The Pen Addict 631/transcript

• From Relay, this is The Pen Addict, episode 631. Today's show is brought to you by Pen Chalet and Squarespace. My name is Myke Hurley. I'm joined by Brad Dowdy. Hi, Brad. Hello, Myke Hurley. How are you doing today? I'm good. I'm good. Yeah, I'm good. It's been a busy week, you know, getting ready for another busy week. That's right. But I'm doing fine. That's right. You're getting ready to get on some travels, which we're going to talk about here in a minute. I'm getting ready to host a guest for next week's podcast, which is going to be really, really fun. I think you're going to enjoy our conversation, not just you, but everybody.

Upcoming guest and stationary internet buzz

• We'll leave the teaser like that, but it is a returning guest that I'm going to have a lot of questions for, and we're going to break the stationary internet next week. So be prepared. As I now oversell this and stress them out completely. I just got distracted, Brad. Okay. I wasn't listening to you for 20 seconds because I just loaded up the St. Jude page and saw that we've passed $306,000. Yeah, boy. For the kids of St. Jude, where the reason that this has distracted me is three minutes ago, it was at 206. So something significant has occurred in the last few minutes. So thank you, Pen Addict listeners, for all your support in the opening minute of this show. Someone was right waiting to drop a cool 100K when Brad logged on today. So thanks, Brad, for that. Thank you. No problem. No problem. Appreciate it. Appreciate it. It is Childhood Cancer Awareness Month all throughout the month of September. We come together as a community to raise money and awareness for both Childhood Cancer and for St. Jude Children's Research Hospital because of the incredible work that they do for children who are in Memphis, who come to the hospital for treatment, but also for the work that they do for people worldwide, whether that's bringing them to the hospital or sharing their knowledge freely with anybody who wants it. So like St. Jude has a bunch of global partnerships. They are headquartered in Memphis, but their work has a truly global impact. They have treated children from all 50 states and from around the world. About 90% of children at risk of developing cancer live in lower middle income countries. That is unacceptable to St. Jude, which is why they have launched St. Jude Global. This ensures that every child with cancer and other catastrophic diseases has access to quality care and treatment no matter where they live. For example, in June this year, the training program for nonprofit partners graduated 19 scholars. They have this incredible training program as part of St. Jude Global where they can bring these people in and give them the information, the skills that they need, the research that they need, and just to help support them. Well, this program for nonprofit foundation partners graduated 19 scholars from 15 different countries, including India, Mexico, Zimbabwe, El Salvador, and Uganda. That is 19 people, 19 professionals, who have learned how to raise funds to help patients, families, and doctors in their home countries. Funds that have helped open new hospitals and patient housing facilities and provided families with transportation and meals. Today, St. Jude collaborates with more than 400 partners in St. Jude Global, representing more than 80 countries and growing. So you may think to yourself, you know, I'm based here, I'm based there, I'm based wherever. Is St. Jude going to help? Yes, they're going to help. They have a truly global reach. That is how far the reach of their work is. More than 400 partners in St. Jude Global, representing more than 80 countries and growing. So, I want you to go and find out more about all this stuff for yourself and get involved. Go to stjude.org slash relay. You can donate there. You can also set up a fundraiser of your own to join us in raising money for St. Jude. If you do just make a donation, check to see if your employer will match your donation. That can double your donation, or more in some instances, to give a bigger impact to the work that you can do for yourself for St. Jude. Similarly, if you sign up to fundraise on your own, you can talk to your friends, your family, your colleagues, your co-workers, your loved ones, and convince them as well to join with all of us in raising money for the kids of St. Jude. So, go to stjude.org slash relay. You can donate or create your campaign today. And I'll mention now that Stephen and I and a selection of other wonderful Relay personalities are going to be producing the podcast-a-thon. It's going to be on September 20th, Friday, September 20th, from 12 p.m. to 12 a.m. Eastern Time at youtube.com slash at relay.fm. Do not miss it. You can go there now, and you can click to be reminded about the event, and I'll put a link in show notes, too, if you want to grab it. It's going to be a great time, as always, and I hope that you'll join us on the day to hang out, help us raise money, and have a good time. Yeah, I'll be there helping to moderate the chat. So, come by, say hi. We'll cut it up in chat while everyone else is there on site. Yeah, having a good time and helping raise money for the kids. So, one of the things I do during this time of year, of course, is to collect good stationary items from the community, from friends, from vendors, from a lot of different people, listeners, who share goods with me to give away as we raise money for St. Jude's during this month. So, the first post went up last week with the first batch of goods, and as always, it's just astonishing to me. Like, the amount of participation we have and donations we have for all of these products to help us raise money.

