog, but a blog that I've been following, I think, since day one of Pen Addict, and that is Doodlers Anonymous. And I think a lot of people are familiar with Doodlers Anonymous, but a lot of people aren't. So I wanted to bring that to attention. What they do is they just, they accept doodle submissions from people all over the world. And it's become a really big thing. I mean, the site has grown and grown and grown over the years. Because, you know, I'm just looking at some of these posts. Like, just if you look at the posts and see how active they are, like a post gets, you know, 900 and something likes on Facebook just for a blog post about a doodle or a book or something like that that someone's created. And I've talked to the founder. His name is, he goes by Okat. He's the founder slash editor of Doodlers Anonymous. I've talked to him several times over the years. He is a huge fan. His favorite doodle pen is the Uniball Sino 207. And I think he uses the 0.7 millimeter. So he's a big pen guy. And he's a really nice guy. And you should definitely check out Doodlers Anonymous to check out all the cool artwork that everyone's submitting. And they're all over the place. And they do different things every year. Like, for a while there, they were doing like a coloring book every year where you could get some of their favorite artists that were doing doodles and making a coloring book and things like that, you know, that were cool for the kids. But it's a great site. One I read daily. And there's always something cool on there. So check out Doodlers Anonymous. Yes.

Brad Dowdy: We don't necessarily have a main topic today, Myke. Just because, you know, I'm in vacation mode. So my brain was not able to put all that together. You know, we just had, you know, kind of do some one huge topic. So I have a little bit that I wanted to follow up on some more from previous podcasts and then had a few questions from Twitter followers that I reached out to yesterday just to see what they want to hear us talk about. So how's that sound?

Myke Hurley: Yeah, do it. Let's go for it.

Chronodex System

Brad Dowdy: So last week we mentioned it was almost in passing. We did talk about it for a minute. But we talked about the Chronodex system that's spearheaded by Patrick Ng of Scription.

Brad Dowdy: And we reached out. I think I said, hey, if anyone uses Chronodex as a system, shoot me an email. Let me know what you think. I got a handful of emails and they just weren't regular emails. They weren't like, hey, I use Chronodex. It's great. It was hundreds of words, passion pouring into this system that people just love. It was like really, really ingrained into the people that were emailing me. So it's like, okay, I've got to look more into this. So I put together a few links and I still haven't like totally figured out this system like to the core. You know, it's still a little bit intimidating to me at this point. But you know what? At some point fountain pens were intimidating to me too. I remember. If I, you know, put some more brain cells on this, you know, I think I can figure it out. Because what it does, it allows you to have, we've talked in the past about you and I and things like planners. So like I tried the Hobonichi planner this year and a bunch of people asked me about that and how's that going. And we, you know, we got the tweet about the, you know, how are our new year's resolutions going and things like that. And I talked a few months ago about how I failed miserably at the planner, but that has nothing to do with the Hobonichi brand itself. You know, it's an awesome product. It's, it's an elite product. I just can't use a system very well where I have to go to today's date and fill out those things for that date.

Myke Hurley: It's just not how I, I don't think it's how my, my brain works. Like I just start new pages where I need them. Like exactly. But maybe it's because I've never used something rigidly enough, but.

Brad Dowdy: Right. So I think you and I are the same in that aspect. So Chronodex is date, it's date based still. So you, you use a specific day, but you do a more visual representation of what your tasks are that day or the things you have planned for that day, or even to-do list. I mean, it could be anything. So we've put a, I've put together a bunch of links in the show notes for those that are interested in the Chronodex. And, you know, I'd love to hear if someone tries this out, who's never had any experience with it and takes the plunge. So what you can do is there's a few things. So we'll have the link into Patrick Ng's introduction, basically to Chronodex and the reason behind it, some general tips on how to use it. And I want to make a point of mentioning that Patrick does all this for free. And at the time when he introduced this, this was 2012 or late 2011 for the 2012 year, his, he was going through some tough times with his father being ill. So he said, you know, I never want any payment for this. And I never want anyone to use this as a product of their own and make money for it. But I'm asking for your prayers from my father, who's going through this illness. So I thought that was a really great thing. You know, he's, he's pouring all this in, giving it away for free and just wants you to pray for his dad. Who's really, really sick. So his dad ended up passing in 2013. So Patrick has still continued to update this, continued to make all these files available for free. And his mom got really, really sick. So now when you download that, he asks you to pray for his mom. And I think that's the least you can do for all the hard work that Patrick puts in to making this chronodex system, what it is, making it available, keeping it updated, like in current to the years. So that's the least you can do. So one, you need to read the story behind why Patrick did this.

