Editing The Pen Addict 258/transcript (section)

== Wax Application ==


'''Myke Hurley:''' This is why I think we're doing it fundamentally differently, right? Because the little kit that I bought, it has a little spoon, so I cut off a piece of the wax, put it in the spoon. That's right, you're tied off. And then heat it over a candle. Yeah. Yeah, that's exactly right. And then just drip it onto the page, right? That's cool. Like, I don't know, like, trying to melt the whole wax straight from the stick just seems like a nightmare to me. I bet that's how all the cool kids do it, but I don't think I'm at that level.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Yeah, yeah. So, the theme or the answer seems to be diagonal, so somewhere in between what I'm doing. Because if I hold it just horizontal to the page, it doesn't drip enough. Like, I think it's going to dry out before I stamp, right? You got to have a nice puddle there. And then if you hold it, I said, okay, well, then I must need to hold it vertically so the wax will really start dripping, and then it just started, like, sparking and shooting crap everywhere. So, that wasn't a good idea either.

'''Myke Hurley:''' That doesn't sound like it went very well.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Yeah. Well, I eventually got there, but it was taking, like, longer than I thought. And I was concerned about, like, it was taking so long, I almost had the ash from the wick fall into the seal, which wouldn't have been a good look. Or maybe it would be a good look. Add some flavor to it. But, yeah, this is fun. It's going to be a problem. Mine says, hashtag hype man and pen addict. And it's got some nibs and ink bottles on there. It's really cool. I need to get some brighter wax. It obviously didn't photograph very well because it's a dark navy blue wax. I don't even know where I got this from. But I knew I had some. I had to dig it out.

'''Myke Hurley:''' I was just saying, man, there's tons on Amazon. Like, seriously, like, on Prime. It's crazy. There's so much of that stuff. I couldn't believe it.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Yeah. Well, and when we were at the Chicago Pen Show, Matt from the Pen Habit came over with a fistful of wax sticks from Renzo at Papier Plume. He's got some beautiful, like, swirly stuff. It looks really nice.

'''Myke Hurley:''' It's a whole big thing.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Yeah. So, yeah, this is a whole thing. So, I'll figure it out. I'll do a better stamp, better seal. So, I'm still not writing any letters yet, but now I guess I'm going to have to to use these fun new toys. So, we'll see. We now both have ours, our Glenn HK stamps, wax seals from Glenn, which is awesome. Thank you.

'''Myke Hurley:''' Glenn is the man.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Yep.

'''Myke Hurley:''' All right. So, talking about the man, Thomas Hall did some detective work regarding the new Edison filling system for me. You know, I asked the question last week if my Menlo could be converted into their new drawer filler. It turns out it can't. It's not possible. Right. It makes sense. Yeah, it makes sense. It makes sense. But it was just like on an off-chance hope, right? And basically, from Edison Penz, they basically said that the interior of the drawer filling barrel has a very precise internal bore that matches with the O-rings. So, it can make the drawer filling action correct. So, like, you'd basically destroy the barrel to try and retrofit it. Gotcha. Gotcha. So, I mean, so here's my thinking around mine. I've just, I've got my Menlo in my hand right now. I'm going to today try and give this thing a thorough, thorough clean, like, everything I can possibly do to it. I'm going to, like, pen flush it and all that stuff, right? Because I haven't used the JB Pen Flush yet. And then I'm going to give it a go and see if I can, see if it performs okay. You know, my concern is that maybe I just haven't been as nice to this pen as I should have been. And that might have contributed to some of the issues that I'm having. If it doesn't seem like it's any better, then I think I'm going to have to send it to them to take a look at it.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' I mean, you'll know real quick if the ink's leaking out the back. I mean, it's not like a sieve, but it starts getting into other areas where it shouldn't get into. Yeah. Yeah.

'''Myke Hurley:''' Like, right now, I think I'm going to need a bit of force to even get the end section off. Because there's just, yeah, some mess in there.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' So I'm actually considering getting one of these draw fillers. I want to see them at the next show Brian's at. Maybe he'll be at DC. I don't know. I'm sure he's planning on it. Might get one there, see what kind of special ones he makes for the show. But I am kind of interested in it now.

'''Myke Hurley:''' Yeah, because, I mean, I just love the pens, right? Yeah, they're awesome. It's one of my favorites. But maybe I chose the wrong filling system. But I was just so excited, you know.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Well, it was the right filling system. I knew going into it is going to be very difficult to maintain. But it turns out it's even more so. And there's some issues with it on top of that. So it's tough. But, yeah, we'll see. I would get yours reworked if it continues to leak because it's an amazing pen.

'''Myke Hurley:''' Yeah, I love it so much. And I don't use it as much as I want to because of it.