Unique and rare pens from various sources

• There's some, you know, some great pens from HelloTello Studio and London Pen Co., and we have a big batch from a private supporter who sent over a bunch of unique, rare, Japanese, limited edition store pens. I love the fact that there's a unique Hurtoga dive in this. That's, like, my favorite thing because it doesn't, like, hang with all these super rare and unique fountain pens, but it's one of the coolest stationary items that's been released in the last couple years, in my opinion, and kind of blew up the stationary internet. So, I like that we're able to give one of those away. And it's just a really fun thing to do. I'm going to have round two of the goods going up today. There's no change. Like, if you donated, you're good for all of these giveaways that I'm going to be presenting through the month. But things keep coming in, right? Things keep, once I get this post rolling, I get more information from people, more things that they want to send in. So, I have a huge list going up today. I'll have another list going up next week. It'll just be continuing to add on, and I appreciate everyone's support so far. One thing I want to highlight, Myke, which I've told you, and I want to tell listeners, y'all be able to see this this afternoon. And I'll probably put an additional post up on my Instagram, which I haven't really done for these yet. But Esther Brook wanted to send us something very special, and I was able to pick it up at the San Francisco Penn Show, and I've shown it to Myke. And I haven't been able to share it publicly yet. They were just waiting to get everything dialed in for this month. But they created a product called the Esther Brook Gratitude Pen. So, this is an Estee fountain pen. Let me read a little bit of the copy that they sent to me, just so y'all kind of get a picture of how important this pen is to them and what they're doing here. So, it says, As Esther Brook celebrates reaching 50,000 followers on Instagram, we are thrilled to announce the launch of our golden gratitude Estee, a heartfelt token of appreciation to the vibrant community of creative enthusiasts who have supported us along the way. This Estee is crafted from U.S.-made diamond cast, renowned for its durability and distinctive sparkle due to its diamond dust within the acrylic body. More than just an Estee, this limited edition model symbolizes how deeply we value our community. Every milestone we reach is a reflection of the passion and creativity that you bring to the Esther Brook family. And this is our way of saying thank you for making it all possible. So, what they're doing is, this is an extremely limited edition pen. So, Estee Brook is going to be giving away 10 of these pens to the community. I'm sure they're going to do that on Instagram or something. You'll just have to follow them. We'll put their Instagram up. I don't know exactly when this is going to launch. Maybe next week, I think. But they allowed me to speak about it today because I have the pens in hand. And then they're giving away 10 additional pens as a special thank you to the dedicated friends and influencers who continue to champion the brand. So, they gave me one of these pens. They gave Myke one of these pens as a thank you for just years of, you know, helping us to Brook along the way, always sharing their products. You know, we just like to share good companies making good things. And that's obviously one that we really, really enjoy. And they gave us a third pen to add to the St. Jude giveaways that I'm doing. So, you will see this posted this afternoon. It's going to be a pretty unique pen opportunity to get your hands on. And they are going to have some for sale. But this isn't going to be like a big release, right? This isn't like a traditional like Estee Brook New Colorway release. It's going to be pretty special, pretty exclusive. And I'm super fortunate that they gave us a couple for our own use and then threw in another one to help us raise money for St. Jude. So, I'm super grateful for that. So, again, there are the ways in which you can be entered into the giveaway is to make a donation. For every $10 you donate is another entry. Once you have made your donation, send that donation receipt to where, Brad? St. Jude, excuse me, stjude at penaddict.com. And that information will be in the post that I have linked into the show. And the post is in the show notes. And also, there is a form. If you're unable to donate, you can have one free entry. There is information about that too, which is also in the blog post, which you'll find in the show notes. So, you should go and check it out because this is just – there are so many incredible things. This is just a taste, again, of just the unbelievable stuff that people are putting in for this. And it's just yet another reason to donate for the Kids of St. Jude. So, we really appreciate everybody that gets involved in this along with us because it makes what we do on this podcast a little bit special too for the money that we raise for St. Jude. So, I really appreciate it. We all really appreciate it. And I just wanted to give a personal thank you again to everybody who participates in this, including you, Brad, for everything that you do for this. Yeah, absolutely. Glad to do it. So, one of the things I do, Myke, which I've probably told you in the past and you don't remember, is all the receipts I get. I kind of give it like two weeks before I go open the email and like make my spreadsheets and do all that. And I always – that's always like the nervous point to me is like how many hundreds of receipts are going to be in here? Because it's usually a big number every year. And we're super, super lucky to have that kind of support. So, yeah, really, really good.
• I want to give a little sound effect into the microphone. All right.
• That is the sick click, as I will call it, from my new spot. And we're getting some hype on this, which is always weird for me to experience, right? It's getting a little bit of reach. Good. For this design, which obviously Brian and I love.
• Yeah. I'm glad you like it because, you know, you got one – what did you get? You got the gray matte one? Yeah. Matte gray. Matte titanium. The titanium, yeah. And I got the, like, rainbow blasted treated clip.

Challenges and feedback in pen manufacturing

• Yeah. So, you can swap out clips in these. So, yeah. Thank you. I'm glad you like it. We're obviously very happy with everyone's feedback so far. And getting these pins – this was a long time in the making. Like, you know, everyone who listens to this show knows, manufacturing is hard. It takes a long time. This has been probably well over a year in the pipeline. But the results are why you spend that time putting in to get it right, to get it out to the market in exactly the way you want to do it. So, real happy with the click. There's two sizes. One for, like, the Parker-style refills. One for the Pilot-style refills. I use the same size one that you have that's called the Model C. Yeah. Yeah, the Parker-style one. And I actually – you've been using the Schmidt refill in here. I like it a lot. But you can swap it out to other – yep. You can use other things like the Jetstream or Oto flash-dry gel, which is a popular one. So, things like that. We're going to keep leaning into this. We're going to have a lot more colors coming. We're going to have some – we'll probably add in some modularity options next year where you can, like, swap out some of your parts. We already allow a small amount of that. There's a couple models you can change the grip color on and then adding in these clips and different parts. So, this is going to be one to watch for us. We're very happy with how it started. And, yeah, we're firing on all cylinders with these. So, I appreciate Brian's hard work and getting these designed and manufactured. And now they're out there. And, you know, he's getting to see a lot of really, really positive feedback for what's happened here. So, thank you all. Like, the size and weight balance is really good. It sits in my hand real well.
• And the knurling is so good. Yeah, yeah. It's right in that – it's like in that sweet spot range, right? Like, it's – at least that's my opinion. Like, some people like rougher. Some people like it smoother. But I think it kind of hits this good middle ground. It's really good. Because you sent me one of the pencils, too. Oh, yeah, that's right. And the knurling is more pronounced than that, which I also actually really like. But I can imagine for a lot of people that it might be too much. Yep. But I actually do really like both of them for different reasons. But I think on the pen, like, it is knurled enough that it provides a grip without providing too much, like, distinct tactile experience. Exactly. I also really like the way that you designed the clip and the way that the clip goes onto the pen. I think that's done really well. So, it doesn't spin around. Exactly. So, it's keyed. Yeah. That would drive me mad. The pen is keyed, but it's also replaceable. Like, you shouldn't ever, like, bend the clip. Like, we designed the clip to, like, really withstand, like, you know, any type of pressure you put onto it. But sometimes, you know, things get caught. People tweak their clip. You're able to, like, easily adjust it or replace it if you want or have an alternate look like you have. And I was – you know, it's good that, like, the way that you design it, too, is, like, it makes the ring part of the design. Yes. It goes around the pen. I think – I can see that this pen would be getting some buzz for you because it is – it's very EDC, but not in a way that is, like, the eye bristle at. Yeah. Yeah. It's not, like, in your face. Yeah. It has some qualities. It doesn't have a blade in it or something.
