This transcript was generated from an audio file by AI, and may contain inaccuracies.
Transcript
Oh, it's a kind of pencil. Black pencil? No. Black avocado. No.
Pencil food.
Is it gold pencil? Is it a black wing? A black wing.
But guess which one.
Oh, the, the golden, the glow in the dark. Black wing. No, it's a black wing number. Like black wing. Black Wing 8 11.
No.
Black Wing 4.
No.
Black Wing 602.
No.
Blackwing 1.
No.
Black Wing 100.
No, that's not.
How do you. Hello and welcome to episode 159 of the erasable Podcast. I am Tim Wasem on hosting duties tonight. We're going to be talking about just kind of whatever's been going on in our freshpoints. We're going to be talking about the pencils that don't yet exist that we were expecting to have by now. So. And we're going to have a pretty exciting announcement about an upcoming issue of Plumbago. So. But before we get to all that, my co hosts, Johnny and Andy. How are you guys doing?
Pretty good.
Fantastic.
Yeah.
Good, yeah.
How about you?
I'm doing great. So I am three weeks and three weeks vaccinated. So that means I got my second dose. So now I am fully in the clear. And Jane gets hers next week, so it's all very exciting.
So Tim, do you want to share a little bit about what listeners just heard in the intro before the theme music?
Yeah. Dinner time gets a little crazy at our, at our house. I have a four year old and a seven year old and usually what ends up happening is that my 4 year old daughter gets my son belly laughing by just being just like hamming it up, just saying like ridiculous things. And so. Yeah, well that's, that's what you just heard. That was some form of the game 20 Questions in which we were guessing things and it quickly fell apart and it was no longer animals we were trying to guess. It became just anything. And so, you know, you what you, what you. What you heard was Henry telling us that he's thinking of a pencil and we had to, had to guess what it was and I did that was not coached. So there was, there was no cue cards in my hands when he said pencil.
We should have a main topic sometime where we do pencil 20 questions.
Oh yeah, that'd be fun.
Yeah, that'd be a good idea.
Oh yeah, sure would be.
We could just do that like once per episode.
That's true.
Take turns doing. Whoever's hosting has to pick a pencil and then when they play 20 questions, I'll just keep score over time, over all the episodes and at the end of the year, we have our totals and see how bad Johnny beat us. Oh, yeah.
Oh, gosh. Nah.
All right, well, do you guys want to just dive right into it with tools of the trade? Sure, yeah, Johnny, go for it.
So I read a book that sounds hokey, but it wasn't hokey, called the Poets and Writers Complete Guide to Being a Writer that was published by the nonprofit slash magazine Poets and Writers, I think right after the pandemic started. So I'd pre ordered it and it showed up in April. And I didn't know what to do with it because, you know, Covid, but I finally sat down and read it and it was really readable for a long book and full of a lot of very good information that you might not have if you didn't go to an MFA program or if you drank your way through an MFA program, neither of which I did. But yeah, there was a lot of good stuff in there about, you know, the industry, the whole, like, over and over again. You're not going to make money doing this to be able to live on, so you have to be okay with that. Okay, that's good. They don't. I feel like no one tells you that. So, yeah, I don't know if the paperback's out yet, but it wasn't a super expensive book and it was very well made, it was very pleasing, and it was written by a husband and wife who seemed to like each other a lot, which is not always true of marriage. And that made the book a lot more, I don't know, cuddly. And on the other end of the spectrum, I finally read Michael and Dante's latest novel called Warlight, which I forgot which reviewer. Someone called it a non romantic B side to the English patron because it's set right after World War II. But a lot of folks talk about the way that Andonche reveals information about characters in his novels in a really, really controlled way. And this was like the perfect example of it.
It was.
If I talk about it too much, I'm gonna blow it. So if you like Michael and Dante at all, definitely pick up.
Warlight.
Just one word. And that's really all I've been up to lately, aside from reading zines and blogs and stuff. Yeah, making zines too. And I'm writing with a long pointed paper mate maraudo classic that I sent a picture of to Andy and Tim that's got like, I don't know, an inch and a half of collar because it smells really good and I'm using my brand new Leuchtturm 1917 Bujo in Pacific, which is not green and not blue. So I'm just going to go with Pacific. It's really pretty. It's like very dark teal that leans heavily toward the green. It's very, very sweet.
Nice pencil. Showing some skin.
Yeah. Somebody circumcised that pencil.
It's like a, like a low cut pencil I guess we call it.
It's a V neck.
V neck. I thought about that. Yeah.
