Heroic Posing

Having (very nearly) slain the metaphorical dragon of my site’s collapse this week, I’d like to offer the trailer to a movie you should see if you haven’t… although not for the reasons which might occur from the trailer.

There are two important lessons from this.  First, never trust a trailer.  Second, people who win Oscars as Best Editor earn them.

Today’s pen: Pelikan 140
Today’s ink: Herbin Vert Empire

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Crank House

The old homestead was a krankhaus indeed– son too sick for school and wife too sick to look after him.  The up-side of not attending work and spending a day in a house full of virus and coma is that I got another four pages written on “Old 237”, which was gratifying.  On the down side, some client pens arrived, and I wasn’t able to do any more than establish that the box was intact.

…and although I don’t follow sports, I’m not submerged literally or figuratively, so I hear the Olympics are ramping up today.  In honour of that (although I find the current government of Russia not particularly worthy of honouring), today’s film:

People like me have a little difficulty telling the difference between this and the real thing.

Today’s pen: Sheaffer Admiral
Today’s ink: Herbin Vert Empire

Don’t Grumble!

To follow yesterday’s bleak murmur (which I think had a little bit of viral infection helping it out– MUCH better now), here’s a little tune to brighten everyone’s day.

I was actually at a wedding where this was the first song played at the reception.  Strangely, the marriage didn’t last.

Today’s pen: Parker 75
Today’s ink: Chelpark Permanent Black

The Trailer of the Soundtrack of the Film of the Book….

Well, it looks like those 10,000 angry people have mostly registered their disapproval, and the tide starts to ebb.  Just in time for me to go and have an off-campus lunch!  Friday remains film day, and since I mentioned a grail recently, this seems appropriate:

Like an real trailer, it gives no real sense of the movie it’s presenting.  Unlike a real trailer, it doesn’t quite wave the ending nor the shocking twist unavoidably under one’s nose.

On a personal note– back in 1986 or ’87, I went to a talk Graham Chapman gave.  He revealed that the combination of drugs and liquor he was indulging in at the time meant that for a couple of the more intense scenes he forgot he was making a movie, and thought that he was in fact in danger of being cast off the Bridge of Death.  Knowing that, one marvels at how collected his performance in scene 22 was.

Today’s Pen: Parker 180
Today’s ink: Pelikan violet

300 (Warning: Contains No Gerard Butler)

I find my Regular Job work station still somewhat reminiscent of Horsell Common after the departure of the Martians, so I’m writing from home.  At home, I’ve got… a new pen!

This is, I suspect, not as shocking a piece of news as the exclamation point urges.  However, it is an oddity in that it is in face a new pen, in the common meaning of the word.  I ordered it based on three foundations: someone’s praise in a pen forum confirming a lingering inclination, a clearance discount associated with discontinuation, and the impending (now accomplished) discontinuation of another discount at Goulet pens.  There was also the scent of victory over a grasping credit card company in the air, so I felt some mis-placed lightness of heart.

The pen, which I’m even now building a page for on my site, is a Sheaffer 300, one of several multiples of a hundred which Sheaffer introduced at the end of the last decade.  It is, sort of, a replacement for their Javelin, although in a somewhat grander tone and moving slightly up the ladder of cost.  It is also quite a handsome brute:

Not that pictures ever do a shiny pen justice. Especially when I’m the one taking them.

It is, frankly, about as nice in the looks department as the much more expensive Legacies, at least when the cap is on.  It’s not terrible with the cap off, as I’ll reveal momentarily, but the inlaid point is hard to compete with.  It is also a rather better pen than the preceding Javelin, in terms of fit, finish and detail.  The way the cap interacts with the pen is high in the points of improvement; while it is just a deformable plastic mechanism that holds the cap down, it’s smoother in operation than the Javelin, and the flush fit of the cap at the joint means less peril to the finish (a point over which I specifically cast aspersions on the Javelin).  Also, note the little raised ring on the tail of the pen.  When one does this…

In all honesty, the section, functional as it is, is a little bit of a let-down, looks-wise.

…it locks into the same mechanism.  The cap is not reliant on friction to stay in place, which is a point that threatens the finish of both Javelin and Legacy (and, moving onto another recent acquisition, just doesn’t work with the Agio).  It seems that Sheaffer has finally, after trouble dating back to the Balance, worked out how to post a cap well.  If only posting that heavy cap didn’t through the… well, the balance off so badly, it would be a nearly perfect pen.

At this point, I would like you to form a picture of noted scholar, writer, and occasional comedian Terry Jones dressed as an early medieval woman; “Oh, there you go, bringing weight into it again!”  Yes, I know, I’m a bit of a broken record on the subject, but it is the one fly in this otherwise delightful ointment.  When capped, it’s merely a somewhat heavy, yet quite elegant, accessory.  Posted, it’s a rather cumbrous and top-heavy pen, as the cap is a large part of the pens weight and most of its weight is at the top.  It’s fine to write with unposted, but when such a good effort has been put into making it possible to stow the cap on the end of the pen, it’s a shame that doing so makes writing less fun.

Still, it’s a pen I like a lot, and I’m sorry to see it being withdrawn.  The silver lining there, for those who don’t yet have one, is they’re going for cheap on the clearance sales.  For those of us who have one, and take an interest in the fates of Sheaffer, there is some extra hope that the interesting successor pens to this one will also be good pens.

Before I wrap up, I want to heap yet more web-based laurels on Goulet Pens.  After the rather dodgy packing practices of various second-hand pen-sellers, it’s nice to finally get something from a source that takes as much interest in getting the pen somewhere safely as I do myself.  The way they send out the orders renders it as liable to transit damage as if it were a block of granite with an address label glued to it.

Today’s pen: Baoer 388
Today’s ink: Diamine China Blue

Brain Activation

For the Monty Python fan, the line “My brain hurts!” will resonate (I prefer the Gilliam or Chapman delivery).  I have put a lot of effort in the past 48 hours into describing the proper revitalization process for a Sheaffer Snorkel, and to that  is added guilt over some correspondence that remains undone.  Guilt being an irrational thing, the fact that the specific time demands of typing the Snorkel exercise can be hidden in a post-free work day while longhanding the correspondence cannot does not actually help.

A facebook associate put me onto a slightly interesting article about how handwriting (as opposed to typing) is good for the brain.  I take some issue with this line from it:

After four weeks of training, the kids who practiced writing showed brain activation similar to an adult’s, said James, the study’s lead researcher.

The issue stems from the intimation that kids don’t use their brains as much as adults.  From observation of my son, and the speed with which he defeats things meant to keep him out of danger, I know that’s not the case, and I suspect the researchers don’t actually mean it that way.  I also note that the poor kid in the picture attached to the article has not been shown how to hold a writing tool well– a candidate for sore joints in years to come.

Today’s pen:  Fuliwen leather-clad pen
Today’s ink: Diamine Majestic Blue

Filler

I’m still somewhat low (although pleasant comments have indeed helped the morale), and suffering under the usual effectof the short Friday writing period, so I’m going to be very dull and merely refer to another blog I was reading earlier in the week.  An examination to the myth of Psyche, it sticks in my head for this reason:

Psyche must, for instance:

• fetch wool from a lethal sheep…, which she does with the help of a reed growing by the river;

I clearly need to refresh myself in Greek mythology– I had no idea it went quite that far down the road of Monty Python.

Today’s brief pen:  Sheaffer 8C
Today’s terse ink:  Noodler’s La Couleur Royale