This transcript was generated from an audio file by AI, and may contain inaccuracies.
Transcript
Then write with the gold pencil if that's what will move her. If you can bounce high bounce for her too till she cried. Love her gold penciled high bouncing lover I must have you.
Ho ho ho. And welcome to episode 130 of the erasable Podcast. I'm Andy Welfle, here with my two favorite hoes, I mean elves, Tim Waslam and Johnny Gamber. Hey, guys. Hey, Andy. Hey. That's quite the slip.
That was an amazing slip from.
I don't know what happened there. So the holiday season, holiday season seems to be much shorter this year because it is shorter. So while you might find yourself in a minor panic over your gift shopping, we are here to help. We're going to talk about the best gifts for all of your intended recipients. From the middle aged coworker who thinks pencils are for kids to your third cousin twice removed whose main hobby is crafting decoy ducks for hunters. Before that, however, we're going to talk about kind of our 2019 Most you Most used tools of the year. In lieu of our usual tools of the trade, just Spotify style. Because everybody knows what everybody else on Spotify has been listening to this month. So fun. So Tim, do you want to get us started with that?
Yeah, absolutely. My for most used pencil is easy is the Black Wing natural. It's the pencil that should have always been here. Now it is. And so it's the only one that I want to use. I use it every single day. That's been the, the most used, I would say. And this I'm just going to break from, you know, the, the pencil stuff a little bit because it's Christmas. It's time for truth telling. But something else that I've been using a whole lot of that I know Johnny can get behind. And it's, it's not a pencil but it's another writing utensil or the, the Papermate capped gel pens.
Oh, the capped ones.
I use the capped ones. Yep. Yeah. The inkjoy gel pens and the. Especially the turquoise one. I love that. And I've been using my, I've been really loving my Lamy Al Star like my. The Aluminum Safari basically fountain pen. And I've got that loaded up with turquoise. So I feel like turquoise is my color of, of 2019. So.
Yeah.
But the Blackwing natural. Absolutely. For most used paper. So I, I think the most used paper that I have would be just field notes. I've just been really like dedicated to just using field notes. But I also want to mention the. Is the, the Baron Fig Grow Journal that I brought up before that I, I enjoyed and I've stuck with that. I mean not necessarily every day, but I've got about I don't know, 30, 40 entries in there over the last few months. Yeah and I really, I really enjoy that. We talked about it a lot when it first came out, but just about how I liked the, the structure of the grow Journal because it gave me just enough structure to not make me feel suffocated, which I have a tendency to do with that kind of thing. But yeah, really, really enjoy, enjoy that Grow Journal. And then as far as most used sharpener, I've really been enjoying that. The, the Mitsubishi Hyuni sharpener that I talked about recently that I ordered. I feel like outside of that everything else has just been the same as I've been using forever. So. But I really like that high uni. I like the, the, the point that it gives which kind of has the, the really long collar and then the short but like super sharp tip on the pencil. So yeah, I really, really dig in that. I think I might be getting another one to have one at one at school I think.
Nice.
So but yeah, that's me. How about you, Johnny?
So my most used pencil in 2019 in terms of pencils reduced to stubs would be Black Wing Volume 4. But that could be misleading because that's a really soft pencil. And like what I'm thinking about what pencil is in my hand a lot this year it's Musgrave Harvests which surprises me because I tend to be biased against non cedar pencils. But this other pencil is so pretty and Henry's really into it. He uses one for his homework for paper, the 1917 bullet journal like the official one and I guess a toss up between field notes and write notepads.
Yeah,
get like I didn't like the bullet journal at first because people sing such praises about the paper, but it's really just slightly thicker than a moleskine paper. But if you're using pen pencils or gel pens, it's fine. And for other accessories I use the magic eraser. That is it Koh I Noor. That makes it the sort of rainbow looking one that's real rubber. Yeah, I like that for crosswords because it doesn't fall off the clipboard because it's sort of gritty. And I always have my brass bullet keychain sharpener on me. And I found this year I found myself using the masterpiece a lot.
Okay, go ahead.
I just said I like my masterpiece and then I My blades got dull, and I just haven't replaced them in forever. And so it's just been sitting there. I need to get some. I need to take care of that.
Has anybody gotten the gold masterpiece?
I might have gotten one for my
birthday,
but I didn't open it.
Yeah, I've been thinking about one.
It's so. It's not that gold, but the picture is.
It looks just sort of like a slightly brassified brass, right? Like.
Yeah, it's just. It's the. The magnesium with a little coat on it.
Yeah, the brass.
But the. Oh, my God. If they make a brass one, that's the end. The. The black plastic or the black. The blue plastic is black. And on the flip side, they didn't put that comb sticker. But the selling point is that the masterpiece is in German on it, which is so satisfying.
Yeah.
I bet you can only buy it from kum. Yeah, from the German site. It says Meisterwerk on it, which is just awesome. Like, oh, it's so pretty.
This sharpener is a masterwork.
Yeah, we'll have to carry it around when you guys are in Baltimore and take pictures of it. Places like Amelie's Gnome. Like, here's the gold masterpiece.
Just take pictures of it doing things around town. Like, put a little, like, tiny martini glass in front of it.
It's got a crab mallet.
Riding the trash wheel. Yeah.
Ride the trash wheel.
Hell, yeah.
You fill up an oyster shell with shavings. Actually, that should be the logo of our. Our live podcast.
Oh, yeah. You can get that. Get that photo. We can make that happen.
Well, I'm on it.
Yeah.
Awesome. So, yeah, those are mine. What about you, Andy?
