Grinding away the same set of pens
The urge to customize one of my pens hits me every now and again. Customizing a nib takes many forms: smoothing on fine-mesh, tuning and aligning mis-aligned tines, and even reshaping the tipping at the end of the nib (or: grinding a nib).
Swapping nibs, tinkering, and customizing
The newest pen in my collection is the Monteverde Giant Sequoia. I ordered it with a silver-colored steel F nib, which works just fine. The coloring of the pen, with its streaks of black and golden brown, calls out for a black nib. As it so happens, I had a black nib sitting in an uninked Franklin-Christoph 31.
Dark and stormy isn’t just a drink
Rain, water, and tea seem to be this week’s theme. November Rain and Purple Rain are titular. Earl Grey and Rikyu-cha are inspired by teas. Verdigris is what happens to exposed metal near the sea. Pushing the theme a bit, Midnight Twinkle evokes how sailors use the stars to navigate. I’ve got nothing for how Andy Warhol fits the theme. Let’s go with: outlier.
There’s freedom in choosing a short-term journal
Searching for a short-term journal — a notebook I will only use for two or three weeks — changes what I prefer in a journal. Knowing that I will leave my next journal in a few short weeks screams for experimenting. I went with a MidoriMD A6 notebook. I even had a spare cardstock notebook cover laying around. Score.