That pencil has a deep V.
Deep V pencils. Yeah.
You need to shave your chest pencil.
Andy, what about you?
Who? Get that picture out of my mind. I've been, I don't know, the last couple weeks. I feel like I've just been really, really busy with a lot of like random projects I've been trying to take on and things to do. So I. I just finished the end of last week a 12 hour workshop with Michael Metz, my co author and co workshop presenter. So whenever that happens, my brain is just like dead on days when I'm not given that workshop. So I haven't like really dug into a good novel or a good book. You know, I've been watching just a lot of like random House Hunter Renovations and the new season of Fixer Upper, which is that show that Chip and Joanna Gaines does do on their new. Their new home, the Magnolia Network on Discovery Plus. So I've been watching that there's a really, really good show on Netflix that they're into the season two of or the second collection of. And I completely missed the first collection. It's called the Taco Chronicles and it's one of those really kind of beautiful food shows that they do kind of like street food where there's just really gorgeous shots and they talk to somebody who's like a few people who are experts in the field and it's all about different kinds of tacos. So we just watched the first one and it was about Al Pastor tacos. Oh yeah, Johnny, there's a deep V. I'm pulling it down. That's. You just won yourself a episode cover. Delete that. So love Al Pastor tacos. They went to Mexico City and talked to a bunch of taco people. It's all in Spanish.
It's really good. So you know it's good.
Yeah.
Talking to the real thing.
Yeah.
Their El Pastor tacos are the greatest.
Oh, that's so good. Yeah.
So do you.
Do you guys do Taco Tuesday at your homes?
Yes.
No. Oh, I.
If we ever skip it. My Kids totally get pissed.
Yeah, we actually pulled off a switch and did last week burrito bowls instead of tacos. And that was really delicious and fun. But yeah, we'll be. We're quickly moving back to tacos for tomorrow night.
That sounds really good. So I've been started watching that really good. If you just want beautiful, like, for lack of a better word, food porn with.
It's.
It's probably. Much of it is probably in a different language, so you're probably gonna have to read it if you spe speak English. Taka Chronicles is really good. The other thing I'm just catching up on is a series of zines called Cat Party by Katie Hagel. She is pretty attached to Microcosm magazine, which produces a lot of zines and actual real life books too. And she wrote a book for them called, I think it's called like Cats I've Known. And this zine is sort of like an intro to that book. And she just writes little vignettes about like, you know, cats that she. That she's known. Like the cat that belonged to a nun that she had in grade school that sometimes came to school and shot cat and her friend's cat and her cat and just really good little vignettes. And as with really great writers and that sort of stuff, they. She'll often like. It's kind of a story about her life too. So really good series. And then like that's issue one and then the next few issues are just like specific stories around cats. Sometimes there's. They're comics. Sometimes it's like a, like a memoir style. But just a really good book if you, if you like cats. I'd argue even if you don't like cats, Johnny. It's a pretty good. It's a pretty good read. Check out, check out these titles by Johnny Gamber. Cats that have made me sneeze. Cats that have swelled my eyes shut. Yeah, they're big books. Yeah. Every cat spoiler. We have to get you one of those genetically engineered cats, Johnny, that like, you know, have like an awful personality because they're genetically engineered, but they're like, they don't have allergens in them.
Oh, that sounds like a nightmare.
They're like $6,000.
Sounds like the beginning of a Stephen King novel.
GMO cats. And I am writing with one of Johnny's favorite pencils, a Tombow 2558, if you remember from two episodes ago, it was on his pencils. I wish I loved, but don't list. It's the cat of pencils.
I'm not allergic to that.
And I'm writing in my Leuchtturm blue notebook. But this is the same one that I've been using since one year ago today. Wow. Yeah, I am. I mean, we've talked about this before. I go through notebooks pretty slowly, especially in Covid times. I don't leave the house or like carry notes with me or anything really. So this is mostly just sort of like work and project to do. Lists with like a little bit of. I started at the beginning. This is something that I'll. I'll tease for the next disposable magazine. If you are a Patreon supporter, I talk a little bit about this. I started trying to keep like a Covid journal in here. I wrote like every day. I wrote down the infection rates and the death rates for the US and the US and the world. But it rapidly got too depressing. So now it's just like work stuff. Yeah, that's me. So let's hear it. One year anniversary toast to the Notebook.
Yeah.
There you go.
Cheers.
A glass of water.
Lacroix.
Yeah. Tim, how about you? What are you, tool of the trade?
