Scribe

Hi. Thanks for having us.

Thank you.

Thanks.

Yeah. So, I mean, I guess I've been consuming mostly Riverdale, stranger things. But I'm only halfway through the fourth episode of the second season, so please, no spoilers. And then I somehow ended up watching hours and hours and hours of football this weekend, which is not my normal Sunday.

I learned a lot about my stepdad's fantasy football team. It was very interesting. Not quite sure what I watched. I don't. And then I've been writing with a mono 100 and then also a Mitsubishi 4B penmanship pencil.

Yeah. You had a lot of pencils on the desk today.

Yeah, just a casual 3, 4 pencils to just have around. You know, normal stuff.

That's what happens when you work in a pencil shop.

So I've also been watching Riverdale. It's the best show on tv. Just gonna go out and say that if nobody here has watched it, it's awesome. It's the Archie comic book characters and kind of like Gossip Girl meets Twin Peaks type setting. Last year, I was very obsessed with it and nobody would watch it. And yeah, flash forward to A year later, all of us at the pencil shop watch it, as do all of my friends. So I think I did a pretty good job converting them all, but it's a really great show.

We ended up making Alex watch it the week before we moved the shop.

Yeah, the whole thing. She had to watch the whole thing in a week. And then while we were moving the shop, the day after the premiere episode was on, we took a break and sat in our really messy basement, ate sandwiches, and watched it during lunch. It's really important.

that's really crazy.

When it was on TV last season, people were watching it, but it wasn't really much of a thing. But then they put the first season on Netflix almost immediately after it was over on tv, and I think that's when people really started watching it.

Yeah, it was a really smart move, but that's a really great show. We've been working really hard here to get this new shop open, so I've been trying to keep any of my out of work activities pretty light and easy.

So that's been nice to have on Wednesday nights. But I'm also reading. I just started the Bruce Springsteen memoir, which is very long. I had been holding out for it to come out in paperback because the hardcover is so big, and I just didn't want to carry it around with me. So when we were in New Jersey last month on a field trip to the General's factory, we went to this really great bookshop called Word, which is in Jersey City. They have one in Brooklyn, too, and they had it in paperback. So I bought it, and that's what I'm reading now. I really want to get tickets to see him during his residency on Broadway, which is a thing right now, but they're sold out.

I was not expecting him to be such a good writer. I mean, I knew he wrote the whole thing himself, which is why I'm reading it.

He absolutely wrote. I'm only like 60 pages in. It's going to take me a while. But I like that each section is really short, so I can easily read it when I'm just riding three stops on the subway or something. It's a really good commute book for that reason.

Yeah.

Yeah, talk to me in about two months. Yeah, that's how long it's probably going to take me. But yeah, that's really awesome. If you guys don't know about it, listeners, look it up. It's a really, really good memoir, even if you don't love Bruce Springsteen. But as far as what I'm writing with, since we've been moving, we used to kind of each have our office pencil, which was the pencil that we used at work, but everything's all over the place now. And we just got our office set up a couple days ago. And so I had a little bit of a pencil identity crisis this morning when I realized that I didn' have an office pencil anymore. So I went into our. We have like a pencil cup in our basement where we do fulfillment now with all of the random pencils that were like, slightly damaged or like the ones that accidentally got sharpened in the shop, like those types of things. And I found a really short Generals test scoring pencil. I tend to. If I'm going to pick at random, I tend to kind of go towards the shorter ones so I can finish them faster and just kind of get them out of the way. But I haven't written with that for a long time, so I'm really enjoying it. But yeah, my desk now has that one. It has a general scribe, which is what I use to write the labels in the shop. So it's important to always have that. And I have an Apsara absolute, which is what I use to write the inserts for the pencil box, which is the thing that I did yesterday. So I keep one of those handy as well.

I like the Generals one better, hands down. Yeah, it's more. It's more comfortable. It just sharpens better too, I think, just for like, for like quality's sake. It's just easier to use because it sharpens so nicely.

I just finished Lincoln and the Bardo, like, two books ago.

