The Pen Addict 315/transcript

The Pen Addict Podcast Transcript
Episode:	315
Title:	This Orange Doesn't Exist
Release Date:	July 4th, 2018
Hosts:	Brad Dowdy Myke Hurley
Guests:	No guests this episode
Additional Information
Official page:	Episode 315
Audio File:	Audio Episode 315
Podcast page:	The Pen Addict 315
Length:	5050 min <br />0.833 h <br /> minutes
Previous Transcript	Next Transcript

Myke Hurley: From RelayFM, this is The Pen Addict, episode 315. Today's show is brought to you by Pen Chalet and Blue Apron. My name is Myke Hurley and I am joined by Brad Dowdy.

Brad Dowdy: Hello, Myke Hurley. Hi. I'm wondering if you realise something. This will be your last Pen Addict podcast as a single man. Did you realise that?

Myke Hurley: Well, it's kind of yes and no, right? We're going to break the fourth wall in this a little bit. So, this episode that you are hearing right now is the last episode that will be released before my wedding. But, episode 316 is being recorded in advance. So, whilst that technically would be the first episode of The Pen Addict after my wedding, it is actually, because of time travel, going to be the final episode I record before I'm married, but it comes out after. So, yes and no, Brad.

Brad Dowdy: I wish we had some ability for me to go baseball nerd on you here, because there was this situation in the baseball season this year where there was a time warp thing happening very similar to what we're doing here. So, it's cool. So, yeah, but we'll just pretend like this is the last one. Yeah, sure. You know, that's what I'm going to go with.

Myke Hurley: Yeah, functionally it will be the last one, right?

Brad Dowdy: So, this show I'm kind of excited and nervous about because we're going the same topics that we would normally discuss, but we've had some very weird things transpire since last episode, right?

Myke Hurley: Yes.

Brad Dowdy: And I'm anxious to talk about them, not knowing what's going to happen with these topics and how things might roll. So, just a little rewind here. We did most of the discussion about the Lamy Orange last week when I shared that blog post and we talked about it. And, you know, the chat room lost their minds. I lost my minds about this orange, like this orange exists, this orange doesn't exist, where can I buy it? No one could buy it. All this stuff. So, it was based on this blog post by the Clumsy Penman and we'll put this link in the show notes again probably this week so everyone can refer to it.

Myke Hurley: Yeah, it's back in there right now.

Lamy Safari

Brad Dowdy: Yeah, listen to last week's episode. But, you know, as big of a fan of orange as I am, you know, I want these things, right? Basic Lamy Orange ink. And at the end of the show, and we even went into the post show after this.

Myke Hurley: Which is why you should listen live because sometimes weird and wonderful things happen.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah, we had some weird stuff happen in the post show last week, but I was like, anyone send me a link where I can buy this thing and I'll buy it right now. And it turns out a company in the UK had it and Myke ordered it. So, my first question before we get into this, Myke, is do we want to link to that store again? Because I'm honestly a little bit concerned about doing that.

Myke Hurley: Why?

Brad Dowdy: Because of what it says on the box.

Myke Hurley: Oh. Yeah, I mean, so here's what I'll say. We shouldn't link to them, but I found it very easily via Google. It didn't take me very long to find that. So, I would say that if you are Googling and you're looking in maybe in Google Shopping, I think might have been where I came across it, for a UK website, you could find it possibly. And we'll get to that in a little bit, maybe.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah, so when we were reading this blog post, one of the things that turned up in the post was the ink box that these orange cartridges came in was an official LAMI product, LAMI box, and the back of the box said not for sale. Or what was the terminology exactly? Exactly.

Myke Hurley: So, a bunch of different languages. It just says not for sale. So, that's in German, I believe, in English, and in French, maybe some other. Yeah, because I think in other languages, right? We've got Venta Prohibida, which might be Italian. I don't know. But it says not for sale on these boxes.

Brad Dowdy: Right. So, we were wondering when we ordered it, one, what are we getting? Are we going to get the LAMI orange cartridges that we saw in this review? Are we going to get the copper orange that was popular a couple years ago? And, you know, are these, is this a real product that's actually going to deliver? And it actually is. So, Myke put in the order and got a box of LAMI cartridges that say not for sale on the back. So, we have the LAMI orange ink cartridges, which Anna in the chat room was very active in this, too, because she's in France and was able to find these. And she was big on this hunt as well. So, I really appreciate that.

Myke Hurley: It's very confusing, though, because everywhere that I have seen them lists these, I think, is LAMI T10 orange. But that is also seen as the title in listings of LAMI copper orange T10.

Brad Dowdy: Right.

Myke Hurley: So, what is T10? Is that the name of a cartridge? Is it the name of a collar? Do we know?

Brad Dowdy: Yeah, I don't know. I imagine it's the general product number, product designation for a LAMI ink cartridge, but I could be wrong.

Myke Hurley: Okay. So, I have no idea what's going on here. But I have, and I'm using right now, a LAMI orange ink. I don't have anything to compare it to. I don't have the copper, but we're being told in the chat room that T10 is the size. But this is a relatively bright orange, kind of, I would say, close-ish to Fuyugaki.

Brad Dowdy: Mm-hmm. Yeah, it's a bright orange, which is why we wanted it so bad, why I wanted it so bad, why this became a thing. But I'm a little bit concerned that the shop is actually selling not-for-sale products. I don't, I mean, like, I'll buy them all day long. I just don't want them to get in trouble, which I don't think they will. Like, believe me, I don't think anything will happen. But I'm a little bit, you know, a little bit hesitant.