Well, I have been listening to a ton of Band of Joy, which is Robert Plants, like one of Robert Plant's post Zeppelin bands. It was actually his. It was the. I think I had read something. It was like the original name of Led Zeppelin or it was the name of Robert Plant's first band before they became Led Zeppelin. And so he brought the name back and has a new band that's kind of. It's just full of like a plus session musicians from Nashville. Buddy Miller is probably the most famous. He's played for everybody. He's been on Lucinda Williams and I think he's been on some Dylan albums. But. But yeah, so there's an album they made called Band of Joy and it's excellent if you like Zeppelin. But also like the stuff that he did with like Allison Krauss. There was like a little more acoustic and kind of laid back. So it's kind of a balance between. Sometimes it does sort of sound like it could be. Could have been a Zeppelin song. And there's a really. There's some really good concerts online too. On. On YouTube. They played at the. Gosh. What was it called? It's like the Artists Nook or something. I don't know. It was some. If you look at. Look them up and look for a full show, they're. They're very entertaining. Some Patty Griffin, if you know her she's the backup singer or co singer. And then reading. I've been reading Curious Incident of the Dog in the Nighttime, which I had never read before and I'm considering teaching it next year. So it's an absolutely wonderful book. So if you haven't heard of it by now, I mean it's most, most people have. It's such a. Like. Andy, you were saying it's a classic. I mean it definitely is, but it's a story. But it's a mystery novel about the death of a dog in a neighborhood. And it's told from the perspective of the 15 year old boy with Asperger's who finds him and decides that he's gonna solve this crime. So. And through him trying to figure out what happened to the dog, all this kind of stuff, he. It's really awesome how he lets you know like a little bit more about himself through the story of how he's trying to get information about the dog. And so you're kind of gathering who he is and gathering what's happening in his family life and a beautiful book. So.
And it, it kind of like you follow the thought process of, of this boy, you Asperger's too. So I feel like you learn a little bit more. I mean if you have somebody with Asperger's in your life and you just like are having trouble like empathizing with them or understanding how they think, I think it has a really good, it helps with that really well.
Yeah, as a teacher, it's a pretty profound book to read because there's, you know, we have students who of course in the spectrum and they. And sometimes it is kind of hard to just imagine what's going on kind of in that barrier between you and them that kind of sometimes pops up and yeah, so it is very helpful assuming that it's accurate. I'm sure he did, did his research but. But yeah, it's a fantastic book by Mark Hayden or Haddon, something like that. H A D D O N and for the only really new thing we've watched recently was we watched the new Disney movie Raya and the Last Dragon, which that's their new new animated movie. And it was, it was very good. It was very entertaining. I think, I think we need to watch it again. We kind of were distracted during. It had been like playing games and stuff. But of course unbelievable animation. It's just like makes your, makes your jaw drop and it's got that classic mix of jokes the kids won't get and then stuff that the kids will laugh their heads off at. So, yeah, definitely recommend it. It's a little expensive, but stimulus money rented Raya and the Last Dragon from. From Disney plus. And I am writing with one of my hardest job in the world, Black Wings collaboration with John Dickerson. And I just started a new pocket notebook, and I've got the. Started this yesterday, the field notes, Gemini 7 edition, the space travel ones. Because I've been watching that for All Mankind show, and it just looked like the perfect choice for right now. All right, so let's get into our fresh point slash main topic of the night. Johnny, get us started.
So I mentioned that I have a new bullet journal, which means that I finished my previous one, which was the Official Bullet Journal 2.0, which has that super thick, like, basically smooth cardstock paper. And I really liked it. And then by the end, I freaking hated it because every ink I used on it looked washed out. I had to use softer pencils than I really wanted to use to get it to make a good mark. And then as soon as I got this one, I'm like, oh, that pink ink that I bought from Giorban is not too washed out to possibly see, and they should never sell it. It was just the paper. And all of my nice vintage number twos are singing again. So, I mean, I don't even know if they got any more in. I think they underestimated people's interest. But, you know, don't go out of your way unless you use a lot of markers, which is what they designed it for. In fairness, the only other fresh point I have is that I finished the most recent pencil revolution scene that was about walking, and it was a lot of fun, but I had to cut out a lot of stuff. So I don't know what to do about that. Like, I have three walking tattoos. I had to cut that part out.
And why did you cut mask? Just to make it not as thick.