Wait, wait, wait.
I have a. You said crosswords?
Yes.
Where do you. What crosswords do you do?
So my favorite crossword is the one from the New Yorker, so I print them out and do them on a clipboard.
Do you like a digital subscription or something?
Yeah. Well, you don't need it. I don't think you need a subscription to the crossword. They only come out on Mondays and Fridays.
Okay. Because.
Yeah, I'm not logged in on my computer.
Johnny has his tablet open and he turns the crossword, and he has to do it on the screen of magic markers, so you can really see it.
Wipe off board.
Yeah.
Reuse it.
Yeah. Cool.
Those are good. They're a good level of difficulty, the New Yorker ones. Yeah.
Yeah.
That's good to know. I'm gonna try that out.
Yeah. Well, my most used pencil of 2019. Tim stole my answer because it's a blackwing natural, I think, most. Most consistently. But also, like, I've had a pencil sitting. No, it's totally fine.
It's.
It's. You're completely right. It's the pencil that should have. They should have had from the beginning, at least. That's what it just kind of how naturally it's. Yeah. I also. This is really weird, but you know those archers, Baron Fig Archer, the school set that are yellow and green?
Yeah.
Oh, yeah. Um, I've been. I've had one just, like, sit in the pencil holder in my desk. Just sort of like in reach enough that, like, sometimes when I'm just trying to grab for a pencil, I don't have one immediately in front of me. That's what I go for. So I bet that I've used that a lot because I've kind of worn it down to the Steinbeck stage. And I have one of those, like, little eraser caps on it like, you know, old days. In fact, I've had it on so long, the green from the cap of that pencil has kind of rubbed off onto the inside of that eraser. And so it's a really. Out of all of the archers, I think that one's my favorite.
So what color is it now? Did, like, the green rub off the
green rubbed off into the inside? It's a very thick coat of green. So it's still green.
Oh, okay. Okay. I was hoping you'd say it would be like, purple or something weird.
The Easter Egg of the.
It's a long game.
Yeah, exactly. Most used paper. This is a boring answer, but I would say probably the standard. What is the field notes paper that Finch opaque smooth 70 pound that they use for a lot of stuff. That's because I've been. I mostly use. You know, I've been using a lot of field notes this year because they've all been so good. And then also the Baron Fig confidant paper, which is also just such a good, good paper. So, yeah, kind of. Kind of a boring answer. But that's probably what I've been using the most. Most use accessories. I would say it's a toss up between the classroom friendly sharpener, my desk and my. My most. Actually, no, that's just a masterpiece because it's, you know, not the special one. So I use that one a lot. I actually just realized that I only once have used my brass bullet sharpener that's on my key. My key ring.
Oh, no.
Yeah. I think I just use it as, like, a worry object. From my keychain, but I almost always just have the masterpiece with me or I'm somewhere where there's a classroom friendly. So I don't know.
I lost my brass bullet.
Oh, man.
I took it off of my keychain for the first time ever and then, like, immediately lost it, like. Oh, no, Immediately lost it, like, within a day. It was.
Yeah.
Tragedy.
So I. I also have used. Oh, I'm trying to find the thing for it, but I've been using a lot of pencil caps and both the Katsua pencil caps. And then. Have we talked about them before? This Sonic Kupo caps, they're from JetPens. I can't even remember where I got them, but I'll post a link in the doc. The Kaetsua ones are really great. But then also these Sonic Kupo caps are really great. They're. They're, like, kind of bulbous and plastic and have, like a rubber rim on it that sticks onto the pencil really well. So I love those. I lose them all the damn time because that's just what I do with pencil caps, apparently. So I did. I did end up buying. I did end up buying those 155 caps that they have, but I'm terrified to use them because I just don't lose them. And then also, I think the eraser that I've used the most kind of outside of my pencil eraser is. You're familiar with the Smart size mono eraser?
No.
Oh, the little tiny one?
Yeah.
Well, they're really thin. I put a link in the show notes doc, but it's. I don't know why it's called the Smart size, but it's this, like, kind of the length and the height of the regular mono erasers. But it's very, very thin. It's maybe like, like two millimeter thick. Is this really nice? Yeah, sorry. It's a five. It's five and a half millimeters thick.
Wow.
I don't know how to guesstimate that, but I got one, I think in a. I got it from CW pencils, either in a trade or in one of the pencil box sets. But that's a really nice size eraser. It is smart sized.
Yeah.
So if only we made like, a really cool little, like, Spotify graphic for all of this. Could just post that to our Instagram stories and everybody could know. Yeah.
Or a not cool one like Spotify did.
Exactly. Yeah.
Looks like they spent a whole five minutes on it and I was like, thanks. I love my playlist. With a passion.
I I'm actually really interested if you like Tim.
If.
If what you're like, most played thing is, do you. Do you know off the top of your head?
I think so. Like, I kind of joke. Everybody joked about it, but just. It is like the playlist of just like, hey, here's the stuff you've already been listening to anyway. But the. So, like, you mean like the top song?
Yeah, like the top song or album or whatever that Spotify tells you.