Myke Hurley: Well, because we have no idea what's going on here. Like, are these old inks? Are these new inks? Like, were these promotional materials? Like, we don't, we have no idea what the situation is.

Lamy Safari Orange

Brad Dowdy: Right. And I think we found when we were looking at the Lamy Orange, Lamy Safari Orange limited edition release, I think it was 2009. So I don't think that these cartridges are that old. It seems like they're newer to me. But I got an interesting email, Myke. Oh, the plot thickens. This just happened this morning, so I didn't put it in the show notes. A friend and listener from Heidelberg, Germany, the home of Lamy. So this is all speculation and hearsay, but they have a friend that works there and Lamy Orange is in production, according to them. So that's a...

Myke Hurley: So you reckon these are samples, maybe? I don't know. Brad, I have a story to tell you. Okay. So this is like, you know, typical Myke style. He has a story which just is going to make everyone mad at him. So this box arrives and I was very excited, right? Mm-hmm. So I wanted to try it out and I didn't have a clean Safari, right? So I took my petrol Safari, right? That had Lamy petrol in it. The cartridge was... It had no cartridge in it, but that was the last thing that was used. And I cleaned it out. Like, I ran it underwater. I was kind of like... I was following along with the Brad Dowdy stream, you know? Like, I watched your stream. And I was, like, shaking it out. Like, I used pen flush. I was, like, putting some water in it and blowing through the other side, right? To kind of extract everything. Doing my absolute best, right? So I was running it through and everything seemed fine, right? And I popped the cartridge in and the cartridge turned blue.

Brad Dowdy: The cartridge itself? Like, it's... The ink. Back into the cartridge?

Myke Hurley: It went back into the cartridge. Oh, Lord. And ruined the ink.

Myke Hurley: That is such a Myke thing to do. So I ruined it. It wasn't like... Okay, so here's the thing. My expectation is a lot of the times that somebody changes ink, right? Like, this is what happens, right? Like, the color kind of changes in the ink that you're using a bit if you're changing color, right? Like, because there can be some residual stuff built up in it or whatever. And usually it's not a problem for me because I'll just keep using it through and the colors, like... It's kind of orange or whatever, right?

Brad Dowdy: Like, usually it wouldn't bother me. Usually, though, it's the output.

Myke Hurley: Yeah, yeah. I mean, I don't know what happened. Maybe when I put the cartridge in, I kind of squeezed it a little bit, right? So, like, it, like, sucked it in.

Brad Dowdy: Right.

Myke Hurley: So I was like, oh, God. Because the problem is I need to see what the actual color is, right? Right. So I was like, well, what am I going to do? So I took it out, ran more water through it, like, really, like, waiting until the water was clear. Put another cartridge in. It happened again.

Brad Dowdy: So, two... See, Myke, this is what happens with not-for-sale cartridges, Myke. These are not... These are not...

Lamy Cartridges

Myke Hurley: I have no idea what it is. Like, it might just be the way that I put cartridges in Lamy pens because they are trickier to do, right? Like, it has a real, like, you have to apply some real force to it to get the cartridge to connect. So I was like, screw this. I want an Amazon. And I bought two things. I bought just a Lamy Safari, a white Safari, and an aspirator. There you go. It's like, this is not happening to me again. So this morning... Hilarious. So I've ruined two of these cartridges. So this morning, which I feel, like, just the worst about in the world. I'm just so frustrated at myself that this happened. But it arrived today, put the cartridge in, and it works. It's orange. There was one other thing that I did, Brad. I bought 10 packs of these cartridges. A what?

Brad Dowdy: The orange?

Myke Hurley: Yeah. Sweet. Did they arrive? No, I don't know. I've been told that it's been dispatched.

Brad Dowdy: Nice. So, yeah. My thinking was... It was two things, right?

Myke Hurley: One, I feel like I owe you these, and I've ruined two of these cartridges, right? So I just felt really bad about it. So I'm hoping that it arrives so I can give some to you. Nice. And the other thought was, like, there is a ticking clock on these cartridges, potentially, right? Because I don't think they're supposed to be sold. Right. So I just decided I would buy a bunch. So I have 10 of them, 10 packs. And it cost me 20 pounds. Right. Yeah, that's perfect. Because they're just paying... That's nothing. They're two pounds a box or something.

Brad Dowdy: Right. They're dirt cheap. So... That's amazing.

Myke Hurley: I bought 10 packs of them. Just some kind of, I don't know, like, some kind of payment for what I've done. I was so annoyed at myself. I... Just so annoyed.

Brad Dowdy: Let me put a bow on this topic with this, at least for now, at least until I get the cartridges. This is one of the most asinine topics we've ever covered on this show. It is so unimportant. At the same time, this is why I love us. Then I love that we do this. This is what we do. We've got to be investigators, right?

Myke Hurley: We love it when there's a puzzle to solve.

Brad Dowdy: But we haven't solved anything. We haven't solved absolutely anything. We've just made up a bunch of stuff. Bought some not-for-sale ink cartridges. No. Oh, no. Like, this is such... We've cracked the case. This is the biggest non-story topic we have ever covered on a show that covers completely non-story topics.

Myke Hurley: This is the most important thing we've ever done.

Brad Dowdy: We're going to win a podcast award for this investigative story.

Myke Hurley: This is Serial Season 5 here, man. Like, come on.