Yeah, I'm the last one someone mentioned it was short, so I made it this one a lot longer. And then. Oh, I had. I had laid it out for 20 pages. And then at the end, I was like, no, like, I have to start all over or cut this. So it had to go because I did this one differently in that it was all paper. So every time I want more, I have to copy them, which is time consuming. But my printer copies faster than it prints. That makes sense because, you know, it feeds. Feeds itself back in. Like, oh, my God, I can't believe you just made one. But, yeah, for folks who are on our Patreon. I think we're going to use the same color for the covers, which is like, if you look up, it looks great in the dictionary.
I got mine too. Oh, good.
And I forgot to send you guys the little tiny notebooks that I made to go with them, so.
I can't believe I paid for this.
I'm hanging up the call.
I've been like all over the place trying to make cool notebooks for walking, but I wanted to make ones that people could make out of stuff they had laying around at home already.
Like lacroix boxes.
Yeah, I used like cereal boxes and Perrier boxes in the back of these. And I mean, I cheated because I have cardstock laying around, because I do. But anyway, I, I didn't want to sell them, but I didn't want to make, you know, a hundred of them. So I just made a couple dozen. But then they ran out quickly because I miscounted. So now I had to make more. But I don't think I'm going to do it again. It's really a pain in my butt. But anyway, they're. They're selling quick and I'm almost out of those little notebooks, so knock yourself out. I thought this was my favorite cover by far. I got to use a lot of
cool maps, which I think it looks great.
Was fun.
Yeah.
Thank you. Yeah, that's. That's all I've got tonight.
Andy, how about you?
Let's see. I guess I have some, some follow up. Last episode we talked about the launch of our 2020 T shirt campaign and that ran for two weeks and it concluded today and no last night. And we. So the way that that bonfire works, the store that we're selling them through, they. They create like two week campaigns so they can print in batches. And our main campaign that we ran ended last night with like several dozen T shirts in it. So it ended and then today somebody placed an order which launched a new campaign. So there's another two week campaign going if you missed out the first time around. And I think that that would probably, probably deliver mid April. So if you are a Patreon subscriber or supporter at $10 a month or more, you are getting one of these automatically. I just placed a bulk order for those today and I should get them toward the end of the month and then after a few days get them, get them sent out to you. So yeah, we have a bunch of T shirts being made and they're awesome. And I'm sort of surprised the Two main colors that we had was a kind of like a heather gray and then there was a gold, like a marigold gold. And the gold was much more popular than the gray. I was surprised about that. So. Yeah, I. Yeah, I mean, it's a really lovely color. So. Yeah. So thanks again to Alicera for designing this for us. Just kind of on a, on a lark. I saw it in one of his notebooks when he was Instagramming about the episode that he was on and I was like, oh my gosh, can we turn that into a design? So thanks for being game about that, Ali. Cool. So that's T shirts. People should be getting them if you ordered through Bonfire or if you ordered through like through Patreon or whatever. Probably late March or early April. You should get those. I was going to mention I had in the fresh points, but I guess we talked about this already about how we should know something about the Blackwing 223 by now, but apparently we don't.
Oh, it's. It been three weeks since.
Three weeks. Yeah. Somebody, Chris Jones in the group posted about that, like how we still don't know anything and Dave Tubman said they're. They're probably furiously rewriting the, you know, the backstory for them since. Since we pretty quickly guessed that it was about three.
It ends up being about the photographer who took that picture.
Yeah. And yeah, that's pretty funny. But they, they actually had another kind of collab has. Has come to light since then, which is the scrawlrbox pencil. Did you guys see this?
Oh yeah, I saw it on Facebook.
Yeah. So the scrawlrbox is one of those. It's kind of like art snacks or bark box or whatever. Like those mail. Those subscription boxes that you get. This one is for like art stuff or. No, this one is about writing stuff. Right, Johnny?
Oh, I have no idea.
Okay.
I haven't seen this.
Yeah, I don't know much about it. I haven't ever really paid attention to it. But they, they did a custom black wing and it is really lovely. It's like a teal color. It's a little bit bluer than like the turquoise inkjoy pen, but not much. The eraser steel. It's called Scrawlrbox. How do we spell this? S C r a w lrbox.uk okay. It's a British thing and it's okay. It is, it is Art supplies. It's the monthly art supply subscription. So if you are a subscriber, you get one of these, you get One of these. These pencils. I think that you can also buy these individually. It's 17 pounds. And the January 21st scrawlrbox comes with some markers. It comes with a. One of these black wings. And it's just like. If you like that kind of teal color, I would say it's very Pacific blue. Johnny. It has a fade from like dark. Oh, dark turquoise at the bottom toward the point with some like, kind of scribbly marks on it, which is their brand. Up to kind of a lighter turquoise. I'll have a link in show notes in case anybody wants to see what this baby looks like.