Brad Dowdy: Secondly, you can look at the download of the current 2014. Um, chronodex. And if you're brand new to the system, if you have no idea what's going on, Patrick has like a full description in the border of this PDF that you print out for the chronodex. So what you do is you download this file. Let me pull it up right here. It's a big PDF. It goes from, uh, what's the date on this one? This is the second half of 2014. So the last six months of 2014, he has it formatted. He's got the dates. He's got the chronodex, um, laid out for you. You just have to go in, print this out. And he's has the instructions on how to cut it. He's a huge Midori Traveler's Notebook fan, Myke. So he's designed this for that. And other people have taken this style and modified it to other notebooks. And they believe in the same thing that Patrick does. They believe in, you know, their modifications. They're giving them all away for free. So you print this out. And then he has a full instruction set on the first page in the, um, in the sidebar. So it tells you how to use it, um, what you should be thinking about when you're using it, and how to nail this down into a system that works for you. It still may not be a system for you and I, Myke, but the passion I got behind the answers to last week's question made me realize there's really something behind this that people like really live for this system. And it's really changed how they plan their days, plan their lives. Um, so I wanted to gather all these links up, get as much information as I can, and put it in the show notes. And then, so we've got the Facebook page in there. We've got a couple of reviews on the system. On the Chronodex system in there. So if you're interested at all in a different planning system, check this out. And, uh, I'm a huge friend of Patrick. He's a friend of mine. Um, and the thing that's always struck me with the Chronodex, Myke, is how a filled out page looks. It's stunning. It's literally beautiful to look at. The images that you'll see of people's Chronodexes who have filled out. I'm such a dork. I could frame some of those and put them on a wall. They look so cool. They look exactly like the type of thing that I like. So I still don't know if I can work with a date based system. You know, that's just a personal thing. But anyone who's looking for something like this, take a look at the Chronodex. And, um, it's just pretty cool. And I wouldn't have talked about it again if people didn't reply so strongly about how much they love this system and how much it's changed how they work. So I just wanted to throw that out there.

Myke Hurley: I think you mentioned, like, you know, why people should maybe consider trying it. I think if something has an effect like this, like if it has the ability to change people's lives, then it's definitely worth a go. But as well, like if you think that you want to have a new system, then maybe if this you should give this one a go if people have seen such success with it.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. And it's just it's a different way of looking at things. And, you know, I'll let everyone know if I commit to this and try it. I haven't yet, but I'm keeping it on the radar, if you will. And I've got some plans up my sleeve that might be able to work this in, too. So I think I want to try it. I need to read up more to learn how to use it. It's it's totally intimidating to look at. So I just got to get past that part. And then we'll see how it goes from there, really. So.

Myke Hurley: Excellent.

Brad Dowdy: All right. So aside from that, we've got a bunch of questions that I just wanted to go through real quick. And one of them has come up several times. And I didn't necessarily attribute it to one specific person, but I've talked about it in the past. And I wanted to ask you, Myke, and I know we've talked about this, but I can't remember if I asked you specifically. How you handled this. But I've noticed with myself for years and years and years, I used gel pens, roller balls, ballpoints. And when I use those, I had a certain writing angle that I use with those pens. My writing angle has always been more vertical. Like the pen barrel is more vertical to the page. I'm showing I'm showing that to the microphone, by the way. Like if this was on video. The microphone can see it. Yeah. I'm holding my pen up vertically to the microphone.