Brad Dowdy: So I'm going to go back to my contact in Heidelberg, and we're going to infiltrate the Lamy factory, and we're going to go through their garbage and see when the Lamy orange is coming out. Yeah. Yeah. So I think we can do this. So this has been fun. It's not over yet.

Brad Dowdy: And if it was any other ink color, we wouldn't care. But, you know, I'm the orange guy. Myke's a big fan of orange. And it's Lamy, and it's a basic color, and we want it. So we're going to make this happen one way or the other, right?

Myke Hurley: We're the best and the worst.

Pen Selection

Brad Dowdy: All right. So now I'm going to pack a Lamy Safari for my trip just so I can't get up myself there. But we'll talk about more when I'm packing in a minute. But the great unanswered question for your upcoming nuptials, Myke, were the notebook that you were going to use for your vows. We've talked about this before. And, you know, you were trying to decide on – you and Adina were doing handwritten vows, and you were choosing notebooks, and you hadn't picked out your notebook yet. So have you come to that decision?

Myke Hurley: Yes.

Brad Dowdy: All right. Are you willing to share with us that decision?

Myke Hurley: Yeah, of course. I decided –

Brad Dowdy: Okay.

Myke Hurley: I decided – like, I was going through things and kind of looking at what I had and tried to feel like I'd pick the most appropriate, and I've gone with Snowblind. Nice. Because it's white, which is, like, nice and neutral and obviously fitting of a wedding. But also they have that cool color-changing thing where they go blue. And so I thought that it might, you know, it might look pretty nice. I have no idea if the color will change where we are, but I kind of like the fact that it's a little weird one. And I've never really gotten to use Snowblind. Like, actually, in picking this was the first time that I ever got to stick it out of the window and see the color change because when these first arrived, it was, like, winter in the UK and it just wouldn't work. Yeah. Like, I just couldn't get it to do the color change. And as Tony has noted in the chat room, yes, it is something blue, I guess, which is funny. So, yeah, I've gone with Snowblind.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah, it's kind of a perfect selection. A couple people picked that – suggested that. I think Ginny Three Staples suggested that. And I was like, I didn't even consider that, but it's kind of the perfect choice.

Myke Hurley: You know what? I actually think that it was Ginny that made me think of it because I just realized this wasn't in my initial picks from last week. So, this was Ginny's idea. Thank you, Ginny, for the suggestion. It was a great suggestion.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah, in retrospect, it's kind of perfect, I think.

Myke Hurley: Yep. Yep, I think so, too.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. So, that's only part of the equation, right? You have to physically write these vowels in there. And the whole world wants to know what ink you're using in the Visionnaire. What? Allow me orange.

Brad Dowdy: So, no Visionnaire, I take it. So, what pen are you going to use to write this in?

Myke Hurley: I've written the vowels in already. I still have my kind of wedding speech to write in, and I think I'm probably going to use the same pen. I feel like this is not a surprise, but I think it makes a lot of sense. I used the Retro 51 that you and Lisa engraved for me. Oh, no way. Yeah. It felt perfect. I was looking at my selection of pens on my desk here, and I was thinking to myself, one, I need this to be in a bold color so I can clearly read it. And I want to make sure that I'm limiting the possibility of bleed, and it's got to be clear. Like, I don't want to use one of my stub nibs or something. Right. I want it to be nice and clear. And I thought that a Retro 51 would do that, right? Because I have just black ones, and it's nice and clear. And then I saw the engraved one there on my desk, and I was like, well, this is perfect. So... Nice.

Brad Dowdy: And actually, that blue kind of matches with the white there pretty good, so that's probably a good setup. Mm-hmm. So, yeah. Cool. I didn't even think about that until you started talking. I was like, oh, I bet he's going to pick that one. Yeah, cool.

Brad Dowdy: May we ask what Adina has chosen?

Myke Hurley: I have no idea.

Brad Dowdy: Y'all keep it that separate from each other.

Myke Hurley: Knowing her, she'll use one of two pens. She'll either use a Retro 51, or she'll use one of the free clicky pens that comes with Field Notes. She freaking loves those things. The big classic? Yeah. It drives me crazy. I'm like, look at what I have for you here. But, like, you know, come on, look at what I have for you here. You can choose anything. Sure, sure, sure. But she loves those things. Yeah.

Brad Dowdy: They're a great pen. You know, maybe I pick something for the wedding, but hey, if she likes it, or...

Myke Hurley: Yeah, I'm not going to take away from her what she enjoys, but I can judge her.

Brad Dowdy: Well, this marriage is off to a wonderful start. Wonderful start. All right. Tell us where else we can get off to a wonderful start today, Myke.

Myke Hurley: Pen Chalet. They sell all of the stuff that you're looking for. They have all of your favorite brands and all of your favorite products. They sell products from Monteverde, Pelican Nut, Lamy Pilot, Namiki Sela, Kaweko, and many more. They're an authorized dealer of all of them. And whether you're looking for rollerballs or fountain pens, carrying cases or refills, Pen Chalet have got it all. They always got fantastic prices. They try and give you low prices on high-quality pens wherever they can, and they back everything up with a 100% satisfaction guarantee. Pen Chalet offer free shipping on orders of $50 within the United States, but they also sell internationally with very reasonable shipping rates as well. They have fast and reliable customer service. Pen Chalet want to make sure that they give you the stuff that you need as quickly as possible, and they back everything up. So go to penchalet.com, P-E-N-C-H-A-L-E-T.com, and click the podcast link at the top of the website, and use the password penaddict for this week's special offer, and to get the code that you need to save 10% on anything at all at Pen Chalet. This week's special offer to celebrate Independence Day, July the 4th, which is the day that we're recording, Pen Chalet has an offer that includes something red, something white, and something blue. There is a red Kaweco Ale Sport, a white Lamy Pico, and a blue Platinum 3776. All great pens, all great prices, just for penaddict listeners. So go to penchalet.com and click the podcast link at the top of the website to get your grubby mitts on those offers. Our thanks to Pen Chalet for their support of this show and RelayFM.