Yeah. Do they. Is it in order? Because it feels like it might be or. I don't know. But I. So there's a lot of mine has a lot of the band Bahamas, Gregory Allen, Isaac off Bonaver, the Avett Brothers, Shaky Graves. What else we got? Of course, Oasis is still on there. Iron and wine, Dr. Dog, a lot of Camp and Kurt Vile, a lot of Tallest man on Earth. Yeah. And then it's just like a big mix. But, yeah, the number one song on here is all Yorn by Tyler Childers, which is a one. He's in that, like, alternative country or sort of throwback. Yeah, sort of like psychedelic throwback country or something. I don't know with Jason Isbell and Sturgill Simpson, where they kind of. Or in the country world. But they're doing things that are a little more interesting. I'm obsessed with that song. I listen to it all the time, so that one made sense. But, yeah, the top two on my list were All Yarn by Tyler Childers and Everyone Hides by Wilco, which I literally listened to over and over and over for like four days straight when
it first came out. Johnny, what are your two, two top top songs? I assume it's Mariah Manson. Yeah.
Oh, my God, I lost it. This can't be right. It says they're both songs by the Birthday Massacre that apparently I listened to a lot of Madonna and Placebo this year and Bastille and Marilyn Manson.
Okay, we don't know what.
Oh, sorry.
And Tori Amos and the soundtrack to Frozen. Because, Rosie,
I have made. I've gone to extreme lengths to keep my kids away from my Spotify account. Like, just. I've been, like, dedicated. It's like if they're. I literally have an Amazon Unlimited account to use for their music so that I don't have to use it with my Spotify account because it's like my precious algorithm will be.
You've been tending to that Tamagotchi for forever now.
Exactly.
Sorry. Go ahead. Okay.
You can give them, like, their own account or Spotify Family.
Yeah. I thought about that we already had Amazon Unlimited going, and so I just left that one. But yeah, that's. That's. That would be easy. That would be simpler and probably a little cheaper.
Nice. My top two are really, really weird. The top one, for reasons I don't quite understand, but I guess it's true, is Under Pressure. The remastered version with Queen and David Bowie.
Oh, yeah.
Don't. I just. I guess I just listen to that a lot. And then the second one is a Freudian number one.
Yeah.
Do you know who Mitski is? Kind of ski. Yeah, she's a. What is she. She's like an alt rock. She kind of. She's had a couple albums recently that's just been really good. She has a song called you'd Best American Girl, which is really good on this album. That's called Puberty 2, which is a ridiculous name.
That's an amazing name.
That's a really good song. So Spotify told me that I was genre fluid, so where should they tell you that? Oh, yeah, when you do that rap, that rapped thing, you know, the like, the little like, dude data visualization that they.
Oh, I haven't seen that.
Yeah, they basically. Yeah, they. They totally kind of like wrap up your listening habits and like, you listen to this 41 times and you spent this many minutes listening to this. This kind of thing.
So all I knew about was the playlist.
That's all I have to find you a link to it. But I think it. I think it makes you a like a little almost like an Instagram story style.
I found it. This is really fun.
Yeah.
Okay, I'm gonna stop it.
No, dig into that.
Yeah, but we should, as part of our, like, tools of the trade, we should put the links to our. Our Spotify wrapped playlist in. Yeah.
Johnny, if you're willing to share yours.
Sure.
Yeah. Cool. Awesome. Should we jump into freshpoints?
Sure, let's do it.
Okay. Tim, do you want to. Do you want to start us off?
Yeah, I only have one, which I am super duper excited about. And I know this. It's not like very recent news, but it's come out in the last, what, couple weeks maybe. But Palomino has re released the Palomino hb, my old favorite, which we thought was extinct because we thought. I don't know, at least I was under the impression that coming out with a standard extra firm core, like the. The Natural was going to be their way of just extinguishing the hb. But yeah, it is back and more expensive than ever. Which was a little bit of a bummer because it wasn't it when it last. I mean, when it was originally out for years and years, it was what, like a. Was it 10 or $11 a dozen?
I think that's right.
Yeah, something like that.
Yeah.
And now it's. It's hopped up to 15 a dozen.
Oh, wow.
So. So yeah.
I don't know. Do you think we need to start just talking about how crappy it is and maybe it'll like, go back down?
Just bring the. I like how you think. Yeah, I think we could do that. I. But I also, like, now I kind of want to. But now of course, I'm tempted to get one because I want to know if it's changed because what if it was $10, I would be buying it. Well, I still have like a hundred of them left, but in theory I would be buying it. But when it's 15, I'm like, I might as well just pay a few extra dollars and get the naturals. Because I'm still convinced that it's the exact same core. But anyways, I don't know. But it's. I'm still just glad it's back because it. It deserves to be back. So the I. I got to give a. Because I had not seen, I guess if there was an email about it or something. But Jacob Cecil, friend of the podcast, he. He sent that to me on. On Instagram and let me know that it was in a message on Instagram, let me know that that was. That was back and I was thrilled. So he made my day when he sent me that, but that's all I've got.
Cool. Johnny, how about you?
So this, this is weird, but I won a Generals giveaway on Instagram.
Nice.
So I think It's. Yeah, their 130th anniversary. So I got a pack of. They're factis if I'm saying that right. Erasers. It's like the white block, the black block, and the one that looks like a click pen with a little eraser in it. And they came in a cool little baggie with a cedar point and like a general sticker on it. Like, this is really freaking cool. So my racer game got stepped up a little bit, which is nice. And so last time we talked about the musgrave single barrel 106, the mine had gotten lost in the mail. So today I got a package from Nicole and like this pencil. So pretty. And we didn't get to do our usual tools of the trade. So I'm Using one of these. And there. It's just such a beautiful pencil. Like, I don't know who picked the fonts that did the design work and the matte black cap, but, like, if they weren't $10 a piece, I would really stock up on these.
Oh, yeah, yeah, they're just gorgeous. I love that cap a lot.
Yeah. Like, I mean, I. It smells like, I don't know, on 80 year old wood or 90 year old wood almost.
Yeah.