Bryson, get my bag of chips.

Yeah.

I'm just getting really excited about that.

Yeah.

So I've been really excited about stickers lately with the whole new sticker shop that we have going on right now. Just curating stickers, making stickers. I found a bunch of pizza stickers in my pocket this morning, which I'm not mad about. It's better than the time that I found a pepperoni in my pocket for no reason, which I promptly put back in my pocket and kept it there all day. And then I'm also. It was a good pizza party. And then I'm also working on a notebook design.

Right now

I'm working on the COVID of a notebook for my old college back in Detroit. They're doing some. They're doing a set of three notebooks as like promotional materials and also for an illustration conference that's coming up this summer. So I'm doing one of the covers of it for different places in Detroit. And then Caroline also is really excited for me to tell you guys about how I accidentally.

This is really fun. Well, can I set this up real quick? For the past week, Meredith's free time in the shop has been spent doing the tiniest illustrations of storefronts of places that we like in the neighborhood. Because we have this map that she made in the front of the shop now where we're pinning all the places that we like. So if you come in and you want to know like where you should get coffee or where you should go to lunch or like what other things there are to do in the neighborhood, they're color coded with matte pins and you can see like the little storefront and it says what it is. So Meredith's have been using a mono 102B for that. It's just been lingering on the desk for like the past week.

And I've been making really good progress on it. Like it's. It's been like disappearing at like a nice rate because I've been doing a lot of drawing. But I was working in the shop sometime last week and a customer came in. I was chatting with them. Oh, here's your pencils. And I actually packed up my mono 2B in with the stuff that they bought. But I left out their Stadler Norris. So they come on instead of their brand new pencil. I haven't seen it since.

Yeah, they haven't come back.

I mean, it was the plan all along when I started here, but

I think it's so funny. This is also the first time that this has happened, I think since we open. I always get scared that I'm going to put a pencil that I'm writing order notes with in somebody's box. That's fear. I think about that all the time when I'm packing orders. Like accidentally boxing up the pencil that I'm using.

I can't believe that that was the first time happen.

Yeah. In like three years. That was the first time. It's amazing.

Try get a trophy.

Sure, you can have a trophy. I'll make it for you tomorrow.

Okay, great.

It's fine. I'm fired now, so. Yeah, but I can't tap that. So that's about it for me.

so, well, I have two things that don't make a lot of sense. So there's. We're stocking a new brand called High Meadows, which is made by this guy named Jacob in the uk. He did some pencil cases for us a while ago, these really pretty leather ones that are kind of barrel shaped that are long enough to hold a black wing. And he recently started a brand of leather stationary accessories that he mostly designed with pencils in mind, not pens, which is kind of exciting. But we just got a new shipment from him and I'd asked him if he thought that he could make us a tiny leather sharpener holder, kind of like the ones that those Dux adjustable sharpeners come in. Except a thing that like you could buy separately that would fit like any of your small sharpeners. And he sent us some samples and they're really, really, really cute. They're adorable. These tiny, tiny, tiny leather cases. They're so small. They're so small. It's really exciting. Yeah, that's a thing that I'm very excited about right now. Hopefully we'll get them really soon. But I'm really. He's awesome. He's basically like made a lot of my stationary related accessories dreams come true. So we're happy to, happy to know him and to trick him into making weird samples for us. And the other thing that has been on my mind a lot lately is glue, which I don't know if any of us know. This is like, I love glue. I have a thing with glue that's like probably it's in. I think it's in like my top top five favorite stationery items. I collect a lot of glues from all over the. And there's this one that I really love that is made in Italy and it smells like almonds. And we put it in our last subscription box. And this was around the time when we were planning the sticker room, which if you guys don't know, we have a new secret room in our new shop called the CW Sticker Emporium. And it's basically like floor to ceiling pegboards that are covered in stickers. Not just like, not a lot of like super novelty stickers, but stickers done by illustrators that Meredith commissioned. Or we even have like a whole section of like letter and number stickers and like color coding dots, a lot of really functional things. But we're also, we're also selling some vintage stickers. And then we thought, well, what if a sticker isn't sticky anymore? What do you do? And so we Decided that we should test some glues and sell glue as well. So we in. On the little table that we have in there, we have a display of this Italian glue that just smells so good. It smells edible. It should. It is edible. It's made out of potato starch. Like, you could eat it if you want. We're gonna bring yeast eating back.

like, telling people who come in. I'm like, come here.