Brad Dowdy: So what's funny, I looked at these pens, and I didn't even realize the colors. I said, wow, this is a really Brad-focused sale page right here, because I love the Lamy Pico. I have this exact white one. That's my favorite one that I use all the time. I rave about the Platinum 3776, and this Charteres Blue even has a soft, fine nib option on it. And then the AL Sport Red is one of the newer colors, which looks fantastic. So yeah, this is a great theme and great pens. Like, I couldn't have picked out better pens myself, so great job, Ron.

Myke Hurley: There is something about July 4th, which is funny to me, in which I am currently responsible for many of my friends to either be back in London, back to be in London, or traveling to London on Independence Day. It's just something funny to me about that. Welcome home, everybody!

Brad Dowdy: Right, I always enjoy the Queen Elizabeth memes on July 4th. I get great enjoyment out of those. It's pretty funny. All right, so I am leaving for this trip very soon myself, and the question always arises, what stationery am I going to pack on any trip? Not just this trip, but on any trip I take, it's important for me to take either a little or a lot of the things I like, depending on the trip. So this will be a very active, busy trip for me and my wife. And, you know, aside from attending your wedding, we'll be, you know, being tourists in London and the surrounding areas. So I want to have a kit that's going to travel well and do the things I need when I need them to perform. So, you know, I don't need, like, all my fountain pens and big notebooks to, you know, write these big diatribes and journals, but I like pocket stuff, you know, pocket notebooks, pocketable pens, pens that are going to travel well. So I've narrowed this down into one little small kit, and the biggest question, I pretty much knew what pen and paper I was going to take. Oh, excuse me, what pen and pen case I was going to take, but I didn't know what notebook I was going to take. And then it hit me. I haven't reviewed my Dark Star notebook yet, and that's a UK-based brand. So that's, like, the perfect opportunity for me to test out this Dark Star notebook. And they're really nice looking, and they've gotten really good reviews. The paper's really good, good quality, so I'm anxious to take that. So that's going to be my pocket notebook of choice for...

Twitch Stream

Myke Hurley: I've never heard of Dark Star before. The first time I did hear of them was watching Brad's wonderful Twitch stream, twitch.tv slash penaddict. And, of course, there is a YouTube channel as well, and I'll put the links for those in the show notes. I'm just going to do everything I can to continually promote this for Brad, because he won't do it. And the other thing is, I am genuinely getting a lot of enjoyment out of watching Brad's stationary-focused streams and the accompanying YouTube videos. I watched an entire 90-minute video yesterday on YouTube, kind of throughout the day, which was just the stream that Brad did, where he was showing off some products and talking about the Dark Star notebooks. So you're referencing them. You're just referencing them. You were also showing off those other ones with the wonderful WAC packaging, which looked cool. Yeah.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah, so we'll actually talk about the stream a little bit more here on the next topic. All right. The pen and pencil I'm bringing, the Cron Dash Fixed Pencil, which is one of my favorite items, period, but it's kind of the perfect travel item because it's a pencil that has a built-in sharpener and lead protection, all built in one. So I love, that's one of my favorite products ever made is the Cron Dash Fixed Pencil. It gets so much use by me. And then for a pen, I'm taking a shown design pen just because the Fisher Space Pen refill travels very well. It's pressurizing to refill. And I actually like using that pen in the small pocket notebook. So those are two good pocket notebook choices, you know, to write it with the fixed pencil and the ballpoint pen. And I found out yesterday, I'm apparently bringing two shown design pens because my wife saw me writing with the Lisa Franklin. And she said, ooh, what's that? And I said, and then I explained it to her. She's like, well, can I take it on our trip? I'm like, sure. That's, yeah, that's all yours now. So she's taking that one, I'll take one with a little clip because I'm clipping it into the Notco Sepolo, which is kind of the perfect little travel pouch for me. It doesn't hold too much, right? It's going to hold my notebook. I'll carry some note cards in it and I'll carry this pencil and pen in there. And they both have clips, so they sit in there nicely. And it fits in my pocket. Like I've carried this little pen envelope case more than I ever thought I would. And it's good, you know, like if we're out on the town and have little receipts and things, you know, I can stick them in there or tickets or whatever. You know, it holds a little bit more than just the notebook and pen. So that's kind of it. Like everything is going to fit in that case and that case can fit in my pocket. So I'm pretty content with this setup. So am I missing anything? Am I going to be lacking? Apparently now I need to bring a Lamy Safari because I will bring that just in case I get an orange ink cartridge. So I'll figure that out next.

Myke Hurley: It's not going to be very difficult for you to buy a Lamy Safari in England. Yeah, but I don't need to buy a Lamy Safari in England. Okay. I'm just saying that like if you didn't necessarily want to bring one or even if you forgot to bring one, they're literally everywhere. Yeah.