When you said 17 pounds, I didn't realize that was for the whole box. For one black.
Those are expensive. Yeah, 17. 17 pound sterling for a scrawlr box, which includes some markers. And it doesn't seem like you can get them in box dozens, at least not yet. But it's just very lovely. It's one of. I think it's. It's a very. It's not too fancy and hipster, I guess. And it has a really beautiful turquoise eraser which I'm sure that hack wingers will really like.
Yeah. Yeah.
The hack wingers.
Yeah.
That's a thing.
Yeah, it is a thing.
Dang old hack winger.
If that doesn't dozens, then, yeah, wingers are going to have a hard time. I mean, an expensive hack wing.
Yeah. With. With the quantity that that scrawlrbox must have had to order, I can't imagine that they wouldn't sell them in dozens. But who knows?
Just wet everybody's appetite with the box and then be like, oh, and by the way, we sell.
Yeah. Like, who knows, like the Monk Laura, or however you say it. The. You know, those custom editions are just impossible to find. So you know that there's just dozens and dozens of boxes sitting around somewhere in some warehouse. Yeah. So that's a cool custom Blackwing. If. If you're still. If you haven't had enough custom black wings, that's still a way to.
Or struggling to make it until the Blackwing 2, 2, 3 is if you need your fix.
I'm like, never mind. We're just gonna do it for summer.
Yeah.
I made my own.
Yeah. So check that out. I also want to mention something really cool, Johnny, that you sent me.
Oh, yeah?
Yeah. I just came in the mail kind of by surprise the other day. It is a. It's called. It's a street index guide of Fort Wayne, Indiana, which is my hometown. Which is funny because Johnny you found it in like an antique store in, in, in Baltimore?
Oh no, I found it on ebay.
On ebay. Oh wow.
And I don't remember what I was looking at, made that come up. It's probably like vintage pencils or something like that.
Yeah, it's, it's very cool. I have no idea how old it is, but I think it's probably pre 1940 because that's when my parents house was built. And the block that my parents house is on is not referenced in this. So it's a. So it's basically. I think I mentioned this on Facebook. It's almost like a city map without the actual map. It just has a list of streets and it has a list of street of cross streets of that street and then like what, what hundred the addresses. So you know like Fairfield avenue, it has 500 Superior Street, 600 Greeley Street, 700 Main street, which is like the, the hundreds mark near that cross street. And I cannot figure out what you would have used this for.
Like a walking guide like that doesn't have all the like if you're walking through Fort Wayne or trying to find your way around, but it doesn't have like crazy amount of detail. It's just kind of like a. Nope.
Just the street names and their cross streets and the hundred block that that cross street is. I, we've speculated that it could be like a guide for cab drivers. So they know like if somebody's like, oh, I live in the corner of like Washington and Calhoun.
Oh, so you're saying it doesn't have any sort of like direction, but it's just a list.
Okay, just a list. Yeah.
Yeah, that's a good.
Somebody else, somebody else thought maybe it was for like door to door salespeople, you know, if they're, if they were going around making sure they like hit each block. That's a, that's an interesting guess.
But it was for all the like violent gangs in Fort Wayne when they were negotiating their turf and they're like, we got Franklin fourth. Yeah.
Yes. Put this up. Yeah, it's, it's a, yeah, it's a really interesting, just old document. It goes really well with what I've been looking at and thinking about lately with my great grandfather's notebook. It's kind of ish, maybe around that same time period. So. Thank you Johnny for sending that.
Oh, you're welcome.
Yeah, that's really fun. Last thing I'll mention is talking about zines. My issue two of 404 magazine is out, which was My zine where I take examples of UX writing from various apps and websites and stuff, and I kind of turn them into poetry. And this one, I promise myself that I'm not going to get too fancy with this scene. It's just going to be just like a little fun project. I can do my printer, but I do get a little fancy with it.
He can't help himself, people. He can't help himself.
He's just a little fancy.
The COVID of this is amazing.
