The Pen Addict 18/transcript

The Pen Addict Podcast Transcript
Episode:	18
Title:	Breaking The Bank
Release Date:	June 14th, 2012
Hosts:	Brad Dowdy Myke Hurley
Guests:	No guests this episode
Additional Information
Official page:	Episode 18
Audio File:	Audio Episode 18
Podcast page:	The Pen Addict 18
Length:	4545 min <br />0.75 h <br /> minutes
Previous Transcript	Next Transcript

Myke Hurley: Hello and welcome to The Pen Addict podcast, your weekly show where we discuss pens, paper, and the analogue tools that we love so dearly. My name is Myke Hurley and I am joined, as always, by The Pen Addicts myself and your host, Mr. Brad Dowdy. Hello, Brad.

Brad Dowdy: Hey, Myke. How are you today?

Myke Hurley: I'm very well, Sam. Very well. This episode is brought to you by Squarespace and Treehouse. We're going to talk about them in the show. So, I have been very excited about this episode. I've been looking forward to this episode for two weeks. We had a great episode last week with Myke Grady. Absolutely fantastic episode. But I have been looking forward to this one because I bought lots of things.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah, you've been quite the tease over the past week or two, either in our private conversations or a little sneak peek on Twitter. I've been driving people crazy. Instagram or something like that.

Retro 51 Pens

Myke Hurley: Because not only did I buy, I bought just loads of stuff, just like a big haul of stuff from JetPens. I also procured three new Retro 51s. And I know we have a lot of our fans. We've got them hooked on the Retros. And I know that it's been driving people crazy. People have been asking me what I've got and I won't tell them. Well, I'll tell you what I'm going to do first off, which is something that I promised that I would do, is tell people the name of the place where I bought my Retros from.

Brad Dowdy: And you bought three of them.

Myke Hurley: I bought three of them.

Brad Dowdy: No, you don't have a problem at all.

Myke Hurley: No, it's no issue to anybody. So the site where I bought, so basically it's an American company called Art Brown.

Brad Dowdy: Oh, yeah, sure.

Myke Hurley: So I was able to buy the pens from them and they were able to ship them to me. I thought they were going to be caught in customs, but they didn't. So I was very pleased about that. So artbrown.com, the link will be in the show notes for them. Fantastic customer service, good prices, and an excellent selection. They sell loads of pens, but they have a real, real great selection of the Retros. And actually the models that I've purchased, the links in the show notes will be to their page because they were the only place that I could find them to be delivered to me in the UK.

Brad Dowdy: Very cool. Because, yeah, I think they have some brick-and-mortar stores in the US. I don't know that I've been to one. I think they're based out of New York. Decades, decades, yeah. I don't know if that's the only place where they have brick-and-mortar stores. But, yeah, definitely a lot of people. I've heard of them. I've never bought anything from them, but they're a pretty decent-sized outfit. So very cool.

Myke Hurley: So are you ready?

Brad Dowdy: I'm ready. I'm anxious because I didn't realize there was three of them. I saw the picture of one, and now I'm like, oh, my goodness. What have you gotten into?

Brad Dowdy: But do you know what?

Myke Hurley: I'm going to make it worse. I'm going to do a sponsor beforehand.

Myke Hurley: I usually wouldn't do this. I just know that there are people that will be screaming at their iPhones or their iPods now just because they want to hear. That was good. So I'm going to do our first sponsor. But, you know, it's awesome to take a break for these guys because they're so amazing, and it's Squarespace. Now, Brad, you're fully on Squarespace now, loving Squarespace.

Brad Dowdy: Full on board. Before, I know you're going to do the sponsor reading and all the good stuff that you normally do. Let me just say the iOS apps alone might be worth the price of admission just because I've had a rash of spelling mistakes here in the past week or two. And, you know, people email me and correct me, which I always appreciate. I'm not one of those crazy people like, don't tell me what I'm supposed to spell. And because, you know, it's embarrassing to me, and I hate typos and just little silly things like that. And, you know, I'll get an email and, you know, I'm not at home or something like that, and I'll just pop on my iPhone. I can go in, edit the post, you know, clean up my stupid little typo and republish the post and be done with it. I mean, the iOS apps have been just stellar, one of my favorite things.

Myke Hurley: How great are stats?

Brad Dowdy: They're loaded to the hilt.

Myke Hurley: Like, so the stats are excellent in two places. So they're great in the iOS apps. I mean, you get the basics, you know, you get your page views, your unique visitors, and you get your referrers and your search information, which is the standard stuff, right? So that's pretty good. But then when you go in on the website as well, you can really break that stuff down. Like, you can get, you know, basically everything that you would want from Google Analytics, really, but it's built right in. And that way, you know it's accurate. I mean, in the past, I have had some real problems with Google Analytics, and I know it's given me wrong information, but there's no way to tell, right?

Brad Dowdy: Right.