Yeah. Hey, kid, try this. Glue is to the sticker room, but the swisswood pencil is to the pencil shop, where we're just, like, really, like, creepy all day when someone touches it. We're like, oh, here, smell it. Like, please smell it. And then you'll get it. But we have those on the display next to, like, a small container of 1oz bottles of Goo Gone, which we also decided was an essential stickering tool. So I'm really excited to be able to sell this glue because it's my favorite glue. My personal favorite. Like, really? It was included in the last pencil box, like, purely for selfish reasons, because I wanted an excuse to just buy like, 800 glue sticks.

But, yeah, it's like perfume at this point.

I know. It's so good. We're all becoming really weird about glue anyway. Yeah. So if you. If anyone is near New York City anytime soon, come check out our stickers. It's really, really fun. Our desk is on the other side of the sticker wall, and it's so fun all day long to hear, like, the reaction that people have when they turn the corner and figure out that there's a room full of stickers behind them. It's great. Lots of gasping, lots of gasping, lots of humanities. It's really great.

I saw that first.

Yeah, I'll tell you later.

It's amazing. So many sticker secrets.

Anyway, that's all I got.

That's exactly what I was thinking.

Yay.

Um, yeah, we're waiting.

I just did a cop out with my boyfriend who put some effort into his costume. He went as a Jughead from the Archie comics. And in Riverdale, Jughead is with Betty. So I went as Betty.

I just showed up to a Halloween party in my regular work clothes, so it was not too much on my part.

No Halloween for me this year. Not doing a costume. And it feels really good to make that decision and just not do it.

Not mad about it. Yeah, it's nice. I'm going to see a screening of Psycho at an old movie theater tomorrow night and that's the only thing I'm doing for Halloween.

Every day.

Nothing fits in. Lady pants pockets are useless.

Sometimes I find receipts in there, but that's only because they don't fit that well.

Nope.

Nope.

Hey, D. Hi.

I have two actually. It's a two part question for Caroline.

first part, what would you be doing if you were not selling pencils?

Well, I actually was just asked this question yesterday in an interview I was answering and I hadn't really thought about it for a long time. Well, this changes regularly. This was like my made up dream job basically. So only now I'm starting to come up with other things that I wish I'd maybe done. And I think that if I wasn't doing this, I would maybe really like to be the postmaster of a post office in a small town. Yeah, I mean, that would be a kind of annoying job. But I really like the idea of working in a post office and knowing all the people and knowing how the mail works and knowing how things disappear and knowing how to help angry mail customers. Because that's a lot of what my job is right now, to be honest. But the one that the really actual job that I would want to otherwise be doing, which I don't think I'm actually capable of doing. I mean, this is besides being a pianist, which was never going to happen because my mother didn't make us learn any instruments as a kid. That's a really far fetched dream. But I would think I would love to be a television journalist. That's something that I mostly think about because my dream kind of retirement job is to be the host of Sunday Morning on cbs, which is my favorite TV show.

Never going to happen. Because I'm not Jane Pauly and I

she's not going to live forever. But I don't have that much time to like to have a prolific television journalism career. Enough so that they'll hire me for that job. All of the, even, like even all of the journalists who aren't hosts on that show are all really, really prolific television journalists. I can't compete with that old. Already should have gotten in there like before college. But yeah, I mean, even at 26, I feel like that ship has sailed. So I'm losing hope for that.

I know I am. I'm gonna be hiding in the back of my shop for the rest of my life.

I mean, you heard what? I had a dream of your job being last night, which was managing a target.