Brad Dowdy: So one of the questions I got asked a lot about this trip, and this is one of the Ask TPA questions, which might be the only Ask TPA in this episode, Myke. We saved them all for next week. This is from our friend Yevgeny. Aside from the wedding, what are you looking forward to the most about going across the pond? Any golf? If not, why not? Frisbee golf counts. So number one, Frisbee golf does not count. Like I'm, you know, I'm a big fan of my, my, my hippie friends that, you know, want to drink beer and get blazed on the Frisbee golf course. And that's great. That's a great event. That is not golf. I will not be playing golf because I'm most looking forward to spending time with my wife. Seeing the sights. This is a side venture for our 20th anniversary. So our 20th wedding anniversary was last year. So this is kind of our, in conjunction with trip, you know, who get to come to Myke's wedding and then get to spend time around London. We're going to do the big, we're going to hit the big sights, you know, because we don't have two weeks to spend. So we're going to do the super touristy stuff, you know, like Tower of London. It's probably the top of my list. Victorian Albert Museum is at the top of my list. Buckingham Palace, you know, just seeing the grounds. I know it won't be open while we're there. Oh, the British Museum.

Myke Hurley: The British Museum is so great because it's everything that we saw, you know, during our time as having an empire, which is, you know, it's terrible. Some of the stuff probably should be elsewhere. But for the time that we have it, you may as well go and enjoy it because the collection of the British Museum is incredible. Like, I think this is still the case, but at least it was the last time that I went there. And when I kind of was growing up as a kid, the first thing you see when you walk in, like in the kind of entrance hall is the Rosetta Stone. Oh, nice. It's just like we have so much stuff we can afford to put something like the Rosetta Stone in the lobby. So there's a lot of really incredible artifacts in the British Museum. And, you know, I don't want to get political on it. I don't know the state of everything. Like, please don't hate on me. I just love this museum. Yeah.

Brad Dowdy: I don't know those things either. But I'm a big museum guy, so I'll be in the right place. So you can assume I'm doing as much touristy stuff as possible since it'll be our first time over there and we want to hit the big stuff.

Myke Hurley: Would you say, Brad, that there is a possibility that you might go and look at Trafalgar Square, London Eye, Tower Bridge?

Brad Dowdy: I'd say those things are highly likely.

Myke Hurley: This is an in-joke right now for me and Brad, which you have to wait about six weeks to understand. But when you know, you can come back here and you can find it funny as well.

Brad Dowdy: I mean, they're all right next to each other, so it should be easy, right? Apparently.

Myke Hurley: We're the worst.

Fountain Pens

Brad Dowdy: We are terrible. All right. So let's get un-terrible and talk about my Twitch stream, Myke. I did a thing on Twitch where I inked up the new G. Herban Corneline Digiped, the orange sparkle ink. Yep. And, you know, I'm not the hugest ink sparkly fan, right? But this one's orange and has silver sparkles in it. So those are kind of two things that if I was going to make like a sparkly ink that I would use, that's kind of the setup that I would think would be something I like. So I said, well, if I'm going to ink this up and use it, let's put it on the stream and see how silly we can get with ink and sparkles. And it was kind of fun to just ink up a pen live on the stream. Like, you know, I made everyone's eyes, you know, go a little bit crazy as I adjusted the camera so you could see me inking these things up.

Myke Hurley: I'm pleased you did that, by the way.

Brad Dowdy: It came out better than I thought. Yeah, you did the right thing. I was a little bit worried about it. Yeah. So it kind of needed it. And I tried that ink on various different papers and I kind of like the ink. It is way more heavily particled than I thought I would, than I thought it would be. Like when you look at the ink bottle, you can see all the sediment in there, you know, like when it settles and you shake it up. And I was wondering by the time I shook it up, set the bottle down, open it up, got the TWSBI Eco that I used to fill it with, you know, am I going to get any sparkles left in the ink or they all sink back to the bottom? And I got a ton, like it is super sparkly. And the thing that surprised me most, even though I used a 1.1 millimeter stub nib, which is wide because, you know, I want to see the effects of the ink on the page. I was surprised at how, just how wet this ink was. There was like no flow issues whatsoever. It flowed really nice. There was a good, I guess, output of the sparkles, right? Like it was consistent. Like there weren't lines with like, that were just orange. Then it weren't lines with like all sparkles. It was very consistent throughout the ink. So I was very pleased, not with just the color, but the performance of the ink surprised me more than anything. That said, it still makes me a nervous wreck. Like even just sitting down the pen filled with that ink while I was talking about other products for, you know, set that pen to the side for 10 or 15 minutes and pick it back up and seeing all that stuff sitting in the feed, like my feed turned silver. I'm like, wow, that's going to bug me. Like, but it's apparently no problem. Right now it has a post, it has opposed the problem. I'm going to leave this, I'm going to leave it inked up while I'm out of town and see how it performs when I come back. Just so I can, you know, kind of get past that myself, you know, to see, is this an issue or is it not an issue? So, you know, I see why these things are popular and it actually makes me want to use more of them, Myke, which I'm surprised to say.

Myke Hurley: Interesting. Okay. That wasn't where I was expecting you to go. I mean, I still feel like I am not out of the woods with my kind of concern. And I know that it's like, it's not founded, right? Because people have no problems with it, but I just really work. Like the way I treat my pens, I don't treat them like precious artifacts. And I just get concerned that I'm going to forget about something and it's going to ruin something.

