Day	What	How Much	Pen	Ink
11 October 12 October 13 October 14 October	Thanksgiving Recovery Day† First draft of “Unintended Consequences” (working title).	Badly overtaxed my shoulders scraping the eavestroughs. 652 typed words.	Pelikan Stola III TWSBI Classic Parker 50 Cross Century II Medalist	Pelikan Royal Blue Edelstein Olivine Edelstein Topaz Herbin Violet Penseé

† I understand that people in the US think this is a month early– that’s how we know it’s a harvest festival. Also, I’ve heard that the people of the republic south of me celebrated Colobus Day on the 11th, although I’ve no idea why they devote a whole day to recognizing a genus of Old World monkeys.

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Day	What	How Much	Pen	Ink
4 October 5 October 6 October 7 October	First draft of “Unintended Consequences” (working title).	915 typed words	Sheaffer Targa Cross Century II Medalist Pelikan Stola III Parker 50	Herbin Lis de Thé Herbin Violet Penseé Pelikan Royal Blue Edelstein Topaz

Day	What	How Much	Pen	Ink
5 October 6 October 7 October 8 October	First draft of “Hobb’s Landing”. Reworking “Disruptions on the Line” for a specific market.	I’m calling this draft done at 6100 words. Just a little tweaking done; not quite enough.	TWSBI Classic OMAS Arte Italiana Pelikan P1 Parker 50	Jentle blue-black Edelstein Olivine Diamine Bilberry Quink Black

Day	What	How Much	Pen	Ink
28 September 29 September 30 September 1 October	First draft of “Hobb’s Landing”.	about 750 words typed; I didn’t attend properly to where the week started.	OMAS Arte Italiana Parker 50 Sheaffer Sovereign II Wing Sung 601	Edelstein Olivine Quink Black Herbin Poussière de Lune Herbin Bleu Calanque

 

What’s For Supper?

I honestly don’t know what the YouTube algorithm thinks, sometimes. I know that a few times in the past I have praised it for delivering something that’s right up my alley, but… well, I don’t watch anything about cooking, and yet lately I’ve had an influx of things like this.

I don’t mind mysterious food instruction suggestions, of course. Part of my motive for putting this up as the Friday Film is so I won’t forget to try out a couple of the variations. I’ve never had great success with fried rice.

Also– fish sauce is a condiment you need. Just don’t think too hard about how it’s made.

Today’s pen: Parker 50
Today’s ink: Quink Black

Day	What	How Much	Pen	Ink
9 September 10 September 11 September 12 September	First draft of “Whistling Through the Graveyard”	19 manuscript pages.	TWSBI Precision Wing Sung 601 Parker 50 Lamy 27	Diamine Midnight Herbin Poussière de Lune Herbin Bleu Calanque Lamy black

 

Homespun Wisdom

Here’s an embarrassment. I’ve only just noticed I didn’t do one of these last Friday. I thought I had, and yet I can find no evidence of even a larval draft of one.

Well. I’m not going to make up for it entirely, I guess. I was distracted by getting a new story into a state that Patreon patrons could get their early-admission gandering-at accomplished, and that’s now thrown open to the world… so that’s some entertainment for you. But because Friday is about films, here’s a guy who has clearly been around a few campfires with a solution to one of life’s most vexing problems; how to clean the cast-iron pan:

That certainly makes maintenance a lot simpler, although as my cast-iron pan weighs only slightly less than my car (it’s a large example of the breed) I may not do a lot more cooking in it. Although it does to an excellent job of browning meat… well, now I have to think about what I’m making for supper.

Today’s pen: Parker 50
Today’s ink: Herbin Bleu Calanque

Day	What	How Much	Pen	Ink
26 August 27 August 28 August 29 August	First draft of “Underground Follies” (working title). Second draft of same	2 manuscript pages 1946 words typed	Wing Sung 601 TWSBI Precision Parker 50 Lamy 27	Herbin Poussière de Lune Diamine Midnight Herbin Bleu Calanque Lamy black

I said I wasn’t going to mention it again, but… that Kickstarter has succeeded, so “The Moon Forest” (first met here as “14 Nights of Day”) will indeed be published, and if the publisher is true to their schedule, it will be available before the end of the year. Hoorah!

Day	What	How Much	Pen	Ink
19 August 20 August 21 August 22 August	A slightly indulgent blog entry. First draft of “Underground Follies” (working title).	See previous entry 15 manuscript pages	Parker 50 Waterman Citation Pelikan P488 Wing Sung 601	Herbin Bleu Calanque Jentle blue-black Edelstein Topaz Herbin Poussière de Lune

I will mention once more, and probably only once more, the Kickstarter in which my recently-written story “The Moon Forest” will find a home… if they reach the funding goal which is painfully close to completion. If I assume my story is of average quality for the collection (it’s the only one I’ve read, so I can’t say otherwise), it’s going to be pretty darned good– I’m very proud of my work on that one. So, tell your family, tell your friends, tell passing strangers who look like they enjoy a good yarn, and let them have a look at the campaign page. They may be the very person who gives it the shove into existence!

SO CLOSE TO FULL! LESS THAN A WEEK TO RUN! SEND HELP!

A Brief Lamentation

A long time ago, I got a new(ish) camera. I went on about it at some length, too, because I was able to take pictures that weren’t hideous, which up to that point was not the wrong word to use.

I mean… you can tell it’s a pen, but otherwise, uck.

Somewhat more recently, I got an actually new, fresh out of the box camera, and not only had it not taken pictures before, it was objectively good. Again, I mentioned it previously, and hinted that I might be switching over to it for site photos.

I did not. Why? Consistency. Let’s have a look at a pair of pictures from that earlier post:

The old Canon

The new Nikon

They’re both good enough for my purposes, but they’re not the same, even though they were taken with the same lighting in the same place. And that made me not want to make the switch– I’m a lazy bugger, sometimes, and learning how to process the new shots so they’d look like the old was too much trouble. Also, the little table-top camera I use has a little trouble bearing the weight of a real cameral, even if it’s not carrying a mass of film in its guts. So, I carried on until…

Until it was time to show you all my super-cool Apollo commemorative pen. I headed down to the photography grotto, and found the camera wasn’t switching on. So I replaced the batteries. Which didn’t work. And that’s why this picture looks a little odd:

Something I don’t know how to adjust in an iPhone: white balance

It turns out the (nearly) modern phone camera  is pretty good, but getting pictures out of it, into my computer, and then washed and filtered until they’re consistent with the other shots on my site is even more work than dealing with the real camera. Ironically, that whole process would probably be easier if it wasn’t an all-Apple environment, but that’s the bed I now lie in.

Anyway, having finally convinced myself that the little old point’n’shoot is never going to open its eye again, I’m using Gargantua and putting in the slightly increased effort it takes to make it look about as duff as my previous efforts:

You might think I took this two years ago instead of mere days (also– coming soon to a website near me!)

I should be happy, because the pixel count is vastly higher now… although you wouldn’t know it. Rather than reducing image size by about 20% as part of the effort to make all pictures the same visual length, so visitors to the site can compare images side by side for a real sense of the pens’ relative sizes, the new standard needs an 80% reduction. In theory, this will disguise more in the way of scrapes and cat hair, leading to more beautiful pictures.

I will miss that little camera, though.

Today’s pen: Parker 50
Today’s ink: Herbin Bleu Calanque