So, yeah, crazy.

I've actually done that.

Yeah, Yeah.

I was a department manager.

Yeah.

She didn't trust me to do it, so that was my dream.

Yeah. But. Yeah, basically. But, yeah. The short answer to that question is, I really would love to be a television journalist.

Okay, nice. So part two is less intensive. A promise. What is your favorite eraser? And are you planning on getting any Japanese scented erasers? And what I'm talking about is not, like, orange or soda or mint. Like, there's these Japanese erasers that have, like, characters on them, like hello Kitty or, you know, they smell. Have, like, a sweet smell.

It's not, like, a flavor or a scent, but, like, I had those as a kid, and they're so hard to find.

I don't know of any of those that are currently manufactured, actually. If you know, if you know what brands make them, let me know and I'll try to track them down. I bet my guy can track them.

They have such a sweet, like, kind of smell. Like, they just. It's almost like the. The almond glue stick. Like, I carry that around and smell it occasionally, and people probably think I'm insane. But.

But, yeah.

So I'll have to look into that. But what's your favorite eraser?

I don't. Well, my favorite eraser is also one of your favorite erasers. I love the Matamaro Kun eraser. I love how, like, light and, like, spongy it is and how easy it is to use. I really, really love that eraser. I have maybe, like, four that are half finished, and, like, everywhere I go, there's one somewhere. I really love that eraser. I think I like it better than any of, like, the kind of harder plastic erasers. Just because it. Just because it requires so much less force. And I don't really draw or use a lot of colored pencils or do anything that requires really, really intense erasing. So that one, to me, is really perfect. I really like the Sumo Grip eraser, too, but I really wish the packaging was better. I'm really. I've become a snob about that. I hate the packaging. I hate the little, like, sumo man illustration. I. Yeah, yeah, I hate it. That's an awesome eraser, but I don't use it just because the Matte Amaro is beautiful and funny looking and works really well.

I agree. So that's all I have.

Cool.

Awesome.

D well, the weekly pencil, I'm actually not really doing pencils that much anymore. I have a bunch of stuff in the queue that I am writing up. The next thing that I'll be posting is a review of the platinum preppy highlighters. They're amazing.

They're refillable, they're the perfect color.

So that's what's next. And then I'm not sure what order

everything else will go, but that's awesome. That's about it.

Yeah, thanks, Dean.

Thank you for having me.

Bye.

Bye.

We'll call you.

Hey, guys. How are you doing?

It's very nice to have the pencil pushing ladies here. So my question is for all of you. What's your opinion on mechanical pencils? And I mean, not just the kind that you would push the button, but also clutch pencils, since there's a lot of members in the group that are into mechanical pencils. And to be truthful, I mostly use them. I'm more of a collector, but I do love a good mechanical pencil. I mostly, I love the way that graphite writes. So that's my question.

And also I got a second question for Callie, but we'll start with that one.

Meredith, you start there. I have strong opinions, so how about you start?

I feel like something that looks like opinions and judgment in your eyes. I'm a little scared.

No.

Well, no. So for me, I mostly just have a. I like mechanical pencils. Like the thought of them, especially with like, as someone who likes to do things with very tiny details that really, really fine point. But I have like this like death grip on a pencil and I like to just like jam it really into the paper. Some mechanical pencils just, they don't last long. For me. The graphite always breaks before I get like any good use out of them. So if I'm gonna go as far as pencils, it's gonna be, it's gonna be a wood Cased one just because it can withstand my powerful grip, I guess.

Yeah. For some reason I'm having a really hard time finding those within my bathroom.

We can make them in our basement. We have a really nice basement now. We have room for a diamond lead corner.

It really looks like there was a perfect spot.

Yeah, I could just see the New York Times article now. Yeah, let's do that.

Look, mom, I'm famous.