Writing Style

Brad Dowdy: So I have to use visuals when I'm talking. So I had a very vertical writing style. With fountain pens, you can't really do that, right? You, by the, by design, you have to have more, a more shallow angle of approach, if you will. So the pen's laid back a little bit more in your hand and it's a little bit lighter pressure and a little bit more flowing. So what I've found that's happening with me now, after about two years of heavy fountain pen use, when I go back to gel, ballpoint, roller ball pens, my angle of approach has completely changed. My writing is not as good. And then I have to force myself back into this more upright stance, upright posture to get this pen to write well. Do you notice if you have two different writing angles of fountain pen and non-fountain pens?

Myke Hurley: I don't think that I do. I've never noticed it. It would surprise me if I did, to be honest. Like maybe it's so subtle that I wouldn't notice it anyway. I'm sure there is some difference, but I think it's pretty subtle if it does exist for me. Or maybe, maybe it's vastly different and I've just never noticed. And now all I will ever be able to do is notice it.

Brad Dowdy: I think, I think you would notice because it's pretty apparent that if I go from a fountain pen to a Pilot Hi-Tech C, I can't hold them and write with them the same way at all.

Myke Hurley: Right.

Brad Dowdy: So I'm wondering if other people experience that too. So for me, it has totally changed and I have, my penmanship is now worse with gel ink pens than it used to be. Because my writing angle has completely changed because I use them a much smaller percentage of the time than with fountain pens. So, anywho. All right, I got a few Twitter questions for you, Myke. Cool. So this one's from Design by MK. Do you use summertime ink colors? Do you change your fountain pen ink color based on the season, Michael?

Myke Hurley: No, I've not changed my main colors in a long time.

Brad Dowdy: Same here. I use bright colors to begin with. Yeah. And so when it comes around to the fall, I tend to not change them. So I'm using, I use spring, summertime ink colors all the time. If I would change, it would be in fall and winter. And I don't. I stick with the main colors I like. I still use the bright blues like Sailor Sky High, Conpecky. I use the oranges that I like, like Apricot, Sailor Apricot, and then a bunch of blue blacks. I kind of have this, I don't know, one big pool of inks that I pull from. And they don't really change with me for the seasons. But I know a bunch of people do. A lot of people, you know, definitely get into the deeper colors in the fall and the brighter colors in the summer and the pastel colors in the spring, things like that. That's never been a thing for me. I just want to use the colors that I like the most all the time. So.

Myke Hurley: I'm the same.

Brad Dowdy: Yep. This is from Jim DeBeer. Where do you buy your pens from, Myke? Which eBay sellers, local retailers, online, et cetera? We also had a follow-up question to that. Someone was asking about British pen shops, pen shops in London today. Yeah. And I have no answer. That's a tough deal, right? Yeah. It's a tough deal.

Myke Hurley: Never found a good one. I'm sure that they exist, but my searching has not yet turned up a good answer.

Myke Hurley: I mean, I think I probably used the standard places. I mean, you know, as well as like JetPens and Pen Chalet and where else? Where is it?

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. Yeah. I mean, this is one. There's no magic here. We pretty much talk about all the places that we shop from all the time.

Myke Hurley: But then I do use UK people like Cult Pens and I use the writingdesk.co.uk. They're really great. And I use Bureau Direct as well. I'll put those three in the show notes because, I mean, I think the other ones everybody knows about. Yeah.

Brad Dowdy: And between, like for me on my side of the pond, you know, JetPens, Anderson Pens, Goulet Pens, Pen Chalet. I've bought from every single one of those this year. And I don't, I stopped using, I don't use eBay very much to buy pens. Yeah.

Myke Hurley: Mine's like, can't get it anywhere else.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. And local retailers are tough. When anyone ever comes to Atlanta, there's like maybe two places I can send them, which is Art Light and Total Office Products. But I haven't been into those shops in, I can't tell you how long. So I don't even know the status of them now. I mean, I know they're still available. I mean, they're still, you know, in business, but I haven't been to them in years. Online seems to be where it's at. But so I'll put them all in.

Myke Hurley: They'll all go in the show notes just in case people are unfamiliar with any of them.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. If you have specific, more specific questions about that, Jim, you know, hit me up and I can definitely guide you. You know, there's probably a few more things I could add in there. So if you're looking for something specific, let me know. And I can also tell you which eBay sellers I've used in the past that have worked out fine.

