Editing The Pen Addict 231/transcript (section)

== Standard Pen ==


'''Brad Dowdy:''' Yeah. So our first our first topic is standard pen. And this was actually my most difficult one. I think out of the entire thing, Myke, of course, right in the document, it says retro 51 forever. So you can't really argue with that. And to be perfectly honest, I was going to go with a very specific retro 51. And this is before I'd seen anyone's picks. I assumed Myke would pick that that was that was kind of a given, right? Yeah. But there was a very specific one I wanted to choose for mine. And it was a retro 51. They did a sterling silver tornado slims model this year called the Deco Tower. And I didn't put it in because it's kind of hard to find. So I didn't make that my pick. But there are a few available. We'll have some links in the show notes like I found it at Farnie's. It's like $140. It's a very expensive pen, but it is made out of silver, sterling silver pen. It's beautiful. Our friend Myke Dudek reviewed it earlier this year. I was super jealous. It's a beautiful pen. So that is a beautiful. Yeah. So that looks

'''Ana Reinert:''' like an Anna pen, to be quite honest. I have eyeballed it. But you're right. It's really hard to find. And it's one of those things where it's like $140 for basically a ballpoint. I'm like, I just have a hard time justifying that purchase.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Yeah. That's what kept me away too. Because the Tornado Slims use a different refill than the regular Tornado's, which uses the Schmidt rollerball instead of the Schmidt ballpoint refill. So I'm sure there's things you can do. And we're actually going to talk about some refills, especially since you're the refill guru. And I already have that in the link. And I'm going to hit it now because my pick for standard pen was the Big Eye Design TI Arto. And that's because it takes all the refills. That's pretty amazing.

'''Ana Reinert:''' And it works. Yeah. Have you gotten a hold of one yet? I haven't had one yet.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' So funny story about that. They sent me a prototype. And it really, really works. Like it legitimately works on anything I put into it. So when it came up on Kickstarter, I backed it as well. So I have one coming. It's closed out. And they're shipping soon. And I put it in the list, even though it's not available yet. They're shipping at the end of November. So you can still get it for the holidays. So I gave this one to Jeff at work one day. I said, here, why don't you... I bought one. I have one coming. They gave me this one. So why don't you go play with it? And he started playing with it. And he's like later that night, he texts me. He's like, oh my God, it takes D1 refills. So like it can fit anything. He was like messing around with it. So excited. He posted it up on his personal Instagram, which is Jeffrey Seamster. And he tagged the Big Eye Design guys. And Chadwick replied to him. He's like, hey, where did you get this pen? Because I think he only had one or two prototypes at the time. And he sent me one. They weren't out in the wild. And here's this random guy tagging him. Hey, check out my T-I-R-do. Excuse me. So Chadwick had emailed him. And then Jeff connected the dots for him. And he's like, oh, okay. You work with Brad. I'm like, okay. So yeah, it was funny. But it really holds everything.

'''Ana Reinert:''' Yeah. I was so jealous you got a copy of that one because I really wanted to put it through its paces. But I did back that on the Kickstarter. So I'm very excited to get a hold of one of them and try it out.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' It's really cool. It absolutely works. And it works well. There's no fuss with it. Once you get the refill locked in, I mean, you're like done. Enjoy the pen and the refill. And I'm linking to your wonderful epic refill reference guide because all of those refills are going to fit this pen. So if you want to see what awesome refills are out there, go check out Ana's blog. And I have a shortcut built in even for that link because I use it so much. So I have like a text expander shortcut I use to send people that link so I don't have to go hunt it down

'''Ana Reinert:''' every time. I should probably do one.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' What's your pick for standard pen? I tried not to look at your list. It's kind of hard not to. And this one surprised me. I was not familiar with this one very much.

'''Ana Reinert:''' This was the one that I got from Goldspot Pens when we were in DC. He brought me one while we were there that I had etched with a well-appointed desk. But it's the cross-century select tip rollerball, the cross-century 2. It is the cross does a couple different like rollerball, but this particular one, the select tip takes both a rollerball and a felt tip. And so in comparison, and what I was looking for really was because I knew I knew Myke would pick the retro 51 and we picked the retro 51 last year. And I was like, I want to want to pick something that was a little bit different. And I, the, if I had thought of the, uh, um, the big guy design TRTI artro, I probably would have picked that too, because that's pretty, that is an amazing opportunity. But the cross, the nice thing with the cross-century 2 is that's something that you could potentially pick up like at a Staples or, you know, an Office Max. Um, but it's a pen, um, it's capped, but because it will take a felt tip refill or a rollerball. So you do have that opportunity to switch back and forth. So while it doesn't give you the option of a ton of different refills, it does give you that possibility of switching back and forth between rollerball or felt tip. Um, but I now have, I think I have four of them. Oh, wow. Um, because I've just, I keep picking them up. Uh, so I just got one from Anderson pens. They had like new old stock from a shop that they acquired, like old stock that had gone out of business, but it was like a, um, a gray, it's like a gray color with like little dots all over it. So it kind of looks like almost like space. I don't know which model it was, but they had a few of them still in their shop. But then I have the blue one that I got from gold spot that he etched that then vanished. I don't know if you heard the story, but right after I got back from DC, it vanished completely. I've never lost a pen before and this pen disappeared. And I'm like, seriously, the one that actually essentially had my name on it disappeared for like two months, could not find it. So I emailed him and I'm like, I have to buy another one. Like I cannot find it. No sooner did I order another one that the pen turned up. Oh, wow. In a bag that I bought after came back from DC. So it was like something I had purchased that never like had never had contact with our trip to DC, the DC pen show. So I'm like, I don't know how that pen got in that back. Like it was like the magic bag. So now I have two of them. Two like the blue, they're like blue metallic, like a frosted finish.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Yeah. So how is the felt to refill? Have you tried that?

'''Ana Reinert:''' Yeah, I have the refill, the fine tip and I've, I have had the refill in both blue and black and I really like it. It's very comparable to like the, what's the refill? The one that everybody uses. The Montblanc has the final. I was thinking like a Sakura Pigma Micron. Oh yeah, yeah, yeah. It's pretty close. Oh, that's great. It's pretty comparable. And again, it's like a refill that you could pick up at any big box store.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Cool.

'''Ana Reinert:''' So yeah, so the one that I will provide a link for, for the show notes, Goldspot has for like on sale for like $30. So it's like very inexpensive way to get into it. But they also have one that's 10 karat gold, solid gold.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Oh wow.

'''Ana Reinert:''' That's like $200. So, you know, you can go either way.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Well, you can get the, I like the, I like the fact that you can get it engraved too, or, you know, have a logo design or something put on it. That's kind of cool.

'''Ana Reinert:''' Yeah. And just kind of fun.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' All right. So let's break into this, this fountain pen and we're going to take this one together. Um, we, we did our lists independently and we kind of landed on the same thing for fountain pen, which actually I kind of surprised myself on this. I was like, this is the one thing that really sticks in my head. And then you kind of had this, you were kind of thinking along the same line. So what do you have for fountain pen?