Yeah, I don't really have that much experience with mechanical pencils, to be honest. I think I use them for a short period of time, like towards the end of middle school, but that may have been the last time I even owned one. I just. You know why I stopped using them was because the idea of running out of lead gave me a lot of anxiety in school that like, I didn't always know exactly how much lead was in there and how far it was going to get me. Because it breaks and because I just, I feel like with the, with the actual wood case pencil, you can kind of. I can look at it and be like, okay, I can kind of guess how many times I'm gonna sharpen this thing or I don't know, it just, it gave me a lot of anxiety and so I stopped using them and now it's just, I mean, I don't use them and we don't sell them, as you guys know, mostly because, I mean, they're, they're totally valid as a writing instrument. I get why people like them, but as far as like their relationship to wood case pencils, they, I mean, they kind of seem like a, like less like a sibling and more like a cousin to me, if that makes sense.

Yeah, like, they don't have a lot of characteristics that are the same as a woodcase pencil. Besides that it writes and that has graphite in it and that it can be erased otherwise. I mean, you're missing a lot of key components there. And for me especially like with the things that I use and the things that I sell, I really like to know everything I can possibly know about them.

And.

And I just don't know a lot about mechanical pencils. And so for that reason we just, I mean, I always tell people that when they come in and they're disappointed because we don't sell them like, well, if you want to learn about mechanical pencils, open a shop next door and we'll build a window between the two. I'm cool. But yeah, we. I mean, I do love the Caran d' Ache fixed pencil because of its historical value and because it's just a really cool object. Really, really simple and really well functioning. And the lead's really nice. I will always have a soft spot in my heart for those. But were designed to completely mimic a wood case pencil. It has hexagonal. It has a 2 millimeter lead. It was the first pencil of its kind. It was created to replace a wood case pencil. So to me, that's a. That's kind of. That's. That connects the two a little bit, which is why I think they're interesting.

But those are really great for drafting or doing perspective work.

Yeah.

To do some really clean drawing.

Yeah.

Precise lines, but like a opportunity to use the really, like, long point or

to also, like, retract it.

Yeah. I can totally get on board with a clutch pencil or a lead holder because that just. That feels like, more physical to me. It feels more substantial. It feels like I have more freedom. But we got. We had somebody email us a couple of months ago, and she told us that she had a whole bunch of these really old Koh I Nora lead holders that she was just going to take to Goodwill. And she asked if we wanted them. So she mailed them to us. And it was like this whole shop display of these really cool, like, red metal lead holders, lots of them. And they. They had leads in them still. They were like. They were maybe an F or an age grade. They were a little bit hard. And I was going to the airport from work, I think for. I was going to a bachelorette party. That's what I was doing. I had to go to my friend's bachelorette party in Indianapolis. So I was. I had one in my bag from work, and I was in the plane and I had some letters to catch up on that I'd prepped. And so I got my letters out. I was searching through my bag and realized that my actual pencils were all in my luggage that was like, in the compartment above my seat. And I didn't want to get up to get it. So I used this random super old f or H grade lead pencil or lead holder to write all of my letters. And I'll admit that I really enjoyed. Was way harder than I was used to using. And it was really chunky. And I didn't have a Lead pointer. So I just wrote with, like, this really, like, fat, dull lead holder for the whole flight. That changed my perspective a little bit. But that old one is really cool. It's so heavy.

I mean, a little bit. Our first, like, the first ever, like, print article ever about me in the shop was in Bloomberg Business Week. And there was this little, like, corner of the page that basically said, like, almost exactly that I hate mechanical pencils, which is not a thing that I ever said. They put those words in my mouth, and I got so many emails from people being like, why do you hate mechanical pencils? Like, what.

Why don't you.

Why don't you sell them? What's your problem?

Yeah,

like, oh, yeah, those are cool.

The zebra one?

Oh, yeah.

They're 0.7.

I like those two.

Yeah, the second one is for Caroline. I know that she has traveled to Central America, and I was wondering if she has ever tried Pathella pencils. They're made in El Salvador.

No, I haven't tried them.

Oh, you should. You should. They're a small. They're really weird in the way that they make pencils. They've been making pencils for about 40 years. They made pencils for everhard fiber back in the day.

