Cyclops

Recently I ordered one bottle each of Noodler's X-Feather Black and Marine Green from Goulet. When the package arrived at my house, it was sealed inside a USPS plastic baggie with their apologies for damage to my item. The damage in question was the black ink was shattered inside. Soaked almost the entire shipping envelope. The label was washed off the green ink, but the bottle itself was unharmed. I asked GPC what to do, whether I should start a claim against the snail mail folks. They asked for photos of the damage, saw the extent of it, and sent me two new bottles at no charge. I repeated that the green bottle was undamaged, just the label missing. They said they would replace it all anyway. It was a very quick response, and did more than they really needed to. I told them that they have a customer for life.

Oh, I almost forgot. A while back I mentioned a 4-pack of Wing Sung 3008s I got, and one of them wouldn't write. It tried a double-edged razor blade between the tines, but that didn't make any difference. So I ordered some replacement nibs (EF, because I write small and tight). They finally arrived. I traded out, threw in a shot of Monteverde's Horizon Blue, and she works like there was never any problems. It's a fairly wet ink; the line it lays is pretty broad for an EF nib. But not so much that I can't use it. I still like it. And going through my other pens, I had trouble remembering which pens were inked with what. I guess I'm going to have to start an Inked Pen Journal: start all over, then put the pen, the ink, and the date.

My Hong Dian Silver Birch Forest in EF came in. It's a very smooth writer. I have it inked up with Dark Energy from Colorverse for now. When that sample is gone, I'll throw something else in it. Colorverse inks are expensive. Well, for me they are. I have a bottle of X-Feather Black and Green Marine from Noodler's arriving sometime this next week (hopefully). I'll be getting the X-Feather Blue when it's back in stock. I have several composition notebooks that I can't use right now because 1) writing with ballpoint or rollerball pens for extended periods of time hurts my hand, so I use my fountain pens; and 2) all of my fountain pen inks bleed or ghost too much for regular paper. The X-Feather inks are supposed to fix all that.

Pilot Metropolitan is a pretty good choice for the money as well. I suppose if it's good enough for a famous author, it's good enough for me. And so far it's the most expensive fountain pen I own. But I'd like to get a Safari someday.

They're close enough for me to not buy ant more Dark Energy. Maybe not for anyone else.

I tried slipping a double-edged razor blade between the tines of that Wing Sung nib. No dice. And it's definitely the nib. I emptied and cleaned it out really good, then re-inked it with Air-Corp Blue/Black. Same thing. Used that first ink, Dark Energy, in another pen and it works just fine. Still awaiting those replacement nibs to arrive. I'm still a relative newbie to the world of fountain pens, but I saw that Dark Energy and Diamine's Oxblood have to almost be put side by side to see any difference in them, they're so close.

I decided it's most likely the nib. I emptied the Colorverse, cleaned and dried the pen really good, then re-inked with Noodler's Air-Corp Blue/Black. Same result. I think I might try a razor blade between the tines. But I also ordered replacement nibs just in case.

Got my 4-pack of Wing Sung 3008 demonstrator pens today. The top one is difficult to read. It's Dark Energy by Colorverse. It's apparently not a good ink for an EF nib. The Noodler's 54th Massachusetts and Bulletproof Eel Black, as well as Diamine's Oxblood did just fine. As a matter of fact, the 54th has done the best in an EF. It's a pretty wet ink, and I write small. And chicken-scratchy.

It would probably be cheaper to find an FP-friendly highlighter than to get all those other inks just to use my el-cheepo highlighter. All I've been using it for so far is to highlight Chapter 1, Chapter 2, etc.

The Noodler's Eel Black is bulletproof, and it still smeared with the hi-lighter. And I believe that Zebra V301 is going in the trash. I emptied and cleaned out the ink carts. I loaded one with Diamine Oxblood. I had to shake it down many times the initial use. Then about a half hour later I had to shake it down a lot again. It's just not worth the effort to me. And it was part of an $18 pen sampler from JetPens. Oh, well. The rest of them are still doing well. And thanks for putting the word out. 'Preciate it.