I'm like, oh, it's so pretty. And the core is nice. It sharpened up well. The core is nice and centered and good. I mean, the core is not that old, but yeah.
Still, I. I had such a hard time sharpening it. I don't. I figured the wood was just so old and just kind of dried out, but I. Yeah, that just. It kind of like started to splinter a little bit. Oh, no, I took care of it. I put it into the classroom friendly where it like just burr grinds it away. So unfortunately I ate up a lot of that 90 year old wood, but. Oh, no, worked a lot better.
So my only other fresh point is that I've been rethinking the Blackwing or they call it the balanced core from the pearl that I usually don't like very much. I found one of those, the custom pencils that Mr. John Morris. Hey. Got made for our Facebook group. Was it like a year, year and a half ago? So I had them. I don't know where they went. I guess I gave them away or something. But I found a black one that's almost Steinbeck stage in a book. So I'd been using that for a little while to take notes on this book. I'm like, hmm, this is not so terrible. I like this. So maybe it was the pretty black paint or seeing the name of our podcast on it, but so now the. Oh, wait, I don't want to steal your fresh points, but it seems like everything, all the things that come out new have that core. So if you don't like that core, you're spending a lot of money for nothing.
Yeah.
So that's all I have. How about you, Andy?
Well, speaking of that, I feel like we've had all of the limited edition blackwings lately. Day after Thanksgiving. Yeah. There were like two separate things that just kind of got revealed. Right. Blackwing announced a special Black Friday 2019 edition, which I think everybody kind of went, you know, gaga for. But I'm also, I'm just also a little worried, like, are they just gonna do like Blackwing you know, Arbor Day 19, like, Arbor Day 20 edition. And I mean, are we gonna have a blackwing for every day? I don't know.
Just go for it.
Where does the bench send.
These are. They're black with. And they're going to do, like, the gold stamping. So they're really just the pencils they use for their custom pencils, just with a different feral, which they. They do the ferals here, right? In California?
Yeah.
So I guess they could just whip
them up, I assume also. Yeah, they, like, stamped them all here. The coolest thing about them, the design is so they're all black with this bright gold ink, but then also the eraser clip is gold. It's the first time they've ever done that. They look really cool. Just that little extra, like, little pop of gold right there at the eraser. Really lovely. They've been doing. They really just went for that collector's edition kind of idea. So they're doing them in batches, and each batch contains 1012 packs. And for each batch, the pencil will have the imprint of the batch on the side of it. So, for example, if you got in the first batch, it would have the imprint BF19 for Black Friday 19, and then, you know, 01 on it or whatever. So they're just leaning into the collector's edition, and then it looks like they're being wrapped up and are kind of like hand. Hand numbered, hand batched, if you will. So, yeah, it's quite a process. And it sounds like they didn't even start making them until after Black Friday was over. I think Nick Sesei in the group said that that was the case. So. Yeah, the earlier you ordered on Black Friday, the higher in the batches you get. So I'm sure that those will be highly collectible.
Pretty brilliant.
Yeah. Also a pearl, but. But also, like, I'm so tired. When. When is the madness going to end? When can we just have some nice new permanent collection? Black Wings?
Yeah. It's just gonna keep going, though.
So 100.
Just lean in.
They're just gonna keep doing it until people aren't interested.
Did you guys buy the small batch?
Yeah.
I don't want to admit it.
I wasn't going to because I'm just like, I don't want a pencil. That's just sort of a testament to just, like, consumerism going mad. Right. Like Black Friday pencils. But then toward the end of the day, I was like, I can't resist.
So I'm the only one strong enough to resist.
You did it. I'LL send you a couple of mine. Okay.
Yeah, I swear that wasn't my plan all along, but that's. Yeah, I'll take a couple.
I was going to buy to open them, but I'm not opening these.
Yeah. I say, yeah, well, somebody is already in the group selling a custom made archival tube in the style of the Blackwing volumes that you. So you can archive one of your. One of your Black Friday 2019 pencils.
That's really tempting. Who did the one with the TWA pencil with the red cap?
I don't remember who it is in the group, but it was so good.
Yeah, really, like amazing.
Yeah.
So the other, the other Blackwing that was kind of revealed, I believe on the same day. That was just really compelling to me is, you know, they've been doing these Blackwing X collaborations where it's kind of their high, like highly customized, high order Blackwing editions for like corporate clients. That TWA pencil is one of them. The other one that just sort of got revealed is that the Philadelphia Museum of Art did one. There's a super cool. Because. So the. The Philly Museum of Art has this statue of. This bright gold statue of. I believe it's the satyr Diana. I don't know much about. It's Augustus Saint Gaudin's sculpture of Diana which graces their Great Stair hall, which is kind of an iconic statue in the Philly Museum of Art. And it's bright gold. And they did a gold everything Blackwing. This thing is like bright gold ink or, excuse me, like barrel color with gold imprint. Gold feral, of course, and a gold eraser, which is amazing. And then on the other side of this pencil is an imprint of a golden arrow, which is kind of what Diana is holding. She's holding like a bow and arrow. So it is very, very, very cold. The Philly Museum of Art. Gold.
I love gold.
I love gold.
I'm so sorry.
Somebody posted that.
Gold. Oh, good, good, good.
You're not the. Don't worry, you're not the first. You won't be the last.
I was hoping.
It's. It's really lovely. I. Packs are kind of on their way. I also. Oh, man, I just was sick of myself. I bought an. I bought a pack of these because I couldn't resist those ones.
I'm still. I'm still tempted, but. Yeah, like the $85 shipping. I was just kind of hoping that you'd maybe give me a couple. Yeah.