Okay.

Yeah. And sometimes they use really good wood, sometimes not so good. But you can get some batches that are truly excellent pencils. And they're very odd. They're very odd. I think they would be a great addition for your store.

S A C E L A.

I've never seen those when I've been traveling down there. I'll be sending you an email tomorrow, Walter. I need some help with that one.

Stumps me.

Nice to meet you, everybody.

Yeah, nice to meet You.

See you later.

We got percentage points and lousy joints and all the glitter we can use, mama. So don't call us now. We'll call you.

Meredith, you can do it.

Can I?

I think you can.

Just gonna end up sounding like a dying parakeet if I try.

What?

My name is. Yeah, that's the closest you'll get. No, I don't even know. Like, everyone I've asked in my family says it, like, a completely different way. We are literally, I am the third generation off the boat, even though we came by plane. And no, like, it's been lost. It's been lost over the Atlantic. I have no idea. I have no questions. I guess I could ask about fountain pens. The question would be, why

Oh, you're gonna ask me questions.

The Swisswood is the most perfect pencil in production. It just is. Okay, let me put it this way. What other pencil would you prefer to use for the rest of your life? You could only just use one pencil, and you need a point retention.

Mono 100 and an F. Ooh.

Oh. Oh, that. Oh, I forgot.

I'm sorry.

I forgot. There's actual experts on the podcast today.

Like, no, no, no, no, no. I'm not trying to be insulting to them just for you guys.

I. I totally forgot. How's the new. How's the new. The new digs?

It's good.

It's really great.

Yeah. I'm trying to get my wife to let me, like, make a pilgrimage there because we have people in New York we need to see. Hans is up there. Hans Noodleman.

Real name with. Real name with health. Nordic, but yeah. So he is. He's very Nordic. You know what his son's name is? I'm not gonna say. No, no, no, no. There's a movie coming out with his name.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. He told me that, and I. I laughed. And then he told me he was serious because we had lunch at a good vegan place down here. Like I said, you're gonna have to cut this out. I've.

Oh, that. Oh, yeah. I had no idea how to even get to that. If you look at Andy's Facebook page, he posted a link to a GoFundMe. We are currently helping out a few cats. My vet told us that there was a hoarder who had 12 cats. We went, and she had 30.

So we. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Yeah. So we. We. We've got some of them already adopted out. We got some of them in fosters. We have a few left, but rescues are. They're a bit full after Harvey.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Yeah. Y', all, my OPSEC is very important. I gave up my phone number in the chat room, but no. So we're. We're taking these cats, and out of pocket, we're paying for their vetting, and it just. It's gotten a little expensive.

So people said we should make a GoFundMe, so we did.

Wow, that's so cool.

I am one of many cat ladies in my family, so my heart is breaking, and I'm gonna go share it

with all my sisters.

How many cats do you have?

I just have two Hipponotus. They're sweet baby angels who also look too fart on my face while I'm asleep. So

I'm trying to adopt some cats right now. I wish you lived closer to here.

You're trying to adopt out or adopt some?

I'm trying to adopt two cats right now. I don't have any cats, so I'm getting two.

Yeah.

One of the rescues I work with, Animal Justice League. I think it's animaljusticeleague.org we adopt out all over the country, and there's some good cats on there now, so. Yeah, I mean, you know, but there's always very much need for local rescues. But I hear up north, y' all don't have many, many animals just walking around. No different in New York.

We don't. I never see Any stray cats?

I, I saw two in the past month. I live in Jersey City, and I saw two of them in my neighborhood, but no, not many of them.

That's a dream. I, I, I literally live in the state. Well, I live in a city that sends out thousands of cats a year to, like, Colorado and Seattle just to fulfill their needs, and we're still way too many stray animals all the time. It's ridiculous.

One of my cats, I know, he was transferred, I believe, from, like, Georgia, and I adopted him in Brooklyn.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. The south is just riddled with animals because we don't care about anything.

Well, you got a bunch of people up here who are trying to adopt some animals, so I'll take them all.

