As for your utility knife, you might have already discovered that knife companies are making fun and interesting folding utility knives now using the same razor blades you get at the hardware store.

That’s what my Stanley was. It was a folding box cutter that looked like an old-fashioned jack knife. And yeah, it had a tool-less design for blade replacement. Okay, I thought it was a Stanley, but after a quick search it was a Sheffield:

It was quite the beast of a knife, worked well, and was quite solid. But, with its disappearance I’m happy to have had the opportunity to buy a pocket knife to replace it. :)

I found the Apica A4 notebooks to be really nice, but a bit on the pricey side given how many notebooks I go through. I found that Kokuyo has their Campus notebooks in a B5 size that’s only slightly smaller than an A4. And, the nice thing for me is they have a 6mm rule instead of the 7mm rule, meaning I can get more text on the page.

The Campus notebooks are a bit lighter weight of paper, but they work well, and are fountain pen safe.

Maruman also has some nice spiral bound notebooks that are semi-B5 in size, and have perforated pages. I was looking for an A7 from them, but I could only find ones that had a spiral across the top, instead of on the side.

Just looked at the Sharpmaker. That seems like a really nice, simple sharpener. Easier than what I was thinking.

Twenty? LOL. Hopefully I don’t get that bad… Although I have to admit, I have ordered a Civivi just to see what the difference is between it and the CJRB (well, that, and the Civivi is a drop point blade).

As for sharpening: I’ll probably do it myself. I just have to get a good sharpener. (I have a grind wheel here, but I don’t think I want to go that route just yet…better to learn with a manual sharpener.)

As for the torx: I have a full set already. I just need to pick up some oil.

I love Apica notebooks — especially their CD Premium line. Use the A5 for journaling. I have to look into the A7 notebooks.

Its cap is both friction fit and clipped, a bit of an odd system that I don’t fully understand.

I noted that on Doodle Bud’s review. It appears to be similar to the Lamy 2000. Any problems with ink splatter? DB’s had problems with his cap being so tight that when he removes it he gets ink in the cap, on the nib/feed/section and then on his fingers.

Cool for them… ;) I don’t trust AliExpress (been ripped off several times), so unless they make it over here guess I won’t see them.

One interesting thing… There is one variation of this pen I haven’t seen anywhere (see marked item in photo):

The cap band is interesting…

I don’t see any listed as “limited edition” — the only differentiator I see on Amazon (where I purchased mine) is the color. I took that photo of the black cap. But the inside of the champagne cap is the same.

I do see a plastic lining in the cap, likely part of the sealing for the pen.

Nice job on reviewing this pen. I got both the black and maroon versions last week, but haven’t had a chance to ink them yet.

It is fully made of plastic, except for the trim ring, clip and section plug that are made of steel.

Why do the caps on mine look (and feel) like steel:

I mean, that looks metallic to me.

EDIT: Forgot to mention: when picking up the pen after it’s been sitting, the caps are definitely cooler to the touch than the body. Typically, that’s an indicator of metal.

I do buy the argument that the majority of the shift is due to AI bots / agents. Just looking at the robots.txt I had to implement just to try to keep the majority of bots off my websites is insane (literally 160+ lines of user agents).

But there are some other factors, such as the seemingly steady migration of users from Windows to Linux. I don’t buy the Valve hardware argument as much since the majority of those will be used for gaming on Steam, and not likely to be seen by StatCounter or Cloudflare.

StatCounter itself has flagged the possibility that some of the new Linux activity could be bot-related, including traffic generated by AI agents and other automated workloads, which would make the jump appear much larger than a shift driven entirely by human users.

Oh, it’s because of AI alright. Because Windows users are tired of it being shoved down their f***ing throats.

(I’m just being sarcastic for the fun of it…)

Man, Mamdani is on a major winning streak… Too bad he couldn’t get Netanyahu arrested (but I’m happy he had the possibility researched).

Partch might give you that same curiosity. Here’s an example: Sonata Dementia (1950) - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qZybJAEPu18

One of the arguments I made in my blog post is that there is a very long history of alternate tunings and microtonality in music. Another composer to get into his Harry Partch, who came up with at 43 tone scale in the 1950s, and had to build his own instruments for an ensemble to perform his compositions.