Shipping from.
I'll pitch in an extra ten bucks towards your tattoo in Exchange for four, two of each of those two.
So. So they're being sold on the PMA website and they're. They're not the cheapest shipping out there. It seems like it was, you know, $5 shipping out of like domestically. And that, that, that on top of the $35 per dozen price, which is a little higher than usual.
Oh, there were 10 for shipping.
Yeah.
So. And then apparently on Cyber Monday, they were on like super sale with free shipping for a little while until they
noticed and they're like, whoops.
Yeah, yeah. Do you wanna do you another secret? I get it. I got in my order from that, like, I wasn't gonna order them until somebody said that, like, oh, look at all this. So I got mine for like $30 total.
It was nice. So change that too. I'll give you $4.
Yeah.
Getting wheeled and dealed over here. Yeah, yeah. So I love sort of the, like the lineup of gold black wings. Right there was that Blackwing 530, which was just kind of like gold was like a design element. And this one is just like, boom, in the face.
Like, as soon as I saw it, I was just thinking, it's the. We should call it the Gatsby wing.
Yeah.
Because it's just like me. Because I immediately was like, no joke, like, saw the picture. And in my head I started. Because I've read that book so many freaking times, I started to like, think of the. The. The little poem at the beginning, the fictional poem at the beginning of Gatsby. And then I was changing it so that it would read then where? Or then write with the gold pencil if that's what will move her. If you can bounce high bounce for her too. Till she cried lover. Gold penciled, high bouncing lover. I must have you so good. That's what my nerdy brain went to. When I saw this, I was like, that's pretty.
So Tina put some in the Facebook group where she took the erasers out and put in red and green look like Christmas pencils.
That's cool.
They look so good. Well, you know, Philly's pretty close to Baltimore, so we could roll up there when you guys are in town, go
to the museum with a briefcase full of money, just like take a nap.
On the way back down, layover and JFK airport and go to the DW
store and we need to make it. And we'll use that same briefcase to make like a Pulp Fiction style video where we open it up and it shines on her face and it turns and then it shows like, it's just full of those gold black wings.
Well, so, yeah, those are the big Blackwing news, and those are both. They're both ballad scores. So I assume actually Charles Berlsheimer Woodchuck himself in the group. After some questioning, he was willing to just kind of, like, share. If you can place a minimum order of 2,000 dozen. It's 24,000 pencils. They'll do one of those, like, Blackwing X collabs. So when we're ready to make our perfect custom erasable Blackwing, we know where to go. We just have to sell 2,000 of them. That will be 60,000 bucks.
We can do it Kickstarter.
Yeah. Yeah. So speaking of, we're Gonna put a
14B core in this thing. I'm gonna make it different.
Yeah, it's gonna waste so much graphite. It's gonna be extra shipping.
Yeah, you can just shake the graphite out of.
Just falls out of it. So speaking of custom products that we are offering, quick update on the Squire. You know, last episode, we talked about the Baron Fig X erasable number two Squier, and I think we announced that it was available the last episode. And, you know, we said we needed to sell 100 of these things to go to production, and we have. In fact, we've sold more than 200 of them, which is really amazing, and we will indeed be going to production. So this episode should come out on Wednesday. Wednesday the 11th. So you have three days to go get yourself one of these before they are gone. So I don't think we quite want to say that they're gone forever because, like, we might want to do these again, but they're gone, at least for the foreseeable future. So get yourself a. Get yourself a Black Wing Squire.
Excuse me?
An erasable Squire. Jeez, not a Black Wing Squire.
Edit that.
Although that would be a pretty good
collaboration, I would be down to see a Blackwing Squire. That would be really fun. Heck, yeah.
That would be awesome.
So we sold 100 of them. We are indeed going to the Pen Show. That is very exciting. We have a lot of things to figure out, but I really want to hear from. Just hear from those of you listening, if you are indeed interested and committed to coming to Baltimore to go to this show, we want to make sure that there are tickets for you. So if you go to Erasable Us Baltimore, or if you just go to Erasable Us and click that live show button at the top, there's a little survey to fill out. We're not going to charge anything for tickets for that because you're already going to the pen show. Just fill out that survey and let us know that you're a listener or you're interested in attending the show. Give us your email address. And we're at this point just kind of gathering tickets because we want to make sure our Patreon members have tickets and we make sure our squire members are going to get tickets. We don't think we're going to sell out, but we just want to make sure that everybody's being considered. So, yeah, come join us at the Baltimore pen show. It's going to be amazing.
You can bring a picket sign.
Yes, yes. Bring a picket sign. You know, graphite is right.
Or, you know, fountain pens are silly.
Fountain pens are silly. Brad Dowdy is the zodiac killer.
There it is.
Whatever. Whatever you want to do.
You can pry my masterpiece out of my cold graphite covered hand.
Exactly.
Fountain pens are the 1%. You know, whatever. Oh, man.
There we got it.
Oh, Ben show.
We are called mob town.
So please, if you are coming to Baltimore, be sure to bring some sort of a pencil. Pencil. Piece of pencil, propaganda, T shirt, protest signs, whatever. So cool. Awesome. So that is. That's fresh points. Do we want to jump into the main topic?
Sure.
Okay. So what we're kind of thinking, you know, everybody's doing their kind of holiday gift guide buying lineup, and we just realized that we really wanted to do something that was very, very specifically customized to the people in your life. So some of these might sound a little oddly specific, but just roll with it. How do you want to do this? Johnny and Tim, do you want to just kind of take turns?