I'm desperate for some pets.

I'll convince my boyfriend to let me have some more cats in our apartment. I'm sure we'll be crazy about it.

And then they need more friends because they don't like the old friends anymore.

That's how it works with cats.

Yeah.

Pip and Otis are tired of each other. Yeah. Yeah.

They just. I caught them cuddling recently. It was, it was a big, shocking surprise in the middle of the night. I was like, are you guys, you guys high on catnip? What's going on here?

They play like they hate each other in front of you, so you'll try to get them together with treats. They're playing you. They're playing you.

I've been obsessed with them, and they're succeeding. They have succeeded in that they're getting lots of treatment.

Must be why I love them so much.

So this is now a podcast about cats. I'm sorry I haven't even talked to you, but this is the podcast I

was waiting for, and I'm just kidding.

I didn't hear. I heard Johnny say something, but I wasn't listening because Johnny said it.

That's okay. You have a philosophy degree. You really make good choices in life.

Can I hang up yet? Because this has been an awkward, like, 5, 10, 20 minutes. 25 minutes.

Oh, thanks. Almost again. Half bell.

All right.

It was great not asking y' all any questions. Thank you, Cwpencils, for existing. Every now and again, I get switchwood pencils from y'. All. That's usually All I get. And the golden seed erasers, because those are actually the best erasers. Just like the switchwood is the best principle. Even though you mono 100 and F. I guess. I mean, if you're saying you're an expert.

Hey, everyone's in town.

Hang up on me already. Literally, just hang up on me.

You feeling a little bruised, Johnny? Listen, kid, you pay for the call.

Thank you. Pleasure.

Fantastic.

Now, originally this was a question that Jess was going to ask, but she passed out. So the question asking baton has been handed off. So the question is for the pencil ladies. Hi, Caroline. Hi, Meredith.

Hi.

What are three characteristics of your ideal pencil?

Only three?

Well, three minimum.

Okay. Okay. I can. I can go first. I think it has to hold a point really well. It has to. To. Oh, it's so hard to pick three. I think I need five.

I'm going to narrow it down. It has to.

You can take five.

Okay, thank you. Maybe four.

It has.

Yeah, it has to hold. Point retention is key for me. I'm very heavy handed. It has to. And this is also a big one for me. It has to make a noise. I like it to, like. I don't like it to necessarily feel scratchy, but I like it to sound scratchy. It freaks me out if it doesn't make a noise at all. I think that's a really important component. Yeah, I want all my senses to be stimulated, at least the ones that are possible to be stimulated by a pencil. And I like it to smell like something and it has to sharpen. Well, I can get over it if it's not super dark or super smooth, but it has to. Yeah, it has to hold a point sharp and well and sound like something. I think those are like my three most important.

Yeah, very good.

Let me just scream that.

Why are you talking about?

Suddenly I became my grandma. I don't know what happened,

me, one of my most major things with pencils is that I really want them to be dark. Like a good dark, soft pencil. But like, even though that's the case, like, I mean, one of my favorite pencils is like the mono KM KKS6B. It's super dark and smooth. But I also, like, in a dream world scenario, it would have as much point retention as humanly possible. Because I'm usually using that to draw for like, hours and hours.

Can I interrupt for one second?

Wait.

I'm scared. Yes.

In case. In case anyone doesn't know, Meredith writes really, really small and draws really tiny, tiny, tiny, adorable things.

And I like soft pencils that dull really quickly.

So I want it to be dark and soft, but hold enough of a point. And then bonus points if it has a decent eraser on it because I'm really, really, really, really, really picky about my erasers.

Which eraser do you like best?

I like the Matamaro Kun.

Yeah, that one's my definite favorite because it's the best.

Yeah, it used to be the technic, but now I've been converted. My mind has changed.

No, it's the same one I like that we talked about with D. It's the Matamaro kun. The one with the Japanese on it that looks kind of cartoonish.