Myke Hurley: You just know in your heart, you know, in your heart of hearts, you know that it's not giving you the correct info. So, you know, but the Squarespace app, it just, you just know that they are spot on because it's built in, so they know the information. I mean, you can get things like, you can, I mean, you can see your traffic over monthly basis, weekly basis, daily basis, which is really good for us. It's good for when we're talking with advertisers like Fusion. I mean, they want to know what our monthly traffic is, and I can give them that really easy. And it shows me a nice chart as well, so I can see what's going up and down. I can find out who, you know, what OS's people are using, what systems they're using, if it's iOS or Mac, Windows, that's all in there. If somebody's linked to us, I can find out what they've linked to. If there has been, you know, if, for example, I think that there might be one post or something that's got a lot of traffic, I can break down my traffic by the most visited pages. It's great. It's fantastic. I mean, you hit the nail on the head. The iOS apps and the statistics are just awesome.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah, with the statistics, anytime I've ever created a blog in the past, it's like, okay, you know, register for the service, pick out my template and grab a Google Analytics code and install it. And this one, I didn't even bother. There's no need. I just used the built-in Squarespace stats, and it's given me everything I've wanted from a statistical perspective. You know, I don't even realize Google Analytics aren't there because I just don't need it. Exactly.

Myke Hurley: Why would you? So aside from all of this, you get the excellent ability to post in it from the iOS apps. If you buy an annual plan, you get free domains. Squarespace is a full package. It's extremely reliable web hosting and excellent WYSIWYG blog creating tools. You have the ability to post. If you have a designer and you have a website designed where you can just drop the CSS right in, it's not a problem. It doesn't have to be one of their templates. It's Squarespace is the full package. Go check it out. Start your two-week free trial by going to squarespace.com forward slash 70 decibels. No credit card required to do this. And if you sign up, make sure you use the code 70decibels6. That's 70-D-E-C-I-B-E-L-S-6 at checkout. This way you'll get 10% off and Squarespace will know that we sent you. So, here we go. I bought three retros. Okay? So, now, the one that I'm going to talk about first is my favorite. And it's now my favorite Retro 51 that I own. And it's from the new Metal Smith series. And it's the Lincoln. Now, anybody that follows me on Instagram, this was the image that I posted. I posted a little sneak image the other day of a notepad that I'm going to talk about in a moment. Now, the Lincoln is the antique copper finish. And this thing is beautiful. The photos do not do it justice. In the photos, it kind of looks like it's meant to look like it's rusted. But it doesn't. It is sleek, shiny, beautifully finished. It's got a fine grain that runs through the whole copper. The entire thing is copper. It feels incredible in the hand. And I absolutely love this model. They have done a stunning job of this. It looks so unique. Like a copper pen, you know. It's like just brown metal. But it looks fantastic.

Brad Dowdy: So, like the finish of it, it's like the, say, where, you know, the silver parts or the chrome parts on the standard 51 Tornado. Or now on this one, it's copper.

Myke Hurley: Everything's copper.

Brad Dowdy: Everything's copper.

Myke Hurley: Except, like, you know the little disc that sits in the top? Yeah. That's the silver metal. Okay, gotcha. Which looks really cool. But this pen is, it's beautiful. It really is a, they did a very, very good job. And it's a shame that it doesn't photograph very well. I was excited. Much better in person. It's so much better in person. Because it does look like in the press images that they got, it looks a bit rusted. Which I also thought looked cool, you know, but not beautiful. But this is, this is a real stunner.

Brad Dowdy: Real stunner. Now, is it, it's the same, it's a 51 Tornado. Is it the same, same dimension, same weight, all that good stuff?

Myke Hurley: Slightly heavier, I think.

Brad Dowdy: Okay.

Myke Hurley: Yeah, it's, yeah, no, it is heavier. It's definitely heavier.

Brad Dowdy: I'm looking at pictures of it now. It's really good looking.

Myke Hurley: I would really suggest this one. If you get, this is actually, this is, this is, this is the 51 that I would suggest you buy. Because it's got a real nice weight to it. And it, it looks very different. I mean, they all look very, the pen itself is very different. And it's, it's quite striking. But this one is, is, is real, really, really elegant. Beautiful pen. The next one I bought, also from the Metal Smith series, is the Jefferson.

Jefferson Pen

Myke Hurley: Now, the Jefferson is really interesting. It's, this like striped metal. Now, this is a very executive looking pen. Um, I, I like it to look at more than I do to hold. Mm-hmm. Because it's got these like metal grooves all the way through it. It's not the most comfortable to hold. But, at this point, um, I'm buying these to collect them, not just to use them all. Mm-hmm. I have used this one. And, and in the hand, it looks, it looks really good. I say, it looks very executive. It looks like quite an expensive pen. Um, because of the way that it's been crafted. But, I wouldn't use it over the, um, the Lincoln. So, but I, I do like the Jefferson very much. It's a very nice pen to look at.

Brad Dowdy: So, that, that one, it looks like, you know, like you're saying, it's not a smooth, like a lacquered barrel or a smooth finish barrel like a lot of these other, uh, tornadoes. Yeah, exactly. It's, it's got the, um, yeah, like ridges. The way, the, the way the barrel's, um, done, there's different, you know, ridges and ins and outs.

Myke Hurley: It's got some horizontal and it's a nice pattern. And, you know, it looks great. It feels great. It's, it's, it's heavy like the, the, the, the, uh, Lincoln.

Brad Dowdy: I like, I like that. It looks like it's got like, um, like a pewter type finish. It's still not chrome. It's not chromed out. It's, it's a little more, it's a little duller, which looks better.