• No glass breaker. No glass breaker. I was just saying that. Which is ridiculous.
• Maybe that's what – Keep your notebook behind plate glass. Yeah. Like, is that what's happening here? Yeah. Since we can swap out, like, the back end by the knock and the clip, we'll just make, like, a glass breaker attachment. You know, however that would work. We'll just – Brad, you might as well. And then you can retire because you'll become millionaires. That's right. Because clearly people love that for a reason that I don't fully understand. But, yeah, really good job by both of you. Thank you. I appreciate it. Really good work. Thank you. Thank you. I'm glad you got one here. I like your tubes, too. Yeah. Those are new. I'm really happy with those. Those came out great.
• Something I didn't notice, but I think it was the case, when the pen tubes arrived, they have, like, these lines on them. And I think the lines were lined up. Now, that feels like that's driving Brian mad.
• Why? Like, I mean, I line them up before I ship them. You line them up? Okay, cool. Yeah, yeah. Then it's driving you. Then I don't surprise – I wouldn't be surprised if it's driving you mad. No, it doesn't drive me mad because it has to happen, right? It's just a fact, right? So, like, that's not going to drive me mad that it has to be that way. So, I pop on the – I load it up, pop on the top, and then twist it to line it up every time. Let me ask you, though. There's no way it's not going to happen. That was, like, I wished I didn't have the lines going over the center line. No. No? You just love it. It looks great. I'm just – I'm worried about, like, the amount of adjusting you're doing to every pen that's going out the door, you know? It doesn't – like, that's one of the things I'm glad to do. Like, it's just pop it on, twist it over. Like, there's no way I could ever pop on that and not line it up. Mm-hmm. Well, that's what I'm worried about. I'm just not built that way. No. So, like, it's just a given. It's just, like, it's just a fact. It's built into the shipping flow, if you will.
• Should we take a break? Yeah. Let's take a quick break. We got a few little things to talk about, a few little follow-ups to hit that are going to be fun. So, let's take a break first and talk about pens. Shocking. This episode is brought to you by our friends at Pen Chalet. They sell authentic, amazing rollerballs and fountain pens, ballpoints, mechanical pencils, and so much more from your favorite brands with a growing list. Pen Chalet are adding new styles of pens and products every single month, and they have great discounts every two weeks. New discounts that you're going to find on the site. Maybe if you've had your eye on something, you'll get it for an incredible price at Pen Chalet. And they believe in making sure that you're happy. They offer a 100% satisfaction guarantee on their high-quality products at the lowest prices they can do with faster and reliable customer service. Pen Chalet ship worldwide. They have great shipping rates. And if you order in the U.S., they have free shipping on orders of over $75. So, take yourself over to penshalet.com slash penaddict. That is P-E-N-C-H-A-L-E-T dot com slash penaddict. You'll be able to get a code to save 10% off of anything at Pen Chalet and to see some exclusive offers for listeners of this show.
• What have we got? Y'all need to go click on this link, scroll down, find the Kaweco Art Sport in Pebble Blue and just buy it. Like, I'm usually not that direct, but the price of this is really, really crazy. It's just, it's probably like, they've been selling out pretty well. This must be the last one. There's like the Pebble Blue in like two nib sizes, but the price is ridiculous. Like, it seems like it's cheaper. I haven't looked at it to compare, but it seems like it's cheaper than the Brass Sports or the AL Sports. And this one is a really, really special, really, really cool looking pen. They also have kind of a surprise, one of my surprise favorite pens, probably, was it last year? It was probably last year. The Kaweco Perkyo in Infrared is one of the coolest pens I've used in a long time. It's a personal favorite of mine. And it was kind of a, I don't know if it's really a limited edition, but they made it as part of that collector series. You know how I can't keep up with how Kaweco like sorts and organizes their releases if it's not a standard release. So this one was kind of in there. And it's discounted. It's not an expensive pen to begin with, but it's one of the cooler pens that I've had the pleasure of using in the past year or two. And then they also have, I clearly like these pinks and reds, Myke, because the Pelican Classic M205 Rose Quartz is in here. It's one of the 205 piston filling models with the translucent rose quartz barrel material. It's just a knockout. And, you know, if you didn't catch up on, if you didn't have enough ink this year so far, you can get last year's Diamine Inkvent calendar, which is on sale. Because if you're interested in doing Diamine Inkvent, I'm sure next year's calendar usually releases in, or this year's calendar usually releases in October. So we'll probably be seeing that soon, but you can get last year's version at a really, really good price. Last one, Myke, there's a lot of good stuff that I want to talk about this week, clearly. Lamy CP1 Ballpoint. This is one of the few Lamy thin narrow barrels. It's a full length pen, but it's a narrow barrel. I have the fountain pen version of it. It's fantastic. The Ballpoint pen version is a really good option. If you're looking for a long, slender type of pen to carry with you, it's a really great pen. Really durable. Really great price point for a really good quality pen. And who knows, maybe next year they'll retrofit some refills with Jetstream Ink, which we talked about last week. Oh, yeah.