Myke Hurley: So if you live in the UK, or at least in Europe, look at some deals on paper. There's a store, I think we may have mentioned this, called De Peppery.

Brad Dowdy: We didn't, but I know where you're going with this. So go.

Myke Hurley: They're closing down.

Myke Hurley: So currently they're clearing out stock. I only thought to go there today. A bunch of people have mentioned it to me, but I hadn't got around to it. And they were selling drink local for £4.50 a pack, which is nothing. Wow. And I've missed them.

Myke Hurley: It's my own fault. I think I saw somebody mention, I believe, that someone's retiring.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. I think the couple that runs the company are retiring. Something to that effect.

Myke Hurley: So I think if that is the case, fantastic.

Brad Dowdy: Absolutely. That's the way to go out, right?

Myke Hurley: Yeah. And now they're passing the saving on to you. So go there. They do some really great brands and they've got some pretty good deals. If anything is still available. I mean, they've got anywhere between 30. Well, it's actually at least 30% off everything. Yep. Like, it's insane. Like, you can get, you can get like Rodian notebooks for the price of a mini. Like, it's, you know, it's nothing.

Brad Dowdy: That's crazy. So one of your country mates, Stuart Hasley, he wants to know how I keep track of all of my inks and pens. How do you record and archive them? Do you do anything to that effect, Myke? No. Yes. Let me tell you how I record and archive all my pens and inks, Stuart. I don't. I pretty much, I, I'm no, um, just Davey B who I always am impressed by his database full of pens and inks and rotating them on a certain schedule. That's seriously impressive. I will never do that because that's not in my mental capacity to handle. The only thing I do is I sort my inks by brand. So all my pilot inks sit together, all my sailor inks sit together. I do that. And then my fountain pen storage is done by region, if that makes sense. So I do have my Japanese pens together, my German pens together, my American pens together, things like that, as much as possible. I'm not totally anal about that, but just, I know if I'm looking for a pilot pen, I know generally where to go look for it. Um, and then all my gel rollerball ballpoint pens are usually just sorted out by ink type, just like that gel rollerball ballpoint. It's really, I don't have any kind of system whatsoever to do, but if you want a system, go read, um, just Davey B's site, which I can't even think of the name of it right now. He's changed it so many times in the past year, but, um, you know where to find him. All right. I like this one.

Myke Hurley: I'm finding out. Yeah. Yeah. It is probably just Davey B.me.

Brad Dowdy: It, he, he's gone back and forth. He will laugh when he hears this because he changed it and was all adamant about the change. And then I think within a month had changed it again.

Myke Hurley: Yeah. I think it's just Davey B.me. Okay. I'm going to go with that. I mean, we could be sending another Davey B who also likes pens. Yes.

Brad Dowdy: So no, he always, he updates every time he changes the pen, but there is a specific method to the madness of why a new pen is in the rotation and why it is loaded out with the ink that it's loaded out with. It is very specific. So it's very cool. So Ash to pen on Twitter said, did you ever hear anything more from the people behind that scribbler pen? Hashtag inquiring minds. Um, no, I never heard anything behind anymore from people behind that scribbler pen, but I did get a couple of interesting theories in my mailbox, Myke, and I'm not prepared. Um, I don't have it up in front of me, but there's something. Called, I got an email and these are all just, um, theories. This is nothing factual, what I'm about to say. People had some ideas on what's going on with this scribbler pen. One of the ideas is that this is a something called, have you heard of the lean startup, Myke?

Myke Hurley: No.

Brad Dowdy: So it's a book, I believe, or it's at least a course or it's some Silicon Valley thingy about the lean startup to where you do this product testing before you have a product. So they believe the, one of the emails I got believes that this is a test to see, do we have something before we invest in making this something? Okay.