Myke Hurley: Yeah. So, it's, it's a nice dark, yeah, like pewter. Um, and again, it looks, it's darker in person than it is in the images that, that are in the show notes for, for, for it. But yeah, it's really nice. Nice. Now, the, the next one I bought was not from the new series. It's, it's one of their older models, I think. It may be new actually, but it's not, it's not from the metalsmith series. It's the bamboo version. Yeah. Um, this one is very attractive. Um, it comes in a completely different box. It actually comes in a presentation box, not a tin. Um, and it's promoted to save the rainforest. So, with the purchase of this pen, Retro 51, make a donation to the Arbor Day Foundation.

Brad Dowdy: That's cool. I've actually, I've seen a few reviews of this pen. And this is, actually, this is the pen that I think where I've maybe first heard of the Retro 51, because I saw a couple of people reviewing the, the bamboo model.

Myke Hurley: Yeah.

Brad Dowdy: And it is really cool looking.

Bamboo Pens

Myke Hurley: And it's got, um, this isn't showing the images. On the reverse, where the clip is, there's a little panda bear face etched into the wood. Yep. Which is pretty cool. Now, here's the interesting thing about this. So, I love the Retros because of the, um, the ink.

Myke Hurley: So, they are, um, what, the Retros, are they rollable or ballpoint?

Brad Dowdy: Rollable. Rollable. Right.

Myke Hurley: Right. Now, so they, they Retro make their own rollable inks, right?

Brad Dowdy: Well, not, not exactly. I think they, they have a branded Schmidt refill.

Myke Hurley: Okay.

Brad Dowdy: Don't hold me, don't hold me to that, but I'd have to go back and double check.

Myke Hurley: But they've got their logos on them and stuff.

Brad Dowdy: Actually, I take that, and they, you can buy a roll, the ones you buy are rollerballs, but they do have ballpoint versions, I believe, of these same pens. Yes.

Myke Hurley: And the, um, the, the bamboo came with a Faber-Castell ballpoint. Okay. Now, that, it's, I don't like ballpoint. Mm-hmm. Um, because it, you know, it feels very cheap to me, so I was upset. However, the Retro 51 branded, um, rollable inks do fit in this. So, I just swapped it out.

Brad Dowdy: And it's fun. Oh, cool. Did you have some extra refills that you ordered, or?

Myke Hurley: Yeah, I, I, I bought some refills before. Oh, that's a good idea. I have a couple of refills. Although now, I have more than enough to just swap them around. I do that, too. So, I have five now. Wow. And I would suggest the bamboo would be a really nice gift. I think would be a very nice gift option if you wanted to buy one for someone. But it doesn't write as smooth with the standard ink, in my opinion. Which is at least not, not to my liking.

Brad Dowdy: You mean with the ballpoint ink that it came with?

Myke Hurley: Yeah, yeah, with the Faber-Castell ink that it came with. Um, and there is a, when, when, when you turn it now, there is a weird, it doesn't, it's a bit tougher to turn. Um, because obviously it's built differently. It's made, made for a different refill, but it does work. It just turns peculiarly. But this one is slightly chunkier than the regular Tornado. Nice. Very, very nice finish. Looks really great.

Brad Dowdy: Is it heavier or lighter with the wood barrel?

Myke Hurley: Uh, much lighter.

Brad Dowdy: Okay, that's what I would assume. Yeah. Because these are pretty, these are pretty stout pens. I mean, for a pen, they're, I'd say, reasonably heavy, not overly heavy. Certainly comfortable to write with. But I was thinking the bamboo might be a little bit lighter.

Myke Hurley: Yeah. Yeah, it's, it's lighter. It's nice. It's nice. When I was, um, showing them to my mother, because she wanted to see them, um, she, she liked the bamboo the most. Cool.

Brad Dowdy: So, I don't know how you'd choose out of, out of those three. I'm looking back and forth. I was like, out of those three, which one would I prefer the best? I'm not sure. They're, they're really good looking. I'd probably go with the Lincoln if I had to pick out of those three.

Myke Hurley: Yeah.

Brad Dowdy: But, um, dang, this is, this is going to be a, we, we've been getting a rash of, uh, oh, you're killing my wallet. This is going to be one of those killing my wallet episodes.

Myke Hurley: Oh, yeah, because I'm not even nearly done yet. I know. I'm not even nearly done. So.

Brad Dowdy: It's hard to choose.

Sakura Pigma Micron

Myke Hurley: I, I would say go with the Lincoln. Um, it is my favorite and it looks fantastic. So, you ready for the rest?

Brad Dowdy: I am. So, this was a big jet pencil. So, I'm, I'm already shocked and surprised so far. So, no telling.

Myke Hurley: Okay. So, I bought a Sakura Pigma Micron.

Brad Dowdy: Uh-huh.

Myke Hurley: Um, because you speak so highly of them. I do. So, I thought I would go with one of those. Um, it's nice. You know, I got the .8. I think I got it too thick.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah, that's a really, that's, I think that might be the single widest one they make.

Myke Hurley: Yep. I wanted to go for that. I just wanted to see. I like it, but it's, it's really thick. Yeah. Um, what else have we got here? Um, this one's really interesting, Brad. Now, you know, it's called the Pentel Tradio Stylo Fountain Pen.

Brad Dowdy: Mm-hmm.

Myke Hurley: This thing is crazy.