Brad Dowdy: Right. Right. So, you know, that's why I chose the EcoT. You know, it's a good pen that I enjoy writing with, but it's also not going to be a huge loss if something happens to it. But, you know, we keep saying these things like you and I are very nervous about that. And people will just yell at us and say, it never, it's not going to happen. It's not going to happen. So, I believe them.

Myke Hurley: I'm keen to try this specific ink because I feel like I would want to use it. And then if I, you know, and then if I liked it, I would probably do exactly what you've done, to be honest. Which is to get something like a Twiz, maybe even a Twizby Go, if that ever appears. That was popping up all over the place in the week. Like I keep seeing that video everywhere.

Brad Dowdy: It's good. They actually sent out the official mail to the retailers. One of them sent it to me that, you know, they're coming in August.

Myke Hurley: Oh, it's coming in August. Okay, cool. So, you know, maybe something like that I would grab and, you know, could ink it up. Because I like the nibs fine, you know, and I could get something like a 1.1 or a 1.5 and really kind of get the most out of it. So, maybe. We'll see. I want to try it out. Oh, I've just seen the, on Twizby page, $18.99.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. No, it was right where we thought it would be. That's $20.

Myke Hurley: Mega competitive. I'm excited about that. I'm really pleased that that's where they're pricing at. Wow, $19? $20 for a piston-filling fountain pen.

Brad Dowdy: That's where it had to be, right?

Myke Hurley: Oh, you couldn't do it any other way. I mean, come on, right? Like, this is what we're saying on the show. You can't sell a thing like that for more than $20, right? Like, I think that we nailed it, right? And I think you can see it in the price point that they've picked, which is $18.99, right? They're making sure they're staying underneath $20. I made the right decision, and I'm really pleased to see that. But, I mean, yeah, could I see myself buying a pen just like that one? So, I have, I mean, it's exactly kind of what I was talking about last time, right? Where this feels like a good ink testing pen to me, just in general. Exactly. The aesthetic of it, everything kind of just looks like, it kind of looks like something you'd find in a science lab, right? Like, it just, it has that kind of feel to me. So, I would, I'm totally going to get myself one of these, and maybe I'll pair it with some sparkles. Who knows?

Brad Dowdy: Yep. So, I, just real quick before we take another break. I didn't have the eco out that I filled up with this Coraline de Jeep while I was talking about it at first. So, I just put it out of the pen case while you were talking, and it just writes up immediately. Like, zero issue. I'm sure. I mean, it's only been a day, but I'm sure it's going to be fine.

Myke Hurley: And also, you know, I do genuinely believe at this point that the large manufacturers like J.O. Barn, they have refined the way that they make these inks to ensure that they're not going to destroy anything that they touch. Right. Right. I feel like this was more of a concern when these inks first started to appear than it is now.

Brad Dowdy: Yep. Agree. Yeah. I think they've got it down. I'm just really impressed with the ink flow. That was my biggest concern, and man, it just, it's wonderful to write with.

Myke Hurley: All right. Well, this is going to go on my Sunday list then, I guess.

Brad Dowdy: All right.

Myke Hurley: Okay. So, do you want to take a break?

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. Let's do that real quick.

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Brad Dowdy: All right. So the Cordelene Digiped was not the only product, as you can hear me clicking in the background here. Sorry, I'm making extra noise today. Sorry. Oh, I just got, oh, I just got the scolded. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

Cosmos Fountain Pen

Brad Dowdy: I talked about the Cosmos Fountain Pen, which is a Kickstarter campaign that just ended a day or two ago. And I didn't get mine early enough to put up a review before the campaign ended. Like, I just got mine Thursday.

Myke Hurley: You know, this might be the most follow-up-y episode we've ever done. Where, like, we'd spoke about a bunch of things, and now we have a lot more detail about all of those things. Yeah. Very interesting. Yeah.

Brad Dowdy: It's, uh, that's why I was actually very excited to write this episode up because we were going to talk about all these things that we'd alluded to previously. Mm-hmm. In more detail. So, you know, I, Stillform, who makes these pens, German company, um, has made pens in the past. They've done Kickstarter projects in the past, and they got in touch with me late in the campaign, and I said, you know, you can send me whatever you want, but I can't get it reviewed before your campaign ends. So I thought I'd put it up on the stream, just, uh, if, in case people were wondering. But by then, I think it was already over with. But they did 200, like, mid 200,000s on this campaign.

Myke Hurley: 260,000 euro.