I really, really wanted to figure out how to like print like green ink on a black paper to sort of simulate a green screen because I really wanted to use a graphic from like an old Apple II era organ trail, like something that glows. And I was looking into rubber stamps, like rubber stamp ink that I could ink onto a black, like a, like a black paper. But nothing is quite opaque enough. I think we talked about this a little bit here. I talked about it a lot in the RSVP group because that's just full of people who know about rubber stamp ink. So I couldn't figure out how to do that. And eventually what I landed on was I'm just gonna take like a bright like lime green neenah paper and just like print all black on it, like overlay, except for like the spots, you know, that I want to show. So almost like a negative. So the trouble is I can't do this on my printer because, yeah, it just eats through the ink and I don't think it lays it down consistently enough. And I also wanted to do like end to end, like to the bleed, which my printer won't do. So our good friend Ed Kemp, who is a zine extraordinaire, suggested this website called Docu Copies, which is sort of like a Kinko's, but online and for pretty small amount, relatively speaking. I got a bunch of copies of these printed on like it's basically one color on one side of cardstock with special paper. And it was like 80 bucks for 150 sheets, which each sheet has two copies on it because it's a half sheet.
Oh cool.
Quarter sheet zines. So I. 80 bucks for 300, basically 300 copies for the COVID stock. And that was. That was good. So yeah, look, for this I have a. I also what I did was I. The middle spread, I printed that on also in green paper and I made that about like with some original poetry. I rewrote some Emily Dickinson poems and I tried to write an elegy in the style of John Donne for a. Basically, if you had a hard drive that lost your data. It's very bad. I did not do a good job. But that's kind of the point. So. Yeah, so 404 computer, if you want to order a copy of the scene and those are my fresh points.
Andy, how many URLs do you have control of?
Oh, gosh, I don't know. I don't know at this point. For a while, every time we recorded an episode of Dot Grid, I bought a funny domain for like A$50 for a year to go with it. And I since have stopped doing that and I. Yeah, so nowadays it's. I think so. Plumbago XYZ and 404 computer aren't hosted domains. They just forward to like a separate, like a special page on the erasable site or on our site. On my site. But like. Yeah, I. I don't know.
I just. Because I remember in our early days, I just remember there being like a spurt where you had talked about like several. Several in a row that you bought. So I was wondering if that's just something you do.
I. If I can get a 200 domains. Yeah, like often name Namecheap will have like some of the weird domains for like, for cheap. So you can get like a Dot Whiskey or Dot Ninja domain and you know, you buy it for a, for a year for like A$50. And then the next year it's full price. It's like 40 bucks. So sometimes I'll compulsively buy it for a dollar fifty or whatever. And when I see that I'm not going to use it for anything, I just let it expire. But I've done, I've done some good ones. I have Andy Coffee, which was kind of a impulse buy, but I was like, I like this. I'm going to use this. And I have Andy wtf, which is my sort of like personal site. And I think that's a. That was a fun buy. I don't even know why how I came up with 404 computer. But I like it.
I love it. Yeah, it's like one of my favorites.
Yeah, there's some good ones. There's a webcomic artist named Jeff Jacques who writes this comic called Crap. What's it called? Yeah, it's a pretty famous web comic. I'm just drawing a blank right now. But he owns all these like weird domains that just forward to his website. So he'll tweet like new comics app and then it says like forward Fart tennis or whatever, which Is his domain name there? I think one of his domain is Ass Pizza. So I take inspiration from. From him.
Oh, geez.
I wish there was a dot pencil domain because we would go a little wacko with.
Oh, man.
Oh, yeah.
Saturate the market.
Yeah. It's like new erasable episode epic159.
Yeah.
Circumcised that pencil. All right. That is. That is it for me for first point. Good night, guys. Tim has the most exciting update of them all.
Yeah. So let's just keep talking about zines and their intersection with the things we love and. Yeah, so we're going to talk about the newest upcoming issue of plumbago, which is plumbago 8 Andes. Amazing handiwork. And Harry just made so many great issues of that. And I suggested an idea for this next issue that we're going to go with. And so I'll be.
We were like, that's a great idea. You have to do it.
And I'm like, no, no, no, no. Wait, wait, wait, wait.
Yeah.
Yes. But I'm. I'm super excited. And it is the music issue. So we've got, like a lot of ideas kind of floating around. So I think there are a couple different things it could turn into, but we know that at the core of it will be recorded music. And so it's going to be. The zine portion of it will be, you know, at least in my head, is almost like a liner note. It's like a book of liner notes. And we're planning to try to make a physical CD with a cover and everything that is made up of original songs or compositions or spoken word over music or whatever it is that you do. Music from our listeners and from our readers. So I'm really excited about it. We're going to. We're going to be working within the. I mean, I don't know about the booklet yet, but within the. The length of one cd. So if you remember what those are, one compact disc that holds, you know, roughly 80 minutes of music. So it'll be some kind of selection process, but we're just really excited to hear what you guys come up with. There is a. See, Andy, how do they find out about it? I mean, I know there's the email.