Brad Dowdy: Ah, is this the, the, the Pula Mon? The one with the, like the bristle tip?

Myke Hurley: Yeah, it's, it's, writes like a fountain pen, looks like a fountain pen, but it has a bristle tip. It's so peculiar, but the feel of writing with it is awesome.

Brad Dowdy: It, it's a, it's a really good pen. This is a popular, it's a takeoff on a, a popular pen called the, the Pentel, I think it's pronounced Tradio or Tradio. Um, that is, has the same tip, but it comes in a little bit larger barrel and it's refillable. Right. Um, but they market it the same way. It's the exact, it's, I think it's the same tip. So they've just, they've made it into a more, I don't know, functional disposable package as opposed to the other one, which run, like this, the one you bought is probably like three or four dollars. The other one, I think it's about nine because it's, it's refillable.

Myke Hurley: Yeah, this isn't refillable. Yeah. It's just like a one-off, um, a one-off thing. It's a real nice pen. Really nice. I like it a lot just because it's, it surprised me. I didn't really know what I was getting with it, but it was hot, quite high up on the rankings of the fountain pens and jet pens and it was relatively cheap. So I thought, okay, this is interesting. Let's try that out.

Brad Dowdy: This is one of those pens that has like a huge cult following. Like the people who use these pens swear by them and will, will die for this, this pen. I mean, there's a huge, huge following for the, for this one. And it's really cool. It's hard to, it's, it's kind of hard to describe unless you, unless you've used one the way it, the way it's designed, but it doesn't matter when you, you know, put the pen to paper. It, it writes like normal and it writes really, really well.

Myke Hurley: Totally. It's nice. I like it a lot. Um, then I bought something I've not, I'm not very impressed with this. Um, the Oto Rook fountain pen. Um, I bought it just because it was a, a relatively cheap place. It's like $16. It's not, not that cheap, but it looked really interesting. And it's a small pen, um, like the Kawekos. It's very, very small, very thin. Um, and it's like a orange and silver metal, but there's a couple of things I don't like about it. The, the word Rook is written on the pen, but the logo is, is really bad. Um, it's like shockingly bad. It actually makes the whole pen look cheap. Um, the tip, the nib is not great. And the actual overall feel of the pen, I'm not very impressed with. Yeah.

Brad Dowdy: I've, I've used one in the past. I've reviewed it on the blog. Um, I feel pretty much the same, uh, about, about that pen as you do it. I remember when I first got that pen, it took me about a minute to figure out how to get it open. Yep. It's difficult. I was pulling it and poking and twisting and turning everything until I finally got it, got it done. And it's for, um, a mini compact size fountain pen that, you know, I think there's probably some better, some better choices. It just, everything is just a little bit off, right? It's just, you know, you can get a little bit better, better barrel design. You can get a little bit better nib. And this one's, you know, I, I don't think I really recommended it very highly when I reviewed it. Um, it's, it's very average pen.

Myke Hurley: Just buy a Kaweco. Yeah.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. Just go straight for the, uh, the classic or the ice sport or one of those. And there are a few dollars more like the rooks, like around 16, 17 and the Kaweco classics and sports around 21. But the, the difference is worth it.

Myke Hurley: Yeah. You, you, you better off doing that. Yep. So I also bought a, uh, roturing tiki roller point.

Brad Dowdy: Mm-hmm.

Myke Hurley: Nice pen. Real nice pen.

Brad Dowdy: And that's the needle. Is that the needle? The needle tip? The needle tip.

Myke Hurley: Yeah.

Ink Flow

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. See, I, I would think that that pen would be right up your alley because the ink flow is super heavy on those. Yep. But that's good. I mean, that's what it's made for. I mean, it's a, it's a writing pen. Oh, it is. You can just write and write and write. It's very smooth. There's no skipping, no, no anything with the ink. And, but then that's for that type of pen. It is sturdy. I mean, you could, it's a very heavy, durable pen for a plastic barrel, you know, disposable pen, really.

Myke Hurley: It's nice and, and smooth and, yeah, nice, comfortable. Great, great little pen. Um, very much, very much so did I enjoy it. Um, so yeah, that's that. What else have we got here? Yeah. I'm basically, uh, reading through my order information online from JetPens. Um, I bought, uh, two UniLive Pigment Sign Pens. I bought one in blue, one in red.

Brad Dowdy: Do you like those? I love those.

Myke Hurley: Yeah, oh, they're fantastic. They remind me of the pens that I used in school. Yeah, great. Yeah, great.

Brad Dowdy: Yep, the, um, the barrel, what was the barrel, um, I can't even remember the name of it.

Myke Hurley: The barrel handwriting.

Brad Dowdy: Mm-hmm, mm-hmm.

Myke Hurley: Um, because it's just that plastic tip.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah, I call it, it's like a plastic tip. I call it a porous tip. Um, I don't know if that's the official term for it. But yeah, it's different from the, the bristle tip of the, of the, um, the Pentel that you were just talking about.

Myke Hurley: Yeah.

Brad Dowdy: But same general concept, but it's a much more tighter, I guess, defined line, if you will.

Myke Hurley: Really, really, really good, fine writing pen. Really great. I like it a lot.

Brad Dowdy: I love that pen. And the ink start on all the colors. I mean, it's, it's a very vibrant ink. And yeah, it looks good on the page.