Brad Dowdy: So that was one theory. The second theory is that this is a take on, and boy, I don't have the link to this in front of me. It, there was a gentleman that came up with this idea several years ago. So, um, excuse me, Myke. Um, let me see if I, I'll find the link while we continue on with the show notes and we'll circle back around to it. But there was a project, like a school project where a guy made a pen or a prototype of a pen and maybe even patented this type of pen to go out and read colors in the real world and then come back and put them down on paper. You know, that would color match it, right? Just like the scribble pen. Um, I'll try to find the link that I can send to you. Um, so that was the two theories that it's either one, this lean startup test to where they're testing to see if they have a viable product and want to move forward, or it's a take on this existing, I think it might even be patented, um, product that someone came up with several years ago and they want to take it to market. But did I ever hear anything back from anyone at scribble pen? No, they stopped answering my emails and I stopped sending them. So I'm good with that.

Pen Ink Nibs

Brad Dowdy: So Jtower42 wants to know about the best pen ink nib combo for fun shading. I'm just getting into stub nibs. Need to know more. You can't go wrong with any stub nib. I haven't met a stub nib that I don't like. I like the TWSBI ones. I like the Lamy ones. The Lamy ones are very stiff and sharp. The TWSBI ones are very wide and smooth. Depending on what you like. I like pilot stub nibs. For shading, I really like the Noodler's Apache Sunset. I like the oranges for shading. And then some of the blues that's shading. Like something like Edelstein Topaz is a really bright turquoise-y blue that's got a lot of shading and it also has a sheen to it. So it's got a red tint to it in the color variation. So those are some of the inks I use when I use a wide nib pen that I want to see the shading or a flex nib pen.

Brad Dowdy: And he also asked, where's the best, safest place to sell pens that I don't want to keep anymore? I actually get this question a lot, Myke. And there's really only a couple of answers. One, you can try the eBay route, which I don't do. So I can't really comment on that. But the real place to go seems to be the Fountain Pen Network Classifieds board or the Fountain Pen Geeks for Sale board. Those are the two places I would send you. I've bought plenty of pens from each. I've never sold one there, but I've purchased, I don't know, six or eight pens from those boards and I've never had an issue. So I'm pretty happy with those.

Myke Hurley: There's something very quickly I wanted to mention. Because I just got the Pen Shelley's email newsletter.

Myke Hurley: They stock Arts and Sciences.

Brad Dowdy: Oh, so Field Notes is new to them. Yeah, they're new. They didn't carry them up until now.

Myke Hurley: They also have Shelterwood and a couple of sort of standard options. But obviously, you can...

Brad Dowdy: Yeah, that's a new thing.

Myke Hurley: You're getting 10% off.

Brad Dowdy: Oh, I didn't think about that. That's a good deal.

Brad Dowdy: Good deal.

Brad Dowdy: All right, so I'm looking up the scribble pen thing. This is a great podcast.

Brad Dowdy: I can't remember the name. All right, so Modern Stationer wants to know about getting started with flex nibs. Good first flex nib pen options. What do you think, Myke? I have no idea. You're sorry.

Brad Dowdy: The Pilot Namiki Falcon.

Myke Hurley: Oh, yes.

Brad Dowdy: Especially...

Myke Hurley: Oh, dear.

Myke Hurley: Well, I mean, yes, of course.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. There's no real great modern options for a flex nib. You can get some from Noodlers. They have a steel flex nib. The nib is actually pretty good on those Noodlers pens. But the barrel, I've had trouble with. The barrel quality is not there. The ink filling system, it's a piston filler. It kind of sometimes works. So flex nibs pens are really expensive in general. So getting started with them, you're looking at the Pilot Namiki Falcon or a vintage pen like a Waterman or maybe Todd. I got a Waterman that's very flexy and I like it a lot. I still like the Pilot Falcon far and away the best. I mean, it's really the only way to go. And I'm not just saying that because of the sponsor. I mean, there's not... There's honestly not a lot of options. Just for example, if you go to someone like nibs.com, which is John Mottashaw's site who is a well-known nibmeister. He can work on all kinds of nibs. So if you purchase a pen from him, you can get an added flex option. That added flex option into the nib on the pen you want is going to cost you more than just buying a Namiki Falcon. So that's a tip right there. But some people... But the nibs that John does are extra, extra flexy. You're going to get a lot of flex out of those. And I mean, it's money well spent for someone who's looking for something like that. But most people don't need that. They need something like the Falcon. And that's what I'd recommend. And it's not close. All right, Myke. What do you do when you first get a new pen? Do you have a cleaning ritual? First thing you write, what do you do? You got a new pen. Your pen comes in from Pen Chalet. You open the envelope. What are you going to do?

