Happy news: I’m going downtown in an hour to catch up with some friends and have lunch.
Bad news: I really need a blowout. And just what am I going to wear?
Question: Do men think this way?
I have a few fountain pens that have some issues I haven’t been able to, or haven’t had time to, fix myself. A pen with a great nib is a joy. But pen with a nib that pops out of alignment or writes poorly is a source of frustration and disappointment.
I’ve been so busy dealing with fire drills on the home front, or work, or things that had to be done for family members, that my misfit pens have sat on a shelf waiting for help for months. It’s especially silly because I have a friend, Dan Smith, who does excellent work on pens and nibs as the Nibsmith. I’ve been promising, or threatening, to send these to Dan since May.
This morning I decided to put all that other stuff aside for a bit and send off my pens. It’s Monday — a good day to make a fresh start. Sure, I still need to do three thousand other things today. But sometimes you need to put aside the demands of everyday life, and do something long-term, and for yourself.
And so, my pens are off to the nibmeister.
American football kicked off its season this week, just in time to inspire this post. Since the NFL has traditionally played its games on Sunday, we call post-game insights and criticisms “Monday morning quarterbacking.” After all, hindsight is always 20/20. But that can be helpful, too. So maybe it will be useful to look back at my pens and inks last week with a little hindsight.
1. Luckiest guess. Putting Diamine’s Shimmertastic Brandy Dazzle into a Pelikan Ibis with broad nib. The vintage Pelikan has a lot of ink flow, and the nib has a bit of flex, and both those characteristics really showed what Brandy Dazzle could do.
2. Luckiest break. I am very lucky to have a great friend who sent me six Shimmertastic ink samples to play with. They were all such fun.
3. Undeserved criticism award. Diamine took a lot of internet heat for putting the name “Shimmertastic” on its forthcoming ink line. And, yes, “Shimmer” would have been fine. But the truth is, after you use the word “Shimmertastic” a few times, you kind of forget that it sounds silly and just go with it. Heck, the inks do shimmer. And they are sort of fantastic. The power of suggestion worked for me here.
4. Deserved criticism award. Pelikan took a lot of internet heat for its M600 Pink Pelikan box design. And maybe Pelikan should have listened. Though it turns out I liked untying the bow, I think just a bow would have been quite enough to set the box apart. The corset lace design felt a little “ick” to me. And even if you like it, it does seem out-of-step with what is actually a fairly classy and professional pen.
5. Unluckiest break. In 2005, the Chicago Bears had the fourth pick in the NFL draft, which they wasted on a running back whose ignominious Bears career would be over by 2008. Among the players the Bears passed over was Aaron Rodgers, the quarterback of my beloved University of California Golden Bears. Worse, Rodgers was drafted by none other than the Green Bay Packers, arch-rivals of the Bears. Rodgers has gone on to become probably the best quarterback in football, a fact that he demonstrates to Chicago fans twice a year by stomping on our Bears. As he did once again yesterday. Sigh.
I usually wait to see a pen in person, or at least in photos taken in person, before ordering one. Publicity photos aren’t always accurate about a pen’s color. But the Pelikan M600 Pink was an exception. I pre-ordered it without knowing the specific shade of pink it would be. Because I realized that whatever pink it would be, I’d still buy it. It’s pink Pelikan!
But for everyone else, here are those photos.
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I think of Diamine Brandy Dazzle as similar to Diamine Golden Sands. Golden Sands is like molten gold, and Brandy Dazzle is like molten copper. Brandy Dazzle is absolutely stunning.
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I couldn’t wait to share a quick look at my Pink Pelikan, the new M600. In person, the color is more raspberry than hot pink. I know some people are having fits over a pink Pelikan. But this is not very wild, for a pink. It’s dignified, actually.
The binde is blend of light and dark pink stripes. It is not translucent. It shimmers. You cannot easily see the ink level.
I want to thank the nice people at Iguana Sell, from whom I bought this. They outdid themselves with great service and great communication, not to mention very fast delivery, all at a great price.
I’ve been writing with Platinum and Sailor’s inexpensive desk pens recently. Both were around $12 from Jetpens when I bought them a few years ago. I noticed that Jetpens isn’t carrying the Sailor any more, but still has the Platinum, as do other retailers. Here are my thoughts when comparing the two for writing, rather than drawing.
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Sailor Desk Pen. This is another sub-$15 plastic desk pen featuring an ultra-fine Japanese nib. I’ve got it filled with Sailor’s pigment-based ink, the nano ink Kiwa-guro. The combination is very similar to the Platinum Carbon Desk Pen featured Tuesday.
Sailor’s stainless steel nib is marked extra-fine. I find it very similar in width to both the Platinum desk pen with Carbon Black and the Pilot Prera fine nib with Pilot Black (a regular dye-based ink). The two desk pens may write slightly thinner lines than the Prera with fine nib, but all three are pretty close in my real world use.
Sailor Kiwa-guro ink is made from pigments rather than dye, so it’s similar to Platinum Carbon ink. In the desk pens, Kiwa-guro is darker and blacker than Platinum Carbon ink. However, Kiwa-guro is only water-resistant, while Platinum Carbon ink is totally waterproof.
Fountain Pen Follies 