Myke Hurley: The red is fantastic. Real, real good red.

Brad Dowdy: And the tip's firm and it stays firm. That's, that's one of my, I mean, for a very inexpensive pen, that's one of my favorite pens I've tried in the past month or two. It's great. Easily.

Myke Hurley: I really like it. Now, I think that's the end of the pens that I bought, but I did buy some other things. But before we get to those, now this, these are some really cool bits. So this is actually going to be a good conversation. Because there's one other thing you don't know. Oh. So we're going to do our second sponsor this week. And this episode is also brought to you by Treehouse. If you ever wanted to learn how to design and develop, Treehouse can help you. Basically, Treehouse is like your own personal training course. Through videos and project examples, you can learn all you need to become a superhero developer. Treehouse can get you into web design, web development, and iOS development, if that takes your fancy. With a gold membership from Treehouse, you can access their entire project library, which is a literal cornucopia of creative training. Do you like that, Brad? I wrote that myself that bit.

Brad Dowdy: Very much so.

Myke Hurley: That's nice, isn't it? Watch as their crackerjack team take various projects from idea to implementation, then download the source code and get your hands dirty. Finish off by completing quizzes and code challenges to show off what you've learned. Build your own app, launch your own startup, or get that dream gig. Just go to treehouse.com forward slash learn forward slash projects. There'll be a link in the show notes for that. That's where you'll be able to find out more. That's where you can take a look at their gold membership, which gets you access to all of this excellent, all these excellent materials. At Treehouse, they're helping you bring your ideas to the light of day. Excuses not included. That's a pretty cool tagline, that one. I like that. Excuses not included. I didn't come up with that. That's treehouses. I wish I did, though, because it's good.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah, really?

Myke Hurley: So I'm going to start off with a thing you don't know I bought.

Brad Dowdy: Oh, man. You are killing me today.

Pen Case

Myke Hurley: I know. I know. I bought a Lihit Lab Tefer Pen Case.

Brad Dowdy: Ah, that's on my list to talk about.

Myke Hurley: Have you got one? Yes. Oh, man, that's so cool. I've got, I've basically, I've turned this into my portable just pen collection. Basically, all my favorite pens are going in here, and they're going to go around me everywhere now. So I'm taking my favorite pens to work, and I'm bringing them back home again. So one side is basically, I have, so yeah, we spoke about this a couple of weeks ago. I will put in the show notes a link to that episode where we spoke about pen cases. Just write that in now so I don't forget. Pen cases episode. So there we go. I won't forget that. So on one side, I've got, so it's basically like a folder. It's like, it's split into three sections, really, isn't it? You've got two parts where you can put your pens in, and it's got like these nice strips so it keeps everything intact, and you can like tack the clips over them. And then you've got some netted pockets. So I've got, you know, some netted pockets to put my ink refills in. And then I have one large pocket where I keep filled notes and some larger refills. And then I've got all of my retros, my Vanishing Point and my Kalito in one side. Then I have my Prera, my Lamy Safari, and then my Uni Kurutoga. And then I have the Rotaring Tiki, one of the Uni Live Pigment Sign Pens, and the Pentel Giudio. At the moment, all of those are my favorites. And I've got the Kaweco in one of the little pockets because it's too small.

Brad Dowdy: So that's my issue. I don't know what to put in there. That's why I wanted to talk about this pen case because of everything that you said because we talked about it, you know, on that episode. And I didn't have one of those. And the feedback we got was, you know, this is the one you've got to get. You know, you've got to try this one. It holds a ton of stuff. I mean, it's a reasonably small case. I mean, it's not an overly large case. It's not going to blow you away size-wise. But for the quantity that it holds, it's amazing. But you know what? Your pens have to have a clip to go in that case. And that drove me crazy. I was like, oh, this is sweet. I started – I just went straight into it. You know, my favorite case, that Nomadic roller case that I use. I said, well, I'm just – this thing's great. I'm just going to switch over. So I started moving my pens over. Then I was like, hey, I don't have anywhere for my Kaweco AL Sport. And it doesn't fit in. And there's – I don't have a clip on it. And so I actually had an extra clip. I put the clip on it, and it still didn't work it out right. I was like, well, I'm going to carry that pen with me. And I'm not going to let it just roll around in this case. So I moved on. And, you know, I carry around the P1 Premier pen, which is one of those Kickstarter high-tech C barrels. Well, it has no clip on it. I'm like, damn, what am I going to do here? I want to use this case. So I was like, well – so I just – I reversed everything back to the roller pen case. And then I found – and then I took the Lihit Lab Teffa case and just put things like my Retro 51 in it and some of the other fountain pens. And some of the bigger pens with the clips that hold it sturdy and, you know, I put a small Rodeo notebook in the back. I mean, it's an awesome case, but that did – I didn't – it didn't register with me when I bought it that if you want to use this case as your only case, your pens need to have a clip on it.

Myke Hurley: Which is fine for me because that's like a prerequisite for me. I like my pens to have clips on them.

Brad Dowdy: Yep. And I'd say generally for me too because I like to clip them to my shirt just out of habit. So I usually always have a clip on my pen. But I didn't realize it until I started loading it that I do have a few that don't have clips on them. And they can't really go in that case. They don't play nice in that case with all the other pens that are clipped to it.