Yeah, I'm a monster. And I like to chop up my erasers into custom sized pieces so I can get little smaller areas if need. I also do that with my pencils kind of. I I knife sharpen. So I was taught a lot of knife skills in art school. Yep.

What is that, three?

Was that three?

Oh, yeah.

Dark, soft. Hold up.

Yeah.

A point. Well, and a good eraser.

Man, yours are better than mine.

Oh, I thought mine were not nearly specific.

I was trying not to be superficial, Andy.

I'm too busy making beautiful things with my pencil for the pencil itself.

Oh, no.

I was gonna say Caroline's answer was perfect. You know, the use the pencil to make a beautiful thing. The pencil doesn't have to be the beautiful thing.

That was Meredith. Yeah, Meredith gets it, so I keep her around.

Thank you. That's the only thing that redeems me after selling a used pencil to a post.

I think he's crying.

Or is he blowing his nose again? Which I guess could be the same thing.

I'm checking the chat to see if he dropped off.

Devil's neck. Got him.

I occasionally match my pencil to my ponytail or whatever I'm wearing if I'm putting it my ponytail. So it's okay. Maybe I'd feel different if I had

a ponytail, but my hair's really short.

Yes. Alex the magical. Alex was able to customize approximately 70 natural finish hex pencils for us, but just JNC and those were attached to programs and I'm sorry, a passenger survey for all of our guests to fill out. Do you remember any of the questions? Caroline or Meredith, like, still with us?

Okay.

It was a typical, you know, wedding type thing. Like, you know, what would you. What do you. What is your advice for a happy marriage? You know, what should we always do? What should we never do? And so that kind of thing.

And that was. That was washi taped to each individual survey. And then for our guest book, we used postcards of places we've been and places we want to go. And we had, I think a dozen of the pink Futuras sharpened in a pencil cup up front. And people would. The guests would take a postcard and fill it out in pencil and then put it back in the slot where we kept all the postcards. And. And then we have our. Our guest book all written in pencil.

Excuse me.

Yeah, we use the Futuras and it was very, very stationary.

Heavy wedding.

And I have to give all credit to Jess, she did the majority of the layout and design and logistics, and that just kind of. She was the brains, I was the muscle kind of situation. I did what I was told, when I was told, and it all worked out.

Gracias.

No. I'm sorry we couldn't hook up when I was out in sf.

But, you know, you know, the Honey, the whole Honeymoon vs Raceable podcast or host is kind of. It's not really a.

Yes, yes, that was. It was. And everywhere was sold out of the breathing masks.

So not completely non pencil related story, but one that I find amusing. That I'm sure it's very quick and I'm sure you'll find it amusing too.

I went to the Walgreens a block from our hotel, and I went in and I asked, it's like, you know, do you have any breathing masks? You know, my wife is very. She's getting sick from the air and like, nope, sorry, we're sold out. Don't know where anyone else has them. I went to the nail salon next door and I just asked very politely, it's like, do you have any extra masks? I will buy them from you because, you know, in the nail salon they always wear the masks.

And I was able to get three masks for a dollar.

This little

nail salon and, you know, took my mask, went back to the hotel and that was that.

Yeah.

Totally MacGyvered that one.

Yeah, it's good to talk to you. I feel like I know you guys from being in the group and reading everything that everyone posts online, and Johnny keeps bailing on coming up to New

Well, thank you for. Thank you for letting me be on the show tonight. I appreciate it.

Feel free to edit any of this out. So, you know. All right, good night, guys. Thank you.

you can find our shop@cwpencils.com Cwpencil Enterprise on Instagram and cwpencils on Twitter. You can also follow our new sticker emporium at cwstickers on Instagram. I do not have any personal social media except an Instagram called Lady Graphite that I've yet to post on.

And then I have a personal Instagram which is just ML and then my last name, my aunt Key, and then that's what I am on every other single piece of social media ever, too.

Thanks.

Oh, my God. I just did one for my sister. I'm totally into it.

I'm very new to drawing cats, but I'm very into it.

I'm into it. Sign me up.

I can taste the days of a

count the times this has happened before.