Yeah, I sent a big email just today. I posted in the group something about it.
Is there a URL?
Yeah, Plumbago XYZ is another domain that we own.
Well, I was just there and I didn't think, yeah, you can contact us. Yeah, so you can. But you can contact us. Through the website at Plumbago XYZ and pitch us your idea. I mean whatever, whatever you're dreaming up.
So if you're a songwriter or singer or whatever and you have or want to write a song that's sort of plumbago related, right, like something that has to do with pencils or stationary or pens or analog pursuits of creativity, like definitely get in touch with Tim and talk about that because we want to like have maybe a little interview with you and include your music in our, our album or whatever. But also if you're not a songwriter, if you're just you know, regular person like me who is definitely not a songwriter and you, but you love music and you want to write about music or comic about music or illustrate about music or whatever, still submit because I think we'll probably have still like regular plumbago content about music kind of around this big main fe.
So yeah. And those of you who do make some music and we've heard from several people who are interested with both writing songs and composing like instrumental things and you want to write a piece to pair with your music, like a short written piece that'll kind of set up the song that you wrote as much as you'd like to or if you're just not interested in doing that, that's totally fine. We also were considering or we're also open to hearing from those of you who might be, you know, interested in being a sort of liner note writer for one of these other people who, who've written a song. So if somebody submits a song and it's like I don't want to write anything, here's a song. We could share that song with you ahead of time and then you could do a little write up for us to, to pair with it and it could just be whatever, whatever you like. We just, I mean with it being a music issue we, we've. I think we've out of concern that it shouldn't just be audio. Right? That wouldn't make any sense. We've opened it very wide open. So as long as it's music related and how it conjoins with analog Pursuits, then we can't, we really want to hear what you come up with.
Yeah.
So I've working on my as. As the joke goes in in our, in our email. I'm working on my Hamilton style musical about. So I, I wrote Sounds amazing.
I. I wrote a, a couple stanzas of what that might. Oh yeah, might sound like. May I read that to you?
Yes, please, please, please let me Load
my messages up a little bit. My name is Nicholas Jacques Conte. Catch me in the patisserie eating croissante Check out my pencils I'm a flaunt they use my hardness scale from Paris to Vermont.
That's the seed for the whole thing. Now you just have like two and a half hours that you need to fill just that.
Harry had some good. Had some good pencil related, American pie related stuff that was good, but I think the best was bye bye shreds of wood and graphite Use my black wing now it's lacking and it no longer writes and the good old days have come and now they've gone by so I'll drop it in the jar and then cry Drop it in a
jar and then cry
that's fantastic. Yeah, I had another one which is. This one's much more of a deep cut. But like my first, first idea that popped in my head is that I was listening to a lot of big stars, which is like, you know, one of those bands that never made it, but everybody loves them, you know, or just kind of underground influence on a ton of people out there. And they have a song called the Ballad of El Godo. And I was like, oh man, the Ballad of El Casco would be so great. Write a song about trying to find and afford this crazy sharpener and like. But, but yeah, despite these jokes we're making, we are not expecting it to be like a weird OWL album, you know, like parody up. So I mean, it, it's. It's very.
Well, you want your original music, folks.
Yeah.
Although. Although I would totally do a feature where we just write the lyrics from pencil parodies within them. It's within the zine.
Yeah, totally. And. But like the. Don't feel like you just let the song be whatever it is that you want to write. Don't feel like every line of the song needs to be about stationary or every line of the song needs to be about one thing. I mean, it could be a storytelling song that just makes. That mentions a few things or describes things in a way that would kind of hit home with a plumbago reader or a race bull listener.
So we're trying to get this. The deadline for this is June 1st, but we really. That's kind of like the deadline for having finished pieces. Right. That way you can start editing. So if we would really love to hear from you if you have like a seed of an idea or you want to talk at. Through to figure out how to develop it more. Because, you know, I Think that generally makes for a stronger submission. So that's the case. Please try to get that to us earlier than June 1st because. Yeah, because we'll want to help you walk through it. Yeah.
So if you email us your. Your pitch, you can include an MP3, like, sort of demo recording using your phone or whatever. It doesn't need to be the final one that we use. Or you can just pitch the idea in writing and say, you know, this is this. At this point and just say, this is the style of music. I'm thinking I'm going to write a song that might be something like this and. And the conversation will start. We'll go from there. And especially, I guess, those of you who are considering doing, like, instrumental music, I mean, definitely would be great to hear your thoughts in writing so that we can even, like, work back and forth with how to present that and how to communicate that idea in the. In the written portion of your. Of your submission. Yeah, I'm very excited. I'm super duper excited. I. I know somebody who's already. I have one song already submitted.