Myke Hurley: That's a shame. That's a real shame. I mean, I love it. It's a shame that you've not been able to get it to work 100% for you.

Brad Dowdy: Well, it's my backup. What it's done is so I carry a messenger bag to work, right? And I have the – the only case I bring is my – the nomadic roller. Well, now I bring two cases. So I have the primary case and I have the secondary case now. So that's – I have a real problem. It's like – It's so much worse than me. Yeah, I don't need to be bringing 30 pens to work, but by gosh, I do.

Myke Hurley: See, people think I'm crazy, right? And I just think you've just got to meet Brad because he's so much worse than I am. Like, you know, especially now, like I'm a grown man bringing a pencil case to work, right? Yeah. So my colleagues are kind of thinking I'm a little bit crazy, especially as I'm starting to talk to them more about my pen purchases because when I get something new, I want to show it off to people. And they're the people that see my pens every day. So I show them the vanishing point. They're like, oh, that looks nice. I'm like, you don't understand.

Brad Dowdy: That's right. That's right. You have no idea at all.

Myke Hurley: I'm still using the vanishing point every day.

Brad Dowdy: Yep. Same here. Same here. We actually, we're talking about that, you know, and, you know, going back and forth. And I, I, I'm still using the cartridges. I have drained a couple of cartridges now. So I got to work on, you know, doing the syringe refill since I got the syringe and some other inks and stuff. Yeah. But I did switch over from the black Namiki cartridge to the blue black cartridge. And I actually like that better for my, for my vanishing point. I actually wanted to keep it with black ink just because it's a black stealth. It was just kind of a thing. But I like the blue black ink better from just the base cartridge.

Myke Hurley: I've never used blue black. I've always used black. I don't know why. I've just, just thought, you know, if I want a dark color, I go for black. I don't know why I'd want anything else. And maybe I should try it out. Maybe I should try it out because I've not. I've never tried a blue black cartridge.

Brad Dowdy: The, um, does the Lamy's come with a blue black standard? No, it's just regular blue. It's blue. It's just regular blue that they give. Yeah. I was trying to think if any of them came with a default, with a stock blue black cartridge, but maybe not. It's mostly just regular blue. Mm-hmm. Yeah.

Myke Hurley: So, you know, the last thing that I bought because I contacted you to ask you a question about it. Now, this, my want for this item goes back to, um, the episode of Enough that you were on. Mm-hmm. With, which is another show on the network, which was hosted by myself and Mr. Patrick Rohn of minimalmack.com. Um, it was the, this, this episode of Enough was what started this podcast.

Brad Dowdy: That's exactly right.

Myke Hurley: Because I told you that you needed to do a show with me afterwards. Um, and Pat was talking about this book that you, you had actually sent him.

Brad Dowdy: I did.

Myke Hurley: Um, and it's, it isn't, it's, it's a notebook, but it's more about the case than the book itself. Now, this is, um, is it Pele? Yes. Pele, it's a Pele notebook, Pele leather journal. Um, I bought the brown and I bought the small, which is 3.4 inches by 4.9 inches. Um, and it comes with a Pele linen paper notebook insert, insert. And I bought one of those. I bought an extra one too, just in case. Um, now the, the paper that it comes with is like, is I've never used paper like this in my life. It's, it's, it's crazy. It's linen, right? It's so weird. Cause it's really, um, it's glossy to the touch, but ink dries instantly. Yeah. And that, I was like, this is going to be useless for me with a fountain pen. So I thought I'm going to test it. I'm going to give it the heaviest test I can. So I got my Safari. That's my thickest of all my pens, the Safari with the medium nib.

Brad Dowdy: You have a medium nib.

Myke Hurley: Yeah. I have a medium nib and I used noodlers ink. And since I used the noodlers ink, the ink distribution was more liberal, which I like. Wrote a few sentences, no smudge. And I couldn't believe it. Couldn't believe it. I was really impressed, but that's not why I bought this.

Myke Hurley: I bought this for something to put my field notes in. And it works. I mean, okay. So my field notes notebook pops out the top a little bit, but I like that. I think it looks really cool.

Brad Dowdy: Like, so it's like maybe what, like a quarter of an inch. So, I mean, it's pretty small.

Myke Hurley: It's tiny and it fits perfectly in here. Cause the, the, basically the note notebooks are held into the, the leather journal by elastic that runs through the middle page. So you open up the book and run elastic, like they're sort of got like elastic bands, elasticated bands inside. Um, and you just run that through the middle page, but it holds more than one. So I actually have the, the Pele insert and a field notes notebook in here now. Um, and it's fantastic. I love it. I'm carrying it around everywhere. Yeah.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. I ordered the, I, and I haven't reviewed this yet and it's killing me just cause I haven't, I haven't had a lot of time with it yet, but I ordered, I have the black medium one. And when you told me you were getting one, I was excited. And then you said, I've got this idea, which, you know, I think I'm going to use my, you know, will it fit a field notes memo book? I'm like, how did I not think of that? That is so simple. And so it's such a good idea. Cause I have so many, you know, that size notebook just slip it in that cover as well as, you know, you can use the, the Pele, um, journal refills and they have a, you know, the blank journal that you're talking about. They have a gridded journal. Then they have a sketchbook paper journal that you can load up, um, your journal with, or like Myke, you can just grab your field notes and you could use three of them in there if you wanted to. Cause it holds like free notebooks.

