pens
The Power of the Pen
I like writing by hand, and I love the feel of writing with a good pen. In my experience, though, good pens are hard to find.
Several years ago I decided I wanted to give fountain pens a try. While I enjoyed the character that the fountain nib added to my writing, I always had a couple of issues: first, I could never get consistent ink flow through the nib. (Maybe I just wasn’t willing to spend enough on a pen? The Lamy Safari is usually spoken of highly, though.)
Second, my handwriting tends to be small, which means I value thin, precise lines. Not so easy with a fountain pen. (I keep a Pilot Varsity disposable fountain pen around for signing things at work. My signature: not so small.)
Then I found the Uniball Signo gel ink pens, which are awesome. (I prefer the 0.38 mm width.) Unfortunately, they’re not sold directly in the US; I splurge every year or so and order a few from JetPens.com, which imports them from Asia.
Then last week somebody linked to and highly recommended the Parker Jotter ballpoint retractable pen. This little gem is stainless steel, refillable, and a little smaller than your normal sized pen; all winners as far as I was concerned.
Then I found out it was the pen used as James Bond’s exploding pen in Goldeneye, and that sealed the deal. (I’m a sucker for Goldeneye for some reason.) The video here is queued up for maximum clicky-ness. (Unfortunately I was unable to find one that ran long enough to get computer hacker Boris’s final, exultant cry of “I am invincible!”.)
And friends, the pen sounds exactly like that when I click it. Which is awesome. (Come back in a week to find out if I’ve completely annoyed my wife with the clicking yet.)
Happiness is... another new pen.
When we were in Minneapolis last weekend I happened upon one of those dangerous places for me to go in: a pen shop.
Let me back up a bit. I have become quite a fan of fountain pens over the past couple of years. I’ve not bought any real expensive pens, but have managed to enjoy and then lose two separate Lamy Safari Al-Stars the past two years - one fell out of my pocket on an airplane, the other dropped off my lanyard undetected last summer. I’ve been resisting the urge to buy another one… but that resistance proved futile on Friday. So, I came out of the store with this:
I’ve been using it this morning at work and I had forgotten just how much fun it is to write with a fountain pen.
Officially, Becky declared that this was my Christmas present from her, so I’ll say this: thanks, Beck, for the present. It’s fantastic. I love it. :-)