What inks are hi-lighter friendly? Noodler's 54th Massachusetts and Eel Black aren't. They both smeared under my yellow hi-lighter. No biggie, it's just my handwritten manuscript which is just for me, but I'd like some ink that is, for just in case.

Got my inks today. I'm just gonna put the BSB in one of my cheapie pens. Might try the Zebra V301. It's really close to Monteverde's Horizon Blue, but a lot more ink for a little bit more money.

I messed around a little with my new pens. The Zebra V301 I wasn't impressed with. I had to shake the thing down each time I wanted to use it. So i emptied the ink cartridges and will be filling one with another ink. I also had a deuce of a time cleaning the nib. But hopefully a different ink will flow better. And speaking of different inks, I have Noodler's Air-Corp Blue/Black and Baystate Blue on the way. Should be here in the next few days. T'would be nice if it were tomorrow.

I'm partial to pie day (and it shows). My b-day is on VE (Victory in Europe) Day.

The V301 is still acting up. I'll re-ink it later. I have quite a few others to use right now. New question: What is y'all's grail pen? Apologies if that's been asked before. Mine is a Montegrappa Hemingway Fisherman.

I'm letting it sit for a little while before trying again. Hopefully it'll work just fine. But if not, I'm thinking of replacing the ink with Oxblood. Just because I have it.

My order from JetPens that was estimated to be here by April 6 arrived today. I also added writing from the other pens I have linked up right now. I'm not overly thrilled with the Zebra V301 at the moment. Once I get it to write, it's great. It just takes quite a bit of shaking to get it to write. Someone else wrote a review to that effect. They said that they just emptied the factory ink from the cartridge, then filled it with some Private Reserve, and it wrote like a dream. It's looking like I'll have to do the same thing. The Fine nib is more like an EF on others. But I like it just fine.

My HP Premium32 paper is supposed to be here today. Jon Bosley over at Fountain Pen Love says it's very FP friendly. Pretty much one of the best, especially for being printer paper. The 54th Massachusetts tends to feather on my current Georgia-Pacific 20lb paper, even with my Jinhao Fine nib, so I'm going to see what it does with the HP paper. Also, I ordered a 5-piece pen sampler from JetPens. And that's supposed to be here Tuesday or Wednesday.

Got the new Metro with the Fine nib today. Inked it up with the 54th Massachusetts. That ink writes pretty wet. Bleeds through the 20lb Georgia-Pacific printer paper. The Jinhaos ghosted on it, but didn't really bleed. But I ordered some HP Premium 32 paper. It's supposed to be very FP friendly. Also, I finished the first draft of my newest book today, a handwritten 122 pages. Tomorrow I attack it with a red pen (Diamine's Wild Strawberry) and make the necessary changes/corrections. Then my wife will put on her proofreader's hat and work her magic. And then the publishing process begins.

Beautiful pen. Just out of reach for me at the moment, I'm afraid.

I got a Metropolitan with a Fine nib ordered. Supposed to be here tomorrow. I'll trade the Fine from the black pen with the Medium from the grey houndstooth pen. That way I get to keep using the pen i really wanted, and I'll give my wife the Medium. She said she'd like to try her hand at calligraphy.

Well, I inked the Metro with the 54th. The ink looks great. The problem, though, is that the Medium nib is too big for my writing. I need a Fine or even EF, as small as I write. I'm looking in to it. But I have to say that the Med nib sure is a smooth writer. And the pen is so lightweight that I have to look at my hand from time to time to make sure I'm still holding it. It's much lighter than my Jinhaos. One thing I don't care for, though, is the bladder inside the Metro. It doesn't hold much ink at all. So I ordered a CON-40 converter for it. Should be here Friday. One page of writing and I had to fill it again. It broke the flow of what I was doing. I'll just have to deal with it for a few days, I guess.

I hooked my phone to my laptop and managed to get the photo off my phone. So let's try this again... and it was either the flower-dy tv tray, or the Care Bears one. I decided to go with the flowers.

I could try, but said photo is on my phone, and I am now on my laptop.

My earlier post was supposed to have a photo in it, but there seems to be a problem with Gmail right now. For whatever reason the pic didn't attach. I'll have to retry whenever "they" get the Gmail fixed.