Yeah, let's just do. Let's just rotate.
Yeah, yeah. So Johnny, do you want to start us off with a. With a suggestion?
Sure. So for your co worker who thinks pencils are for little kids, I suggest a box of black wings and the middle finger. Because black wings are not for kids. And you know, all. Even little. My children all know not to yuck somebody's yum, so shut up.
Yeah,
I just. I just like to think the idea of like just a pencil box with a hole kind of the bottom. And you open it and there's your middle finger and it goes.
Step one, the pencil box. Step two, put your middle finger.
Middle finger.
Step three, F you, Roy.
You put two holes in the box. One, One hand is holding the pencils, the other one's flipping them off. There you go.
Can we get a lonely island? Maybe when we get together, we can Record a lonely, Lonely island style video for this. Tim, do you want to. Do you want to go next?
Yeah, yeah. This next. This next option is for your aunt who you don't really care for, who is also really into adult coloring. Like really into adult coloring. And so you obviously want to go with some colored pencils. And so you don't like her very much. And so it's going to be the Staedtler Woe Opex colored pencils
with this lady.
Point retention. Point retention.
Yeah, as in they never go away because they don't write on paper.
When you guys come to Baltimore and you're sleeping, I'm going to take all your pencils and just like leave you each with a box of.
What are we going to like beat us to death with a. With a pillowcase full of wopex?
Wouldn't take a pillowcase. A sock full of wopex shavings could definitely take out like three people.
You're gonna wake up with a colored picture of a horse head in the bed.
Yeah, you can bust a hole in the drywall with one of those things.
So of course, you know, you have your uncle Roy who sits in his wood paneled den and is like, you know, rocking chair building decoy ducks for hunters. I think clearly his, you know, his, his preferred pencil will be this Musgrave single barrel. Because he likes fine aged wood. Like deep, deep wood pencils and something.
And something beautiful that you're gonna like, love and use once and then never touch again.
Yeah, he's gonna put it in a display case along with.
Yes. You're just gonna admire it.
Yeah, yeah.
Ship in a bottle.
Yeah, he'll get done. When his, you know, daughter starts dating somebody and he's starting to like, you know, that they cleaned their gun, he's gonna just sharpen his pencil.
Just knife sharpen his pencil.
Yeah.
With a masterpiece.
Yeah.
Hashtag boy, just go right through you.
Johnny, do you want to take the next one?
So, you know, we all have this one neighbor in our. On our block or you know, in our building who's elderly but always, you know, puts his or herself up for other people. So for your neighbor who shovels your walk Even though he's 77, 2000 custom black wings that say just you're simply the best. And of course you give it to him with a Tina Turner cd.
Yeah, you have to get everybody else in the building to go in on that with you. Yeah. Yeah. So Tim, how about you?
I think this next one, this is, this is gonna be super helpful. I think so Everybody has that one cousin who says he's like a traffic analyst or something, but he's totally a CIA operative.
Yeah, of course I'm talking about. Yeah, that guy.
Yeah, yeah, we all have that. Where you're like, I know what you do. You don't have to pretend you showed up in a helicopter.
Yeah.
So I think, I think I have a. So I think for that person you should get them something. Something rare. Right. Something that is maybe a little dangerous. Like his middle name. Danger. And so we'll go. We'll go with a vintage. No blot. Because you know, it's permanent. And so that's. That's problematic if you're trying to keep things secret. But you can always. You can always burn after reading and then also after you burn after reading, you can use the pencil to poison people.
Just. Just dip that tip in like somebody's like water and just immediately. Lead poisoning.
Yeah, man. Sharpen that thing in a masterpiece. Make yourself a little like blow dart gun.
Yeah.
Nobody will even know though. They'll, you know. CSI people aren't gonna figure that out.
For your neighbor who drives a. Just a high end Tesla and you just like goes to all the fancy restaurants. I think this is, this is a little, a little off topic. Like it's not quite stationary, but. Has anybody seen the. But I butcher this name. Vove Clicquot champagne that comes in a pencil like case. Get them, get them a nice 70 bottle of champagne. That's. Yeah. That comes in a pencil. A pencil case. Like a. It's like a tin or something. Like a collectible tin that looks like a pencil. How about you, Jenny?
So you know your sister in law hates you and calls you the trash can for some reason. You know those there are yellow Dixon pencils that they're not taekwondo orgas. They say Dixon you can get it back to school. Which are the worst branded pencils I've ever seen. Those and the middle finger.
I'm a theme here, Johnny. Yeah, yeah.
I'm kicking all the negative ones.
Tim, do you have anything to contribute to this conversation?
No, no, I'm good.
You say it.
Go ahead.
We'll say that for the after dark episodes. I feel you. I think next. We've been talking about friends and kind of in laws and stuff. So I think a close family member thinking like a brother. Maybe like your 40 year old brother who still order things off the kids menu. Like you go to like a. A nice restaurant that has like scallops and steak and all. This stuff. And then he's like, I'll have the. The cheesy pasta and chicken. What do you get? What do you get for. What do you get for that person? I think we. The perfect choice. You want something that is childish, but also, you know, a. A grown ass pencil.
Yeah.
And so we'll go with the. The jumbo golden bear. I think that's a nice choice. And then we'll pair it all the time. Yeah. And then we'll like. And then we'll pair it with a box of shells and cheese that could be eaten or used for, like, arts and crafts.
Perfect.
You could like, glue it and like, make like some sort of like Valentine's Day gift for your mom.
Oh, geez.