Brad Dowdy: Wow. Wow. Yeah. So, hugely successful. Really good-looking pen. I really, really enjoy this pen, Myke. It, from the moment I saw it, it looked like a pen-type bead to me. Mm-hmm. And, you know, I compared them on the stream. They're very much similar in shape and size. This one's a lot lighter. It's aluminum. It's an aluminum barrel. But the shape and size and feel of it is good. It's kind of got a long section, so your fingers don't get in the way of either the end of the grip or the cap seam, you know, where you cap it. And it's very comfortable to write with. The magnet goes on very strongly, and it lines up every time with the flat sides of the barrel. So, it's kind of got some anti-roll flat sides of the barrel on opposing sides, and the magnet is designed to line those up every time. I know that's a big thing for us fountain pen fans. We're very particular about those types of things. I just have to say, overall, I very much like it. I probably would have backed it if I thought about it in that time, but I didn't. I didn't notice in the campaign. They sent me, like, this midnight blue color. I don't know if that's in there. I'm assuming it is, but it is really pretty. It's a better color than the Ixion in blue. Did you get that Ixion in blue? Was your stab at the color? Yep. This color is better, and I like that Ixion color. This one's a little bit darker. And overall, nice pen. It does use Bach nibs, and mine does not have a good Bach nib in it. It's got a baby's bottom on it, so it's writing very inconsistently right now. So, your mileage will definitely vary on the nibs that you get, and that's just kind of a thing, unfortunately. You know, if you're a new user, you could get a bum nib and be disappointed with it. I could see that happening. But for experienced fountain pen users, you know, there's ways to get around that. You know, swap in another good nib that you have. You know, you can work on this nib a little bit. But it just stinks that Bach's QC has risen to the top of the discussion points, when it's really nothing against the Cosmos pen at all. It's just the nib selection. You know, a lot of companies are kind of, you know, stuck, if you will, for the nib choices that they have. And this is probably one of the better choices that they have. And just sometimes you get a bum one, and my nib is not very good. But that doesn't take away the design of the pen to me, but I'm also someone who is flexible with that type of thing. So I think you would like this pen, actually, Myke. So this seems like a kind of a Mikey pen. We'll see. But not as much, Myke, as the next pen. So this was another reason why I was excited to talk about this show. And also, I'm concerned about talking about this on the show. Because as we are prone to do, as you alluded to earlier, sometimes we don't have every ounce of information right up front, but we do tend to find it. And what happened last week in the post show, when we were talking about the Lamy Orange Inc., our good friend Stacy sent us a link. Because Myke was talking about Sailor Pins, and we always talk about Sailor Limited Edition Pins. She sent us a link to a company called Pinsachi. We'll put a link in the show notes for you to see. And this is essentially, I think the best way to phrase this, Myke, is this is a middleman site. Is that fair?

Myke Hurley: Oh, without a shadow of a doubt. Yeah. Yeah. I think to the point where sometimes it seems they're actually getting up, going out, and buying it, and sending it to you.

Brad Dowdy: Right. So I'm putting in this in the show notes with pause, right? Because I don't have full knowledge of their operations. I can kind of make some assumptions.

Brad Dowdy: I know Stacy's had good luck with them so far. I know other people have had good luck with them so far. I know you had a little bit of a different experience. You didn't necessarily have bad luck, but you had what I think is expected. So tell us about your experience in trying to order a limited edition Pinsachi.

Myke Hurley: I was digging around on their website and I came across a purple Pro Gear, which made my brain kind of explode because it's one of the most beautiful pens that laid my blue eyes upon. And I ordered it on their website. I went through, chose my nib, paid for it, paid for it via PayPal, which I super recommend you do if you're going to go to companies like this because you get the additional protections that PayPal will provide. Right? Like that, I really, really, really would recommend that you consider that, not just buy it via a credit card. I genuinely believe that you probably will have more protection with buying it through someone like PayPal. And they took my payment and then like maybe a day or two later, they got, they emailed me and they were like, we're really sorry, but this is sold out. Like we don't have any, we can't do anything. Um, my expectation is like they put some of these things up there and then they try and buy them. And if they can buy them, they buy them. If they don't, then they're sold out. And it's now listed as sold out on the website. Um, and they were like, what we, you know, we have these other two pens that you saw for two Pro Gears that are available right now that are the same price. Uh, we have these. Are you interested in either of these? And I was like, no, not really. Like they're not the colors that I want. And I said, can you refund me? And they're like, yep, no problem. Immediate refund. So good. You know, like, uh, and, and it took a couple of days to process because that's just whatever. Like it takes time to process. But to be honest, I was super pleased with the way it all went. Like I was frustrated. They didn't have it, but you know, I could kind of understand it because like I can see how their business works, right? Like they're not actually holding stock. They just, they know that there's pens they can get their hands on. So they're doing that. That would be the way that I expect it's going to work. But if you're going to do it that way and it doesn't work, you want that customer service there where they can just refund you. I mean, ideally I would like them to not charge me until they know they've got the thing. But either way, you know, I was, I was relatively happy with the experience and I'm keeping my eye on this website because I would like to really buy one of these pens and it feels like a good way to maybe try and get my hands on something a little bit more limited. And like looking through their catalog of pro gears of what's listed as sold out, you know, stuff that I saw in the past, a lot of pens I really want in there.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. So we bring this up to hopefully educate the listener. You know, if they're looking for this type of thing, this is the type of site you can use, but you need to understand what this type of site is doing. They're not, they may have a limited stock of these. They may not. They may have to get them after you order them. This reminds me of in Geekha in their hair, in their heyday where you would order a limited edition pen. They would see if they could get it. And sometimes they couldn't, sometimes they couldn't. It's just like the risk you take, but you know, you're, you know, you were never, you know, out any money or anything like that. But, um, if this site works and becomes, you know, a bigger, a bigger deal, I could see it being, you know, a very valid way to get some of these products that are hard to get without going through, um, you know, the white rabbit, like the, uh, like the shopping sites, you know, that will go and buy something for you in Japan and then ship it to you. So, you know, I, it's definitely something to keep an eye on. It's definitely something you need to understand what you're doing when you're making a purchase in here, what you're committing to, which, which you're committing to maybe not getting that pen. Um, but I'm glad your experience was good. I know, um, Stacy has received a couple of pens from them just fine. Right. And, um, if they, uh, they stay on top of these things, yeah, this is going to be bookmarked and, uh, might cost me some money, money down the line.