I’m surprised you didn’t include King Gizzard in your list – especially Flying Microtonal Banana.

So, there are good explanations as to why they are popular, and not a joke even slightly.

What AdP have done is combined:

• Pop rock using looping tech and really tight percussion / guitar work
• Some very technical playing, especially using microtonal instruments with a 24 tone scale
• A dada-esque aesthetic to make themselves standout
• Created a lore that allows them to preserve some privacy

So, no, the music is not a joke. It’s real music, made by musicians that have been performing together since they were ~13 years old (over a decade at this point). If you listened with a critical ear you might realize that many of their pieces are actually satirizing the clichés of pop-rock music. The aesthetic is made to be fun and get attention.

I’ve written a bit more about them here: The Summer of Angine de Poitrine.

Oh, and FYI—if this is a joke, it’s one of the most successful jokes in nearly 20 years. They smashed the attendance record set by Stevie Wonder in 2009 for the Montreal Jazz Festival.

Also, when buying Chinese pens, or anything Chinese really, I would very strongly advise to check AliExpress first,

You must not have read the article carefully. ;) I’ve been ripped off by sellers on AliExpress four times and have vowed to never purchase another thing through that site.

I have, however, found a really nice reseller that (while a little more than AliExpress) is much better than Amazon, and very clearly labels their products. I have a review of some pens I purchased through them coming up.

And, I think the “no QC” thing is changing. A bunch of the Chinese companies that have gone into “luxury” products (like watches and leather goods) have started realizing that QC is a necessity. Doodle Bud (on YouTube) has mentioned that Asvine has actually reached out to him to get feed back on some of their engineering and QC issues.

Do note that they both rely on (included) cartridge converters.

That’s probably one of the biggest things to me: having different filling systems. As I mentioned in the article, I have piston fillers, vac fillers, etc. I wanted to have Parker 51 clones that use the Vacumatic system.

I am surprised that you were disappointed in Jinhao pens,

At this point, I think the only decent one I have is the x750, and even those have an issue with the cap wobbling (but at least the seal still seems to be good). I’ve had at least a dozen other Jinhao pens (not just Parker clones), and they’ve consistently had issues from scratchy nibs to bad seals.

In contrast, Wing Sung and Hong Dian pens have never quite matched my expectations from reading online reviews.

These are the first Wingsung pens I’ve managed to get, so I can’t say anything beyond this experience. Hongdian OTOH, I’ve not had an issue with. I have four M2s, two Black Forrest’s, and a pair of C2s, and all have been exceptionally high quality. I would almost prefer the M2’s over my Kaweco Piston Sport pens… But the Piston Sport is a piston filler, which I like over cartridge / converter pens.

One of the things I’ve noted is that many of the Chinese manufacturers have had inconsistent quality control, especially a few years ago. In particular someone pointed to Asvine pens they bought 1.5-2 years ago as having issues. It seems that in that time at least some of these companies have improved their quality and/or quality control.

But, I’ve also noted that many of the sellers on Amazon won’t specify when the pen they are selling was released. It’s possible that the Jinhao and Junlai pens may have been from a few years ago, and lack the quality control they have now. (But, this is completely a speculation.)

I kept trying to journal on my computer, but I would do it for a while, not write down anything useful and then just give up.

With the paper journal I just started writing, and the focus required using a fountain pen brought out a different side of my writing… Then I did something that really helped:I started keeping a list of everything that I wanted to write about. Once I had that list it was easier to commit to doing it every day — my brain treats my adding stuff to a list as a commitment.

Proceeds to write blog post about their interest in fountain pens that started last fall.

Okay, fair, was really saying that before last fall I’d never had interest in fountain pens… And I’ve been here some 50+ traversals around the sun by our planet…

For me, it forces me to slow down my writing and make the letters right.

That’s where I started, but not (completely) where I stayed. I find that writing with a fountain pen makes me more intentional because I need to be able to read what I’ve written. But instead of just focusing on penmanship I moved to journaling instead.