• So we'll see. We'll see. Go and check it out for yourself right now at penshalet.com slash penaddict. Thanks to Penshalet for their continued support of this show. All right, Myke, we got a shout out of the week. Shout out of the week. Dime Novel Raid Raven, which I'm pretty sure I've given Casey a shout out here before, but I wanted to shout out a post in particular. I just love seeing this when people on Instagram or different stationary bloggers. The title of this post is Stiology A6. So that's a notebook. I finished one. And I love this so much. Like, this is what gets me excited about stationary and about reading about stationary and seeing how people use stationary. It's a big deal when you finish a notebook. I don't care what size the notebook is, right? And the Stiology is, even the A6 ones, this one is a monster. So this one is 368 pages. So it is a big, big, chunky notebook, even if the A6 size is, like, smaller, right, in square millimeters compared to an A5. It's a big deal when you finish something like this. So I just wanted to give Casey a shout out because this is really cool. And it might, you know, if we get to it in Ask TPA, it might lean into questions about finishing notebooks. So we'll see if we can move that one up to the top if we get time for Ask TPA today.
• I just think it's really cool. And everyone should be praised, no matter if you finish, you know, a small field notes, which I'm about to do on my desk right now, maybe during this episode, or a big, you know, 300 and something page Stiology notebook like Casey did. And you should be proud of it. So I think it's really, really good stuff.

Review of Sutanai Recycled Washi Paper Notepad

• Speaking of paper, Myke. Yes. I wanted to mention this review that I did on the blog this week. It's called the Sutanai Recycled Washi Paper Notepad. So this was a pickup at Stationery Fest. And one of those products I would have never probably seen or picked up if I wasn't in the right place at the right time and got to talk to the right people. And the right people at the time were the actual maker of this notepad, Sochi Yoshikawa of Yoshikawa Paper Company. So I wasn't really familiar with what they make or what they do. And luckily, one of the mornings, I got in a little bit early, right before the doors opened, I got to speak with him. And to hear someone like this talk about the products that they have their hands directly involved in making is really cool. So I like this before I even talked to him because I was seeing. So these are not widely available. You can get them at Cute Things from Japan, which I'll have a link in my review to go look at them. And there's this picture on the Cute Things from Japan page where they use like a blue ink on this page. And the way it looks on the page doesn't look real. Like the way this type of paper absorbs ink and the ink dries on the paper, it looked almost like it was a printed blue ink on the page. And I loved using this even though it's a little bit problematic for fountain pens, right? Like it's a recycled washi paper. So this is a handmade, not only is washi paper like a traditionally handmade paper in Japan, this is now the recycled version of the traditional washi paper. So this is the waste product. So this is, you know, like a chef using, you know, every bit of food to, for sustainability purposes, they're using the waste from making the standard washi into this recycled pad. And it's not awesome for fountain pens. No, when I read about this, because I read your review, like, for me, it's just a great thing that this exists. And it's fun. But just like from what I have come to learn about paper probably couldn't be a worse, like, like foundation for fountain pens. Right. Because it's mixed material, which will have different properties, but also recycled, if it's not processed super well, adds for, there's like a lot of detritus in the paper at time, in the paper formulation, which can trip up fountain pen nibs. And like, and you can see it. Yeah. In the paper, you can, every time you see like a little block of color, like your nib is probably going to get stuck. Right. Yeah. Which was weird. So number one, yes, to all, everything you said. Um, number two, recycled, when you're talking about being a fountain pen user and seeing the word recycled on paper, it's usually an instant avoid. Right. And I normally would have too, but I got to test this paper out and it's weird in that I enjoyed the writing experience on it because it was smoother. It was a pretty smooth page. Mm-hmm. And like when I hit one of the little, uh, like you said, the, the, the detritus, like the extra, the fiber chunks in there, uh, in a less, in a less formal word, you know, all the, all the, the darker spots that you see. It never really hung up my pen nib, but the paper overall with my extra fine nibs, it tend to bleed. And I put a picture in there, showed a good amount of bleeding. The problem I had with this review, which, you know, it's hard to get out there, is that I love this product for what it is, but it's a really difficult recommendation to say, hey, you should go buy this paper because look how great it is. Well, it doesn't always work great, right? Like a lot of times with my extra fine nibs, it was poor, uh, some inks and nibs better than others, some worse.
• The broader, smoother and smoother nib that I have worked better on the page than my extra fine nibs, which theoretically. That makes total sense to me. Yes. Yeah. So I can see myself using this as just some interesting, like large format writing with bigger, bigger nibs, wider nibs and inks. It was really, really enjoyable. The, the output on the page was super enjoyable, even with the feathering in the extra fine nibs. You have to get pretty close to see it. And I like how the ink looks on this page, but like, I can't recommend it to anybody. So it's like really tough to review because I reviewed it kind of positively. I'd say there's a definite positive spin on this because like I get a lot out of this product from its mere existence, right? Why it exists, what it's made from, what the processes it went through. Um, despite it being not something that I want in an everyday notebook, right? So I kind of classified this as a specialty product, right? If it checks these various highly specific boxes, you know, maybe it's something you should consider. And the thing I have yet to mention is the price. It is absolutely crazy expensive for, uh, what some might call a terrible writing experience. I didn't find it that way to be a terrible writing experience, but it's a problematic, it could be a problematic writing experience with certain nibs and inks. You know, it's, it literally works out to 80 cents per page, right? Which if you do the math, like that's really expensive, right? You know, whatever thinks about almost no one thinks about a per page price when they do notebooks. Like we talk about per milliliter prices when we talk about inks and how we kind of rate, whether it's, you know, you know, a good price or an average price or an expensive price. Let me tell you from my own lived personal experience, I've met, I've come into contact or have been communicated by lots of people who believe in price per page.