Myke Hurley: Cause I have loads of field notes and I want to use them, but I don't like just carrying them loose like that cause they get destroyed really. Right. Or I think they will do it. And I want to put them in something nice and this is perfect. And I can take a retro, right. And just cause it has an elastic band that goes around the, the, the book itself. Um, as an orange one, you get another one in the case, which I thought was awesome. So you can change out the color to brown if you'd like. Um, and I'm able to just tuck the, the retro 51 in underneath the band along the edge and it just stays there perfectly. I love it. And the pairing of this and the Lincoln, the copper retro 51. Yeah. Oh boy. They are, they're, they're a match made in heaven and, and I'm, I'm really happy that I'm getting more use out of my field notes. I love having a book this size cause I could just carry it around. The leather is meant to get, they, they say like that they get destroyed, but in a good way, the leather ages. And I love the fact that I don't need to worry about this. I could just throw it around the place. And every time I do that, I'm giving it more character and that's, that's right.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. It's, it's completely built to, it's built to be aged. I mean, it's a thick, thick leather leather. It's soft and pliable, but it's, it's built to take a beating, you know, in your backpack or just, you know, your desk and any, it's, it's, it's built to travel around.

Myke Hurley: I love it.

Brad Dowdy: So that's awesome. I'm, I'm glad you got one of those. Cause I, I sit here and stare at mine. I was like, man, I gotta get, I gotta take this thing out for a test drive. I've just, I've gotten so much stuff here recently. I haven't, you know, been able to keep up with some of the review stuff that I need to do. And that's, it's just cool to look at. I always grab it and flip through it and hold it. And, you know, going back to the paper, I haven't done all the, the ink tests that I like to do yet on it, but that's kind of a recurring theme that I've heard about how the paper, the Pele paper itself handled fountain pens very well. And that was one of the biggest features that people enjoyed about this, about this journal.

Myke Hurley: See what I've kind of put in my brain is like the field notes. It's just for me to write down whatever I need to write down. Right. So if I'm going to call with somebody, I want to take some notes. I just grab the field note side. But if I ever want to write something of meaning, I'm going to do it in the, uh, in the, the Pele pad.

Brad Dowdy: Very cool. Yeah. I ordered the, I ordered one of each style of journal, the, the blank, the gridded and the sketchbook. So I can test out all the paper. Then I was like, well, what, what content's going to go in the blank and what content's going to go in the grid? What content's going to go in this, in the, uh, in the sketchbook. And, you know, Patrick Rohn would kill me. He's like, don't think about that stupid stuff. Just do it. Just put it in there. Whatever it is, put it down. It's like, you're wasting time. Patrick's always in my head telling me, telling me things.

Brad Dowdy: But you could, you could stop worrying and just do.

Myke Hurley: You could put like the small dome, um, paper books in there. Couldn't you?

Brad Dowdy: Oh, I'm totally doing, um, I'm totally stealing your idea. Absolutely.

Myke Hurley: Cause you could, any, any of these sorts of small books. So you've got like the dome paper, uh, field notes. It will all go in there.

Journal Dimensions

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. They're all, they're all that, that size, I think is three and a half by five and a half.

Myke Hurley: I want to say.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah.

Myke Hurley: Uh, field notes. I'll open it up now. Cause it's actually got the measurements in the back. Uh, they're three and a half by five and a half. Yeah. So it's slightly bigger, but I didn't, I wanted it to overlap, not to be smaller, you know?

Brad Dowdy: Um, so I fit all, all of that style, like utility journal, you know, small pocket notebook, basically almost all of them are that same dimension. So yeah, this is like the perfect cover for those. I thought, you know, I was like, well, I did not think of that. That's just right there, right in front of you. That's perfect. I think that's a great use for them.

Myke Hurley: Yeah. Um, I was, I had a brainwave cause I've been looking for, and I've had, I've suggested it on the show before I wanted something to put my field notes in and I've had a couple of people suggest a couple of things, but they've like been leather and they've been really expensive or just not, just not what I'm looking for, for whatever reason. And then I remembered cause I wanted one of these journals, but they were sold out for a long time. Yes. And then I thought when I was sort of flicking through, um, when I was basically that this, this big, um, purchase on jet pens, um, there was nothing that I was looking to buy. Like I had a couple of things I wanted to knock off the list. Like some cheaper stuff like the, the, the sign pen and stuff. Um, and then I just started trawling the top lists for, I try out some new things like of my own rather than just, you know, things that you suggested to actually try to see, you know, what can I, what can I get here? Like, let's have a look, let's have a dig around. And then I was just looking through the top lists and buying the things that made, that looked interesting to me. And, and then I ended up going into the notebooks and saw the Pelé and they had them, um, in stock. I was like, I've got to buy one.

Myke Hurley: So it sort of just occurred to me and like a fleeting moment, but it was cool. I'm really, I'm really pleased with it. I love it. Absolutely love it.

Brad Dowdy: Now you're, you're, I'm going to have to, when we're done, I'm going to have to go get, get mine out and start using it.

Myke Hurley: Yeah.

Brad Dowdy: I think you should. I've been putting it off and putting it off and putting it off. So I need to, I need to get on that. Cause it's really nice.