I. So. So we all have that friend who just kind of does everything that you do, Right? Like, they get into the same things and they just. They think you're the coolest and. But they, they think it's kind of the. The original idea. And, you know, they just realized that, hey, they're really into pencils too, but they don't really know. Like, you know, it's like, you know, here's my Office Depot pencil. Here's my. Here's my Black Wing. So CW Pencils has the perfect thing for them. Have you guys seen this? The 200 pencil box?
No, I had never seen this.
It is really interesting. I can't believe they started selling this. This is real, by the way, everybody. So for the past four years, CW Pencils frequently gets asked if it's possible to buy one of every pencil that they sell. So here it is. Most of the pencils that they sell, there's 200 of them that comes in a custom box with a list, and it costs $400, which is only $2 per pencil. So not too bad. And a nice box, but instant collection,
so that's pretty sweet.
Yeah. If you like. If you like that friend enough to spend $400 on them, you can just give them sort of like an instant interesting pencil collection. Yeah. Johnny, how about you? What do you have going on?
What's on the list? So your parents who hate paper and think you're silly to be playing with pencils all the time. I don't know if it's our parents or parents of like, your classmates. I would say nothing. They don't deserve presents.
Set the middle finger.
No, they don't even consider the middle finger. Nothing. Like my, my Christmas present or holiday present to you is that I'm going to pretend you don't exist.
Perfect. Tim. Do you have a. What do you think
you. I think you. There's all kinds of members of your family, right? Some people have got the close family members, like the human ones, but then you also got the pets. So think about your dog, you know, and think about your dog and maybe like, what are you gonna get your dog? And you can get them those like eraserless Wopex pencils because that's like a pretty inexpensive alternative to the nylabone for him to chew up. And it probably lasts just as long and I don't know, just feels, it feels appropriate
for sure. Well, and that being said.
And it's made of the same material too.
Exactly. I don't want to poison your dog though. That would be like all the noxious chemicals inside that will pack. That's true.
Depends on the dog.
I'm going to redact.
That's a good point. That's a good point. Well, for your cat, on the other hand, you should just get a big pencil cup and put in just a bunch of cheap pencils and also a Blythe. And the cat will instantly go and start chewing on the most expensive pencils. So that'll be a nice gift and be very self satisfied about it. So perfect gift for your cat.
Oh, that's funny. If I gotta, I gotta, I gotta interfere in all this and just on the subject of cats and say, did you see that the video of the people using that cat filter, like on their face? Yes. Did you see this video?
Yes.
Oh my gosh. I was crying. I was laughing so hard. There's like people. It's on my. If I post it on Twitter. So people need to see this if you haven't seen it, if you're a cat person. But it's like using like a Snapchat feed feature that like makes your face look like a cat. And they're basically looking at their phone with their cat and their cat looks at the phone and realizes that their face has turned into a cat. And you just see their responses for like, I don't know, it's like a minute long. But it's, it's, it's very, it's very worth your time.
So did you see the, did you see the video of that cat whose meow sounds like, hi, y'. All. No, that one's really creepy.
No, we'll have to tell TJ about that one.
Exactly. I think you're right.
I think that'll be a good fit for him.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Johnny, how. What's your. What's your.
We're we're forgetting our parental units.
Yeah.
So for your mom, which sounds like the start of a joke.
Your mom. That's not the direction I thought you were going with this.
Yeah.
So your mom in the document was like, okay,
an erasable square.
Yeah.
Because my mom wants one. Because. Buy more of these pens.
Yeah. They're. You have a very limited time. What are you waiting for? It's your mom.
Forget. Or your dad or favorite uncle or grandfather or grandmother, if they're alive.
Any of those. Yeah. What about you, Tim?
I think we can get into the. The subject of. I mean, some of us are just really. Some people are just really well connected, you know? Like, you just know. You just know people. You know, famous people, maybe. And it's, like, hard to buy a gift for people who are really well known and, like. So say you're buying a gift for. Say you're buying a gift for. For Scrooge McDuck.
Of course.
Everybody, he's like. He's like an old family friend.
He follows me.
You used to go over to his house and swim in his, like, pool full of money when you were a kid. And inexplicably, you dive in and sink into the money, because that's just what happens at Scrooge Dynamics. It's kind of. Yeah, Yeah. I mean, it's kind of like Bill Gates house. It's just like one of those weird features that he spent a lot of time on, made happen, and you just got. You just have fond memories and so obviously, weird flex, but okay. Yeah, Yeah. I mean, that's just. I mean, that's what your childhood was like. Right? So to thank him for all those years, you should just shell up the $45 of shipping and get him some of those new gold black wings we were talking about earlier.
He would do the same for you.
It's his favorite color and.
Yeah.
Just perfect.
Perfect. Well, I think in the. The same sort of vein, obviously, you know, celebrity that we're all very close to. Been on the show multiple times, you know, our friend Oprah Winfrey.
Yeah, she's great.
Yeah, she's fantastic.
She's. She's like a. Yeah, she's a little mean. Like, off the air, like, before we were recording. She's a little pushy, but, man, she's great.
So, you know, she. She was on TV here in Baltimore.
Yeah.
Before she was big. So we go back.
Yeah.
I sent. I send her crab cakes. She sends me cars.
That's awesome.
Solid gold crab mallet. Now she. You know what you do is you sit her down and you, you know, pre. Pre visit, you tape something under underneath her chair and you say, oprah, there's something under your chair. And she reaches down and picks it up and it is that Everhard Faber perfect pencil. No, it's the fabric Estelle perfect pencil, isn't it?
Yes.
Yeah, yeah. And then you just shout, it's a perfect pencil.