• Yeah. I can imagine. So I can imagine. So I have encountered many of these people. So how, how would, how does 80 cents per page sound to you, Myke? I would love to make a notebook that costs 80 cents per page because that would be the serious thing. Yeah. So I would have a good time. I would have a good time. Yeah. So just for clarity, I've bought much more expensive notebooks that I've paid for cover materials, right? Not the paper that's inside them. Right. So I've bought very, you know, like I talk about the Misubi notebooks that I buy, I've spent 150, $200 on a notebook, but I'm a lot of the times I'm buying for the craftsmanship on the exterior of the notebook. Right. This is literally like an A5 desk pad, string bound. The binding's pretty cool. Perforated pad. Right. So I'm not paying for like, you know, indigo denim dyed fabric on here. I'm incredibly, my bias is massive, but like my feeling on that price is like, yeah, it's expensive, but like you see what it is though. Right. You know what? And like that's, because I think for me, it's the Sidekick notepad. People say that it is an expensive product. But it's very expensive to make because of the materials that we choose to use and we use those and the way in which it is made and we make those choices for a reason. Like we're not saying, and I know here with this washi paper, right, it's just not saying like, oh, this is the notebook you should buy. It's like, no, we have made this notebook and it has its own features. It has its own specification. If you want that, you should buy it because it's the only one. But like, right. It's not like, oh, this, you know, you should buy this instead of a legal pad or whatever. Right, right, right. So, you know, I just wanted to kind of bring this up because it's a very like interesting conversation I have in my head when I talk about this, right? It is. Oh, man, it's gorgeous. What I like about it specifically is how unapologetically recycled it is. Yeah. That's what I like about it. And I think that just comes from the maker, from Soichi, just being passionate about paper. Like, go watch. I have a link in my review to an Inky Rocks video who is often on the Tokyo Inklings podcast. Lessa did a great like 10 or 15 minute video where you get to see making washi paper and you get to see Soichi of Yoshikawa paper, like testing this out and like rejecting some of the papers and stuff like that. Like super passionate about this really kind of like a technology that's losing, right? Printmakers, especially handmade paper, like they're just losing every bit of market share that they've ever had. So to see someone like really lean into this and do it kind of in a hardcore way, like Yoshikawa paper is doing, it's pretty cool. So yeah, it's fun stuff. I'm going to like use this pad for things and I might not buy another one, right? Like this just might be it, but I'm going to enjoy it even though if you want like a technical descriptor of it, like there's no way you should buy this pad, right? Like if you're looking for like a great writing experience. So, but sometimes, sometimes our products are more than that. Sometimes our products are more than like the, just the technical aspects. Enjoy the journey, right? That's right. This is definitely an enjoy the journey pad for sure.
• Speaking of enjoying the journey, Myke. I couldn't believe this when I saw it in the show. I was so excited.
• I'm just going to read the title. I've become absolutely obsessed with Ralph Nader's pens. Join me on my continuing investigation. So we covered this back in what episode 613, where the wire cutter, who often is very stationary friendly, you know, with their content. They do a lot of pen rankings and stationary rankings. And a lot of us in the pen community have talked to them in years past, helping them kind of like sort out, you know, like what's a good pen, what's a bad pen, things like that. And they've kind of grown into their own thing. And they do a lot of other different products. New York Times Company, just to put that out there. So this is an update from a post that you and I loved and we really dug into. Yeah. Back in April. And they turned this up to 11 in every way possible from. So they just listed out a bunch of theories and tried to like prove these theories. Right. And there is even like x-rays or cat scans, whatever these scans are. Yeah. It's like a CT scan of these pens, which really, I mean, it doesn't prove a lot because like the barrel doesn't make any difference in how the pen writes technically. Um, but they have some vintage flares that they sourced all the way back to 1966. They have like pens from 1966, 1983, 1989 and 2023. It's funny. The 1989 pen looks fantastic. They like the ink output of the 1989 pen currently looks amazing. So that's like, yeah, that was a good vintage year for the flares. So that's the, that's the boxes that, uh, Ralph Nader apparently needs to, um, to, to start hunting down on eBay because they even went, even for this, uh, project that they're working on, they even went and bought more pens out on eBay. Um, and they're finding some flares from the sixties. So just to give you a concept of how much effort Anne-Marie Conte and the Wirecutter are putting into trying to work out what happened to these pens. They put them in a CT scanner to try and look at the ink flow and like the ink amount inside is really good. This is just worth going through and like, just even if just scanning it through it, which I did, like I didn't read the entire thing. Like I kind of, it's a huge article, but I love, I just love the efforts that they're going to try and solve this mystery, which I don't think is solvable by the way. Yeah. It's probably not. Uh, there's at my whole point, I think probably the first time and then probably now is just like the amount of variables is, is large and you should find a pen that you enjoy more. Like the biggest problem and the biggest variable that you cannot account for is nostalgia.