Myke Hurley: I... Well, after inking it up, you know, letting the ink settle a little bit, I just grab a Field Notes notebook, usually turn it to the last page, and start writing hello and bonjour quite a lot.

Brad Dowdy: Ah, bonjour.

Myke Hurley: Ah, bonjour.

Brad Dowdy: So what I do is I open the package, unscrew the pen, and run the nib underwater, and clean it first. I don't know why. It just seems like I want to avoid that step of, hey, my pen, I just bought this pen, and it's not writing great. I don't want there to be any question of why it's not writing great. I want to... I don't want to say, well, did you clean it? No. Dump out the ink, then clean it. So I don't do a thorough cleaning. Run it under the water. Kind of make sure the nib gets cleaned out as much as possible, because you never know what happens from manufacturing to, you know, landing on your desk. And then after that, I ink it up, and then I just start doing scribbles. And then my name on... I have this big rhodia pad that I just kind of use for ink testing, and it works out really well. So here's our friend, JustAVB, that we were talking about. I forgot he had a question today. How about the worst performing ink that you own? He nominates Noodler's Luxury Blue. So I've never used that ink. Do you actually... Do you have an ink, Myke, that you've bought or tested or whatever, and you said, this is horrible, and I can't use it again?

Myke Hurley: Uh... No, I've not bought enough inks, I don't think.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah, I think I'm going to disappoint Davey too. There's inks I prefer over others for various reasons, but there's none that I recall, you know, inking up and writing with, and then saying that I just cannot use this ink anymore because it does this, you know, either leaks, you know, you know, the feathers just uncontrollably or just has some kind of horrible property to it that I hate outside of the color. So I'm going to actually work on this and see if I can come up with something. I don't have anything off the top of my head though. There's no... There hasn't been an ink that has just been so bad performance-wise that, you know, I've completely banished it. So last question, and we'll end it on this, Myke, and we always end on top first questions because he has the best questions. He says, Dowdyism, how about you confront the truth that this podcast is an elaborate joke and you really only ever use Bix?

Pen Addict Podcast

Brad Dowdy: It's the truth, Myke. I got to come clean today. This is going to be the last ever episode of the Pen Addict Podcast because I've been found out.

Brad Dowdy: I have a box of Bix crystals in my desk. I do prefer the blue over black. That's the only pen I use, Myke.

Brad Dowdy: I don't know what to say. It's kind of sad to end it like this, but now that we've been found out, I don't think we can go on with this podcast.

Myke Hurley: I think that's fair. Yeah.

Brad Dowdy: All right. It's been great talking to you. Yeah.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. So I think we're done. The show is no more.

Myke Hurley: I don't really agree with that. I like doing the show. Just kidding. Just kidding. The Bic Addict, right? Coming soon.

Brad Dowdy: Bic Addict coming soon. You know what? If I did this show on my vacation, I'm pretty sure we're coming back next week.

Brad Dowdy: What do you think about that? I agree. Yeah.

Brad Dowdy: Sorry, Taffer.

Myke Hurley: Thanks to everyone that submitted questions this week. We always love it when you do that. And a great way to do it is by getting us up on Twitter. We are at Dowdyism, D-O-W-D-Y-I-S-M. Well, Brad is. I'm I-M-Y-K-E. If you want to catch our show notes, go to 5by5.tv slash penaddict slash 113. You can also hit the button there, which will take you to the contact. Well, it will allow you to send an email. You press the contact button, and you can email maybe some longer stuff to Brad, and maybe if it's cool, then we'll read it out on the show. But I think Brad does a pretty good job of responding where needed to. So thank you all for listening to this week's episode of the Pen Addict Podcast. Thank you so much for our sponsor, Pen Chalet, and we'll be back next week. Say goodbye, Brad.

Brad Dowdy: Goodbye, Brad. Bye. Thank you.