Then you look around the room and say, you don't get a perfect pencil. And you don't get a perfect pencil. But shit, she gets a perfect.
You get one.
Yeah. Because you're Oprah.
You can start throwing them out. You'd knock out some teeth.
Yeah.
Crack a skull.
Okay, everybody, one more round. Johnny.
Okay, so I don't have a day job, but I know people in my life who are like co workers. But you know that co worker who won't shut the F word up about some, like, stupid interest or hobby that he thinks everybody should be into, like football or something that people are into. Get him a fountain pen because it'll keep him busy and get him away from you, you know, messing with it and getting it ground and washing it and putting different inks on it.
Ink all over his fingers and.
Yeah.
Buying new shirts.
Go to show pen shows. Yeah. Tim, how about you?
Yeah. So college is a special time, or the years after college when you're living with somebody other than your family for the first time and you have a roommate. And usually there's a pretty special connection between those two. I'm still friends with my first roommate from college. Well, not my first first roommate. He. We did like a roommate swap thing and we were like, I think you should be with this guy and I should be with that guy. And it worked out great. And I actually. I think his name was Terrence, which makes sense, but we were my. So for that first roommate, though, the one who knows like all of your embarrassing secrets and saw you living on your own for the first time in your entire life, I think it would be an interesting experiment to get him one of those Habane five year journals and try to just like fill in those years of being. Of being with you and just like recreating that entire thing from memory. Because I assume with the three of us, they're gonna remember everything. And so just tell them, you know, like, just take some time and just go back through day by day through the. The four years that we lived together or even just that one year and just get those, like 180 days hashed out while we were in school. I think it's not too much to ask.
You'll sit around the house and look through your calendar and just reminisce about, like, all the. All the good times that you had, like, you know, go into workout with. With Screech and doing all that. Yeah. Now we're all within five years after graduating. Right. Like from college. So we're all three for me. Yeah. Yeah. We're all extremely young, and so I think. Yeah. Especially if you go back and still in middle school. Yeah. Retroactively write in, you know, something innocuous over the embarrassing secrets. I think you'll be fine.
Yeah, that sounds good.
And. And finally, your kids. Don't get them anything because they have everything already.
Yeah. They don't need anything.
Yeah.
It's ridiculous.
Yeah.
Don't buy your kids anything. Why would they need anything? You buy crap for your kids all year long. Just.
Exactly. They should be paying. They should be getting you Christmas presents. This is your time.
They should give me back some of the black wings they stole from me.
Yeah, they should.
Retribution. That's what you should get your. Yeah. That's what they get for Christmas. Yeah.
Well, this is. This is a way more useful gift guide, I think. I think we did good work here.
I think we did a social good. Like, we, like, took care of some things that just don't get talked about. You know, sometimes these days it feels like everything's talked about, but I feel like we found our corner of the. Of the Internet and just be like, you know what? We're going to do it. We're going to take care of this thing.
Yeah, you're welcome. Yeah, you're welcome. This is our service to you.
No family member or friend left behind this holiday season.
Yeah, exactly. Well, you all ready to wrap it up?
Let's do it.
Okay. First, before we wrap it up, I want to thank our Patreon members, our Patreon producer level members, and those are the amazing, amazing folks. We have 27 of the producer level Patreon members, which is just amazing. Thank you all. So, by the way, with any of these, please reach out to me if we mispronounce your name or if you would rather we not use the name that's kind of provided on the Instagram, which for some people is like a handle. But I'll go down the list. Thank you so much to Alex Jonathan Brown, Bobby Letzinger, Chris Jones, Chris Mitzkiss, Dave McDonald, Dave Tubman, Fourth Letter Gangster Hotline, Dr. Hans Noodleman, Ph.D. jason Dill, Jay Newton, Joe Crace, John Baynon, Johnny Baker, Kathy Rogers, Kelton Wiens, Larry Grimaldi, Leslie Tuzou, Lisa Baby, Mary Collis, Measure Twice, Mike Hagen, Random Thinks, Stuart Lennon, Think Travel, Eat. And Thomas Eckerberg Anderson. Thank you so, so, so, so much for enabling our lavish lifestyles with all
these gold pencils we're flinging around that
we're just buying, spending $60 in shipping for. So thank you so much. Johnny. Where can people find you when you're not buying gold black wings?
You can find me@pencilrevolution.com and on social media at Pensolution and at the Baltimore Pad Show.
Yay, Tim. Where can people find you when you're not just buying wool packs and feeding them to your dog?
Probably Cracker Barrel.
Yeah, good point. Sorry, I don't know.
It just. It just felt like the right answer, so. But no, you can. But, yeah, the better answer, you can find me staring at my phone on Twitter @timwassom, or on Instagram at Tim Wasem.
And when I'm not, gosh, I don't know. I've lost my train of thought. That was such a good answer.
Eating avocado toast.
Yeah, I'll be eating avocado toast @awealFly on Twitter and Instagram. And Andy, WTF is my website? So we are the Erasable Podcast collectively. You can find us on Twitter and on Instagram at Erasable Podcast. Same thing on Facebook. Facebook.comrasablepodcast Find our website at erasable us. If you want to get show notes and the recording for today, it is at erasable us130, because this is episode 130. Come join our Facebook group and join in the really amazing community which is facebook.com group erasable find us on Patreon. Lend your support if you can you enable this very lavish lifestyle that we hold so dear. We can buy all the gold pencils@patreon.com erasable and thank you very much and we will talk to you in a few weeks. Do you like our podcast? Most people like our podcast, but if you like our podcast, David will turn it off.