• Yeah. I agree. And like his perspective of how the pens were is definitely not accurate. Like it might not be far off, but there's just no way a human can remember that like succinctly. I feel like, um, to every experience they've ever had with a specific pen over like 60 years. Um, maybe except for you, I don't know. Uh, but I, I just feel like that's the biggest issue that they're, that they're going to have with that one. But right. Right. So yeah, this one, uh, this one goes, uh, like every, I don't know what they, what else they could have done here, um, to, to basically say, yeah, inconclusive, right? Like it's going to be inconclusive. That's just the way, like, this is kind of why just in a small way that we'd like this so much, right? Because we can be as stationary users can be really, um, particular about certain things that we like. And, um, and, uh, that's why we've been able to have a podcast about pens for 12 years or so because we, we have our own little Nader like obsessions and I'm just mostly impressed that, uh, they got the budget to just dig into this even more. So it's kind of like, uh, they, they hit a good nerve with this one and, uh, I, I, I bet we're not done yet. So, um, well, we'll, we'll see more from them. This episode is brought to you by our friends over at Squarespace. They really are the all in one website platform for entrepreneurs to stand out and succeed online. Whether you're just getting started, maybe you have a blog that you want to get off the ground. Maybe you have a growing brand and you want to stand out from the crowd of a new, beautiful website to help you engage directly with your audience, sell your products, services, or the content you create. It doesn't matter what type of website you want to make. 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But then when you're ready to launch it to the world, go to squarespace.com slash penaddict. You'll save 10% off your purchase of a website or domain. That is squarespace.com slash penaddict when you decide to sign up and you will get 10% off your first purchase of a website or domain and show your support for this show. Our thanks to Squarespace for the continued support of the penaddict and Relay. So I was thinking when I was writing this episode, number one, I had a little bit of a brain freeze going into write these episodes. We talk about this a lot. Like you don't, I like, I generally write the show notes of the flow and then you'll add things afterwards. Yep. Well, I was pretty late getting this one because like I didn't have like a bunch of dedicated things. Like some, like last week, it's super easy. Like a lot of news, you know, a lot of new products to discuss this week, like zero, like any of that. So I think about like what topics do I want to explore? So I'll sit at my desk and it's like, okay, like on my task list, it's like, I need, I need to write the podcast. And by Tuesday afternoon, it's getting pretty late and it starts to weigh on me if I haven't come up with anything by then. So what I'll do is I'll sit at my desk and start doing other things, right? Um, stationary things like looking at the pens I have inked up on my desk, starting to write with them, you know, kind of test them out, just kind of doodle, draw, make notes or do my regular work, work in my planner, work in my journals. And then the other ideas start, you know, to hit me. So as I was sitting here doing this, I was like, I've been thinking over the past month how I want to approach my own personal stationary journey, like through the rest of the year or just going forward or what changes do I want to make? So that's kind of what I wanted to talk about just for a minute. There's really not any huge life-changing types of goals, but I did have some goals for the rest of the year.
• And number one, the thing that I wrote down is the thing that I'm kind of the most active with in my own stationary journey right now is I titled this, do something with these notebooks, but I don't mean it in like a negative way. I don't mean it in like, oh, this is ridiculous and has to stop kind of way. It's more of a, like, I'm really kind of... That has a very, won't somebody think of the children vibe. Right. Like, when you're saying it like that. Right. Someone must go do something about these notebooks or like these snakes on a plane kind of. But I'm actually reaching for and grabbing a larger variety of notebooks than I ever have. Maybe not ever have, but just like it feels okay to have a lot of notebooks in use right now, but that also needs to be refined. Right. Normally, I'm more restrictive on my notebook usage. You know, I want to have like plans and dedicated, you know, spaces for certain things. And I've freed myself up a little bit on that. But also, I do want to like rewind a little bit and kind of have a plan. And so, we're talking like, I mean, I'm counting like my planners and journal in this. I probably have like maybe five or six things I'm actively, you know, grabbing and writing in, you know, which... And I'm happy with it. Normally, that would like freak me out. So, I'm playing around. I'm actually writing a lot. Not in like a creative fashion, but just I am really enjoying using everything right now. That includes notebooks and pens and everything.
• So, you know, I'm going to take one of these notebooks and I'm going to sketch out some journaling layouts. Not that I want to change any journaling habits I have, but I kind of maybe want to think about how can I improve things? What can I do a little bit better? What am I... I'm trying to figure out what I'm looking for personally. Like, what is my end game here? And I don't mean that like a journaling layout is going to solve my end game. But what am I trying to accomplish within myself to make myself happy and to reach my goals and like in a personal way? That's what I'm trying to figure out. And maybe a journaling layout will fix that or not fix that, but maybe it'll help me get along that way, right? Like I'm really thinking about the theme system journal again, right? And what I'm looking for for myself on a personal level. So that kind of stuff. I also want to start like doodling and drawing more. And over the years, I bet I'm not the only one when I say this out loud. How many... Raise your hand or raise your pen if you've bought like an online course to learn how to draw and never started it.
• So I've got two of them sitting in my Domestika account that I... Oh yeah, I like this person. I like their art style. They're probably a little bit advanced for someone that's a very beginner like me, but I don't care. Like I'll just go do them. So I have this daily sketching for creative inspiration. The artist is named Sorry Kim. And then I have one called The Art of Sketching, Transform Your Doodles into Art by Matthias Adolfsson, who I've followed for years and years and years. So I was like, you know, you find... I don't take a lot of online classes, but I've taken like some hand lettering classes and things like that before. And when sites like that run a sale or something, I'll go and grab a class or something and then never take it. So I've put those on my shortcuts bar on my browser windows. Like go click on the link and do the thing.
• And that's also using my notebooks. I also... Where the notebooks live on my desk, I'm going to reorganize my desk somehow. And it's not... Like my desk is a catastrophe right now with the amount of stuff on it. And I'm shockingly okay with that because I'm enjoying... I've been using a lot of things recently. So they just tend to pile up. Like I'll grab, you know, a pen to use and to test and then I'll just put it back. I won't put it back where it came from. I'll just leave it on my desk. Like I'm okay with that because I'm actually using this stuff. But I want a space refresh. Not necessarily do I need to put away these pens or move these notebooks somewhere else. But I just want to... Anyone who does like creative work, you want to be happy in the space that you're in. And that just leads to better work. Refresh is a good too. Like, you know, like you can be happy but then, you know, things change. Time changes. And especially with us, collections grow. So, and I think it's nice in those moments to be able to kind of break it all down, start over. Exactly. And like it might end up the same way, but at least I did that part of it, right? You know, I don't have a huge amount of space. You know, if I added in more desktop space or anything like that, it's just going to lead to more sprawl, which is not what I'm looking for. I'm not looking for more space. I'm just looking for like a refresh. You know, I want flowers on the desk or something like that. Like that would make me happy.