Myke Hurley: Really? I like it a lot. So, uh, I mean, I have spoken a lot in this episode and it's, we're already at 40 minutes. If you've got anything you want to add before we wrap up today?

Brad Dowdy: Well, I just want to know, didn't, I guess it didn't get stuck in customs this time.

Myke Hurley: No, I got it all. Um, the, I didn't go with the, um, I went with the cheap shipping, the untracked shipping. Gotcha. So I was able to, to get it all in, in, in good, good time.

Brad Dowdy: Well, you did, you did awesome. You got some, you did get some awesome stuff. And that's, that's funny about the, uh, the Teffa pin case, because I, I wrote down the, the one thing I want to talk about was I got that case and just say, you know, the, the couple issues that I had with it. And, but you know, it, it's still an awesome case. The other one other pin that I've got, which I didn't have high hopes for, um, when I bought it just because I, I don't know, I w I was a little unsure, but I bought one of the, um, the Lamy Tipo roller balls from jet pins.

Myke Hurley: Oh yeah. They look really cool.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. The Tipo has been around for a while. I don't know if I'm, I don't know if it's Tipo or Tipo. It's been around for years and years and years, but I don't know if these colors that they introduced are new. Um, that's really kind of, it's one of those pins where I had low expectations and it's kind of surprised me in a, in a positive way. The, the, I have a, um, Lamy AL star, the aluminum barrel roller ball pin, and I didn't like it at all. It's, it's very large. Um, I didn't like the refill. I thought it was too inky. Um, you know, most of those come with a standard 0.7 millimeter, uh, liquid ink roller ball refill. This one, for some reason, it, I don't know. It, it reminds me a lot of the retro 51 and how it writes, you know, that, that type of refill. When I, when I started writing with it, the, you know, the barrel is very different than the retro 51. It's hugely different. I mean, it's a lightweight plastic molded plastic, you know, plastic grip. Um, you know, it's, it's about half the price of the retro 51 too, but from a writing experience, it was awfully close and I haven't broken them out side by side, but I keep finding myself going back to this Tipo and it's still, you know, it's a medium tip. I mean, it's, it's 0.7 millimeter refill, but I don't know. I'm, I'm enjoying it very much. And, and one thing about this pin I'll, I'll explore it before our next episode. I'm pretty sure that, you know, people that like to do pin hacks. I think this pin fits a few very common gelling pins like the G2, like you could put a G G2.38 refill in this without any modifications and use that as a upgraded G2 barrel, but I'll verify that before next episode. So I was, I was, this was on the pleasantly surprised list.

Myke Hurley: So yeah, it's always nice to be pleasantly surprised. Like, like I was with the Pentel 3D. I didn't really know. I thought I was getting a cheap fountain pen. Like, you know, Pilot do the V pen.

Brad Dowdy: Yep. I have some of those.

Myke Hurley: Which are cool. Nice disposable pen. Mine are probably those. I used that. I've been used, I had been using those for years, but they run out quick. And the reason I used to buy, I used to buy those when I was in school, because you could get really bright colors and really like wild colors in a fountain pen. And at that time that was quite new to me. You know, you could get these really bright colors because I, you know, I didn't know anything about inks or anything like that. But yeah, no, I liked it. I liked it a lot.

Future Episode Topics

Myke Hurley: So yeah, it was really cool. So next week, a couple of things for next week, actually. We have a sponsor. I'm not going to say who yet because I don't want to spoil it. And I'm not going to say what, but they're doing a really cool giveaway, this sponsor, that this show will love. The listeners to this show will love. So you want to tune in next week. I've got a sponsor that's doing a giveaway that you were going to like. So say that. And also, we're going to talk about your top five list. Yes. You've updated your top five list. We're going to talk about that. I have some things that I want to say about it. And I might be able to kind of maybe a top three or something. I don't think I've. Do you know what? I actually think I could probably do a top five as well. So we'll talk about this point. I think I could too, because I'm looking at my pen case and I can already see the five pencil pick.

Myke Hurley: You know, I would like to do that too.

Brad Dowdy: And any listeners out there, if you have any questions about the top five that you want me to discuss next week, this will give you some time to get your questions in. You know, drop me an email. You can email me at thepenaddict at gmail.com or you can just go to the contact form on penaddict.com. Those all come straight to me. If you can just, you know, put a note that says, hey, top five question for the podcast, something like that, just so I know, you know, you want me to, you read the post that went up this morning and you had some questions or some things you want me to cover about the top five list. So, yeah, we'll tease that for next week.

Myke Hurley: If you want to complain to us on Twitter that we've burnt holes in your wallets or purses, you can do that. I'm iMike, I-M-Y-K-E. I apologize for everything I've done to you in this show. Brad is at Dowdyism, D-O-W-D-Y-I-S-M. Yes. We've covered it. And I think I definitely gave people what I told them I would and maybe a little bit more to boot and I offer my sincerest apologies to you all.

Brad Dowdy: My wish list has grown. So, and that takes a lot.

Myke Hurley: I'm actually, I'm thrilled that I've been able to do that. For once, I've been able to put things on your wish list as opposed to the other way around. So, thanks again to Squarespace and Treehouse for sponsoring this episode. And Brad, thanks a bunch and I'll talk to you next week.

Brad Dowdy: Thanks, Myke. I will talk to you later. See you. Bye-bye.