Myke Hurley: Yeah. So like, I think I can kind of see what's going on. Cause like one of the pens that I was just looking at, it's no longer listed. I think what they do is every time somebody makes a purchase, it gets listed as sold out. They see if they can then make the purchase. If they can, they complete it and they put it back up again. If this possible, that's, that's how I reckon they're doing this, which again, like I do not fault that way of the way that they're working.

Brad Dowdy: If it works for them, um, it's, it's an arbitrage system for us and the rest of the world that want these products and they can make their money on their end and we can get the products that we want at a reasonable price.

Myke Hurley: Which reminds me, um, I'm on the lookout for a company that I can send things to in America and they will post them to me. I would love recommendations. So send me tweets with recommendations. If you know of any companies that can do this kind of thing.

Brad Dowdy: There are, because I know, um, some of our customers at Knock use them. And, um, as a matter of fact, uh, we'll, uh, I know someone we can email when we're done who you know very well.

Myke Hurley: Great.

Brad Dowdy: Who uses one of these services that you, you, it's a shipping forwarder. Yeah. So this is what I'm looking for.

Shipping Forwarders

Myke Hurley: And I know they exist, but I want personal rec, like recommendations from listeners, right? Like people that have used these things bunch of times and they know they're good. So.

Brad Dowdy: Yeah. So we send them to, um, there's a place in New York and then a place in Portland, depending on which side of the country we're going.

Myke Hurley: Oh, okay, cool. All right. Well, let me know. Yep. But yeah, I still want to hear from people though. If they have recommendations.

Brad Dowdy: Sure. Sure. Sure. All right. So I'm saving my money for Pen Saatchi because I'm not going to be buying the 2018 pilot vanishing point limited edition. This pin is called crossed lines. And what did you think when you saw this Myke? So this is a link on Reddit, but this link came from Hamilton pen company, which is a British fountain pen retailer. So this was an email from them to their mailing lists showing the new pilot, uh, 2018 lemon edition pilot. Anyone found it anywhere? Like, can it be found? I looked, I looked, I looked on Hamilton's website and it wasn't listed yet, but I mean, I don't have any reason to think this is not true. I mean, if it came from an official source, a pilot retailer from their email list, I don't have a problem discussing it. So there, there is a risk we could be wrong. I, I'd say this is probably a high certainty of existing.

Myke Hurley: So like, this is a, seems like a super strange pen to photograph. And I feel like it could be photographed way better. I'm assuming this is an official press, like an official product shot, but it's a pen that has a bunch of vertical and horizontal lines on it. But there is a line from a light from the photos that also goes down it. So, well, is that a line that's on the pen? Like it's not good photography. And also it's just not a good looking pen, especially because why don't the lines line up?

Brad Dowdy: I mean, I don't know what to say other than, you know, you're, you're preaching to the choir here. I, I, you know, it's fine. It's a perfectly fine pen. It will do well. Their lemon edition vanishing points always do well, but it's just super boring. Super, it doesn't make any sense. Like they really did such a good job these last few years with the crimson sunrise and the twilight and all these gradient colors and super pretty wild stuff. And this is just looks like a, your basic stock vanishing point. You know, that, I don't know. It's fine. I have no interest in it. I don't get it. It's like the Burberry plaid kind of model. You know, it's just got these lines in it. And it'd be nice of like, okay, can the lines be metal inlays? You know, do something special. It's like your 100 tier anniversary pilot. Give us something, man. I don't know what's going on here.

Myke Hurley: Right. But this isn't the 100th anniversary pen though, right?

Brad Dowdy: So it's not, but it's still their 100th anniversary year.

Myke Hurley: Yeah.

Brad Dowdy: I mean, it's definitely not anything related to their 100th anniversary, but it's just, it's a letdown, you know, and I don't buy all these. I didn't, I didn't even buy like the super pretty ones I was just talking about. You know, I don't need any more of these, but this is just like not even on the, on the radar. I don't get it.

Myke Hurley: So I would say that like, I feel that, I don't know. I'm trying to be hopeful here, right? That they didn't want to make it too special because they have room special pens coming still.

Brad Dowdy: I don't know. I don't know. Hey, we'll go with that. Like I would like, I hope we get some kind of fancy vanishing point for the, for the 100th anniversary, but who knows, who knows what they're going to do. So anyway, I wanted to share that because we just got that. I got that in a, in a Twitch chat this week, Myke. So Twitch has been useful for product information as well. And when I saw that, it was just, you know, the resounding meh.

Myke Hurley: Yeah.

Brad Dowdy: So, and that's a wrap on this episode, Myke. It was definitely not a resounding meh episode. This was a fun episode. I enjoyed talking about silly things like Lamy orange inks and sparkle inks and Cosmos fountain pens and Japanese pens and vanishing points. This was a very pen addict, pen addict episode, Myke.

Myke Hurley: Most definitely. And if you want to find the links to everything we've discussed today, you can head on over to relay.fm slash pen addict slash 315, or you should check in your podcast player of choice. Hopefully the links will be right there. If you need them, you can find Brad online. He is over at pen addict.com. He's dowdyism on Twitter, pen addict on Instagram, but you want to go to twitch.tv slash pen addict where you can follow Brad, you can subscribe to Brad and check out what he's doing over on Twitch, which is a lot of fun. I am at iMike, I-M-Y-K-E, and we'll be back next time. Until then, say goodbye, Brad. Goodbye, Brad.