• And that's the kind of change I'm talking about. Not in like a pure like structural change. Like, oh, this is inefficient and screwing my workflow. So, like no. Like sometimes, you know, you just need a vibe update. And like I'm vibing pretty good right now. And I was like, you know what? We should probably take the time while I'm feeling good about things to make them even better. So, last little thing I want to get done sooner rather than later is updating the TPA 100, which is a project I gave myself for my personal fountain pens, like stuff that, you know, I don't count as reviews or loans or things like that. But my personal fountain pen library that I kind of keep trying to keep under control. It needs a bit of an audit and a cleanup just because I haven't had time to spend on it recently. I'm definitely over the 100 count in where I would like to be, but not by a huge margin. It's not like I'm at 120 that I need to somehow fix. But it just needs a bit of an audit and a bit of a looking at just to see, you know, do we need to sell some pens that we haven't used in the past year, things like that. So, just kind of give it a once over, give it an update. That's the whole point of it, right? Like that was the point in the first place is like to give you that. That kind of forcing you to make these decisions. Exactly. So, like I've added a few expensive pens over the summer, right? So, like there's like four pens for sure that need to go into this accounting of the TPA 100 that I haven't yet. And, well, that means something else needs to go, right? Because if I'm using these pens now, that means I'm not using other pens and which pens fall in that category for like the longest amount of time. And maybe I need to rehome them somehow. So, that's all. Like not a big deal stuff. I just think I'm really content right now. Yeah. In my stationary usage. Good. So, that makes me actually want to do it better, if that makes sense. It's like I'm not just content being content. I'm like so content that I think I can do an even better job. So, that's the kind of thing that I'm thinking about right now. I'm just living that mechanical pencil life. I'm just living it so much. So, that is on the radar. We'll probably do – that will be like an October episode. We're going to do a mechanical – we're going to do a full episode of mechanical pencils. I just need some time to spend on that and write it up. That's actually on my personal list. I didn't write that on the rest of the year's stationary goals. But on the actual handwritten list I did before I talked this up was like I need to have a – commit to a pencil week. And just get back in the flow of – back in the graphite flow with mechanical pencils and wooden pencils. Because those have been the forgotten writing instruments here over the past few months. And those are products that I love. So, we'll get back into that soon. So, we'll do a whole episode on mechanical pencils pretty soon. All right. Got a few RSTP I want to knock out today. So, Adria asks, I keep hearing you mention every F1 race week and it gets me pumped. I don't know if we mention all of them but we talk about it. I'm new to the podcast. What are your favorite F1 teams? And do you own any F1 specific stationary? So, I will start by saying I bought the Tactile Turn GT edition because it is very racing adjacent. But I also got it for McLaren and I got the number four on it for Lando.

Discussion on favorite Formula 1 teams and drivers

• Because McLaren, I like the team. I like Lando most. For me, I am more attached to drivers than teams.
• I would say that like the moment really for me, it's like McLaren and Mercedes because that's where my favorite drivers are. And I look forward to being a Tafosi next year when Lewis Hamilton moves over. Right. But yeah, I'm very biased to all of the British drivers. It's just how it goes. It's just how it goes. Yeah. Yeah. And I'm a newer convert although I'm bordering on hardcore. Like I really follow it closely. I just don't have the long history. Neither do I though. I just don't have the long history. Right. So, I'd say I'm McLaren leaning from several years ago. Yep. Like in Lando, I actually bought the exact same pin that Myke did and had number four attached to the clip because that's what I should do. Still, I definitely root for McLaren, but I do find myself like Myke rooting for drivers. Like I don't dislike, well, I maybe dislike one driver. It's probably like a short list. Y'all could figure that out.
• But like I pull for a lot of drivers. Like I want to see what Carlos Sainz does next year. Like I think that kind of stuff like super interests me as an F1 fan. Yeah. Like I'm a fan of team principal Williams James Valls. Like the spectrum and this is what Drive to Survive allows, which is the documentary series, can allow you to be big fans of certain individuals. They may not even just be drivers. Right. Right. So, yeah, I really like the stories and storylines.
• And just my favorite thing about F1 is the importance of literally every position on the grid, which when you're not a fan and don't understand how the racing works, just thinking, oh, same guy wins every week or, you know, that race was boring. And not having the actual context of like, you know, how important this 16th place was for this first time driver. And, you know, how close they were to their teammates and the milliseconds that this stuff comes down to is just, it's just fascinating to me. So, yeah, I generally pull for McLaren. They're stressing me out right now. They're problematic for me. One of the worst statements I've ever heard. It's almost like they don't want to win the driver's championship, even though they could. I genuinely think, Brad, that that was a one-off and we will not see that again. That's my feeling. Yeah. The problem is they've had a one-off for like 10 weeks in a row now. So, 10 races. Well, I mean, yeah, but it has changed. Like the situation has changed, right? Like I feel like, but we'll see. We'll see if it does change. I did want to mention, as we did one of, throughout the St. Jude campaign, we have milestones of like content and things like that we can hit. But Tom and Dan, this came from Dan at Studio Neat, who I produced the show Thoroughly Considered with, where we talk about product design and stuff.
• Dan recommended that we do a ranking of the driver's poses in the intro credits for the races. F1 has like an intro with a song and it shows all the drivers. It's like, here's all the drivers. And this plays before the beginning of every race broadcast.
• And they like record it at the beginning of the year. They'll have like the media day, get these recordings. Yeah. Yeah. And so, they have all of them and then they play it the whole time. And Dan was like really fascinated by it. So, we did like a video where we broke down and ranked on a tier list ranking all of the drivers. It was such a good time. Like, I don't think you really need to care about Formula One to enjoy this. No, no, no. Not at all. It's just thoroughly silly in a really good way. We had a great time doing this. Yeah. So, I haven't watched it yet. It's in my queue. But now, I think I'm going to go do my own ranking and see where we come up with in the end. Because if it's just basically on the poses and like the presentation of the vibes of the drivers. Yeah. I'm going to do my own ranking and then watch it. So, that'll be fun. So, clearly, Adria. Yeah. We definitely like it. We've actually even built Lewis's F1 car on our Lego stream before.
• One of the worst experiences ever.