Oh, wow.
Tell you guys about off. Off mic. It's not me, but anyways, I'm super excited. So plumbago8 gonna be hitting your mailboxes in. In June, the music issue. Plumbago the mixtape.
New mixtape. Dropping new plumbago drops.
Yeah. Put it on SoundCloud. Yeah, that's all I got. That's. That's the big one. That's. I was just looking forward to sharing that. So it's been. It's been good to talk to you guys. I mean, it feels like it's been longer than two weeks. I don't know why it does.
Lots happened since then.
Yeah.
Except for there being a new Blackwing.
Yeah. Thanks. That's. Oh, that's why it feels like it's been so long because we've been waiting.
So just waiting.
And the field notes should be dropping pretty soon.
Yeah, that too. Number 50. Originally, when we were like, hey, let's just do fresh points, because we're surely going to have, you know, new field notes and a new Blackwing by then. But we don't. And don't call me Shirley.
Yeah. When did.
We
talked about the. Or we didn't talk about the field notes thing where they had reached out to subscribers and asking about, like, your favorite editions. Like, what that all means. Like, what is that?
Yeah, I have not been able to answer that because I can't pick 10.
Yeah. I don't. Yeah. I'm so curious. To see what they do. It's definitely not going to be. I wouldn't think it would be something as like, BASIC is just giving you a mix pack with four different notebook or three different notebooks in it. I'm guessing they're gonna do something a little. Little. I wouldn't be opposed to. That actually sounds pretty great. If you got like, you know, the three most beloved ones reprinted and put into a. A pack, or if they jumbled them all up, you know, like, that would be. Yeah, that'd be incredible. If it was like the top 10 and they had. Well, that doesn't make sense because. Multiples of three. But yeah, but yeah, that'd be. That'd be actually really amazing. And it would definitely poke a hole in the. The market for collecting. Collecting some of those.
Yeah. Cool.
Cool. Well, you guys want to wrap it up?
Yeah, sure. Yeah.
So short.
Keep it a showdown.
Yeah. Well, I think hopefully we'll have a couple things to talk about, some extra exciting things to talk about in the next one. So we'll just see. But yeah, so let's tell people where they can find you on the Internet. Andy. She starts up.
Yeah, I'm at Andy WTF as we. As we discussed.
Or Flamboga XYZ or Andy Coffee or
404computer or erasable us whatever.
Or Fart Ninja.
Yeah, I am Andy WTF and Twitter and Instagram as at Awelfley. How about you, Johnny?
I am at only one URL pencil revolution.com and on social media at Pensolution. And you can buy my many zines at Etsy.comshop/pencil revolution.
All right.
I am Tim Wasem. You can follow me on Twitter Tim Wasem. And I'm on Instagram @timothywassum. And you can support the Erasable podcast by signing up at Erasable Us Patreon, where you can support us at many different levels or we have multiple levels, all of which will get you some extra content, some perks. We do a pen podcast just for our Patreon supporters that's called Indelible that you'll get access to. We usually do, you know, about one a month or so. And then we try to also offer special kind of swag, like these T shirts that we were talking about earlier. So those, you know, if you're a supporter at $10, then you will get something sent to you each year, something special that we've put together with the help of our. Sometimes with the help of our community. So. And you can, if you. If you also do support us at that producer level, you can get your name right on the show. Here we go. Adam Prabola, Alex Jonathan Brown, Ali Sarah, Allison Zepeda, Andre Prevost, Andre Torres, Andrew Squish and Sipe, Bill Black, Bill Clow, Bob Otswald, Bobby Letzinger, Chris Jones, Chris L, Chris metzkus, Dave Dave McDonald, Dave Tubman, Diana Oakley, Donnie Pierce, Aaron Willard, Fourth Letter, Hans Noodleman, Harry Marks, Hunter McCain, Jacqueline Myers, Jason Dill, Jason Santa Maria, Jay Newton, Jamalia Joe Crace, John Bannon, KP Kathleen Rogers, Kelton Wiens, Kyle, Mary Collis, Measure Twice, Michael d', Alosa, Michael Hagan, Millie Blackwell, Miriam Bokout, Oa Pryor, Paul Moorhead, Random. Thanks. Stephen Fangsali, Stuart Lennon, Tana Feliz, Terry Beth and Tom Keakley.
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