• That was terrible. That was so complicated. It was so bad. Evan writes in with a question that offends me and Brad personally in different ways.
• Evan says, you've mentioned you've been using AI to write your episode descriptions. And I've noticed that stationary with an E is being spelled stationary with an A at times. I just thought you might like to check on it. So, there's so much going on here. One, I don't use AI to write show descriptions. When I write a show description, I will often run it through ChatGPT to check my grammar and punctuation. Because it's the thing that I'm quite like not embarrassed. What's the word where you're not confident about something? Yeah. Not confident. You know, I'm not confident in my grammar and punctuation. Sure. It's not really something that I was ever very good at. I think I'm a good writer, but I'm not very good at those kind of like rule-based stuff. Sure. And so, I will always put these things. Insecure. Okay, got the right word for me. So, I always put it through and I'm like, can you just rewrite? I always say, rewrite this and keep it in my style. And most of the time, I take what it says. But a lot of the time, I also just change what it says. Like, I just get it to tidy things up for me. But that's one thing. Second thing. I don't write these descriptions. Brad does. Brad writes the descriptions for the pen addict. I don't touch them. And Brad told me. Michael, literally watch me type it up in the Google Doc. Once we're done, Brad starts typing. And this does happen. I think the reason Evan wrote in is because I checked last week's episode. It had stationary, not stationary in the description again. Brad tells me, because he writes them into Google Docs. I confronted Brad about this recently. And Brad blames Google Docs for this. So the problem is, the problem is at one point, probably like a couple years ago, we had it fixed. It used to do this all the time. Stationary with an E would constantly be autocorrected with an A. And then I thought we had it trained. And then all of a sudden, it's literally been like, I say all of a sudden, it's been like a year or two now. It does not keep any stationary with an E. And the problem where I miss them sometimes is if I'm, I will, I often don't write directly into Google Docs. I'll write in Ulysses, paste it over. And then when I paste it over, it changes it without me seeing it, right? Because I'm not right there on that cursor line. And it'll just bump, change it. And that's the ones that I miss, right? Because we've already had one in this episode.
• So in my Ulysses, I say I have a topic. And it says rest of the year stationary goals. When I went and looked at that in the Google Doc, it had switched it to an A, right? Without me noticing it. I literally had to change that like 10 minutes ago when we were getting ready to get to this topic. Because I just changed it. It's really hard to spot it, I think. Yeah. But Google will not learn not to change that. And it's problematic when I copy and paste it. When I'm typing, I can go back and fix it, right? Because it does it on the fly.
• The other problem with that is it takes me like three times to fix it, right? It doesn't like, I tell it, no, E is what I want. It's like, nah, I think we're going to go with A. And I'm like, no, no, E is what I want. And it's like, yeah, one more time. I think you really meant A. I was like, I do not mean A. Silly. I want it with an E and then it'll finally stay. So the problem is when I cut and paste and I don't see it. That's wild that that happens. Like that is wild that that happens. So I literally had to go change that topic title. Even though no one's ever going to see that, I had to change it because it made me mad. You can't live that way. It just continues to happen. So yeah.
• Yeah. But I do write the, I don't use AI to write the show descriptions. Wow. If I, if I do, it's probably like the, like, if you think that, like, you must think I use like the worst AI ever because.

Creative storage ideas for finished A5 notebooks

• All the best. All the best. Maybe it's truly me. So maybe it's truly me. Finally today, Matt asks, do you have any storage ideas for finished A5 notebooks? I was thinking about a small shelf or bookends for my desk, but was wondering if there are any more creative ways to store them. Ideally, I would like them to remain accessible. So this is kind of what I was alluding to when I was talking about Casey's post at Dime Numble Raven finishing a notebook. Like, it's one of the most joyous things in the stationary world. That's stationary with an E. It does not autocorrect my speech yet.
• I, you have to, if you're someone who values completing notebooks, you have to lean into some type of display, right? You want to be proud of those. Literally just the shelf. Go look at Austin Kleon's posts. He always, like, he's like a prolific notebook user and goes through tons of notebooks every year. And he just has them stacked on shelves. He has the bindings marked usually with tape or just written in like a white paint pen on the binding, the date, start date, completion dates, or the contents. We can put in a link, but like, it doesn't take long if you just go look at Austin Kleon. He's, because he's always sharing that type of content because he is so prolific. I just feel like I don't have like a super clean absolute answer for you, Matt, but I am saying you have to find a way to display those because it's motivating, right? You see that shelf, you're, man, look at that. Look at all of those pages I wrote. That is sick. Look at all the stuff that's in the notebook. When you're stuck sometimes, you just grab one of those notebooks, start flipping through it, and like the ideas start coming back to you. It's like, oh, man, this is cool that I did this. And it just kind of like, you know, reformats your brain there real quick. It's like a little bit of an in-person defrag, right? Like you're just kind of getting everything wired back together. And you can see some of the stuff it did in the past. And you can see your successes there all in these notebooks. And just having them right there within reach visually, physically, you have to find a way to display them. And really, it just needs a basic shelf. Because as a lot of us stationary users will tell you, storing notebooks is impossible. Like it's an unsolvable game of Tetris, trying to store notebooks. Because sizes, bindings, formats, how much they've been used, how little they've been used, how they all stack together, it's impossible. So get a shelf, stack them up, put something on the binding so you can refer to them quickly. And like that's what I would lean into. Thank you. Thank you to Penn Chalet and Squarespace for their support of this week's episode. But as most of all, thank you, Brad, for joining me. If you want to find Brad online, go to penaddict.com, spokedesign.com. He's at penaddict and at twitch.tv slash penaddict. You can find me here on Relay and at cortexbrand.com. And I'm at imike. I-M-Y-K-E. We'll be back next time. Well, Brad will be. I'm going to be off for the podcast-a-thon. But Brad has a great guest lineup and I'll be back on the 25th. So say goodbye, Brad. Goodbye, Brad.