This transcript was generated from an audio file by AI, and may contain inaccuracies.
Transcript
If Michael Jordan was on the Globetrotters. That's my Hubble game.
Oh, yeah, okay, whatever.
I only barely understand what that statement means.
Hello and welcome to episode 161 of the erasable podcast. I'm Andy Welfle and I'm here with my comrades in graphite. To Tim Wasem and Johnny Gamber. Hey, guys.
Andy.
Hey, Andy.
Hey. Well, we wrested control of the erasable airwaves away from the evil yet iconic duo of Johnny and Charlotte. That was, that was pretty great.
We'll get you next time. Johnny and Charlotte Newton.
She made me do it. Later we're going to catch up with Noah Beer from Maker's Cabinet, the folks who created the Hubble Sharpener about their new pencil focused product on Kickstarter. But first, let's talk about the tools of the trade. Tim, what are you. What are you writing with and consuming?
Well, the most important thing I'm consuming, which has just been really awesome and I'm trying to savor it as much as possible, is the new Hemingway documentary by Ken Burns. So we.
Oh, you didn't finish it yet?
No, we, we subscribed to the PBS documentaries channel on Amazon and.
Oh, neat.
Yeah, it's like four bucks a month or something. And it's just the easiest way to get all those together because I just watch them all the time. So. Yeah, I've watched the first one and I'm halfway through the second one and I seriously am like they're so long. I mean, they're like, it's like six hours total. And I, I'm watching them like 30 minutes at a time or something like that. But it is so good. So Johnny, you've seen the whole thing?
Yeah, you can get a PBS passport for like six bucks I think a month and have like everything on pbs. It's like, ooh, you won't sleep anymore. But yeah, we, it was not spoilers. The middle one was rough because, you know, know his life was rough at that point. Like whenever you read a Hemingway bio, you're like, yeah, that like pre midlife, he's a jerk thing coming on.
Yeah.
But I thought it was really balanced. What did you think?
Yeah, I think they do it. He's doing a really good job and it makes it super. Makes everything feel new. Like the information feels new that you get. I also like that it doesn't have like rose colored glasses or whatever where he'll just be like, here's a bunch of lies he used to tell about himself. You know, like he used to say that he did this. He didn't.
He.
You say that he did this. He didn't, you know, so I like that part of it. And, and I was a little afraid that they were going to like spend too much time on like his like little, like when he was a little kid or something. But that was. I think they sped through that.
Right? Nobody cares about that.
Right at the perfect.
Yeah, they really did.
Perfect pace and a lot of interesting focus on his mom because everybody always talks about his dad because his dad and him, you know, died the same way. But so that he. She usually gets a little less attention, it seems like. And so they talked a lot about his mom and like they had such a great crazy relationship. I don't. I loved it. And also there's just tons of like manuscript pictures that are just really awesome. Like lots of close ups on pencil manuscripts and shots of his desk and all that good stuff. So can't go wrong.
Any picture, any pictures of old pencils?
I haven't found any yet. Johnny's further. He's through it. I haven't seen any, but yeah, you
can identify them though. They had access to the house in Cuba, which was pretty awesome. Did a lot of cool, like long shots with the sunlight coming in the windows.
That's very cool. I heard the other day, and this might be later in the documentary, but I saw it on Twitter and it blew me away that I learned that in 1936, Hemingway's rate that he got paid was a dollar a word in 19. 1936. So that means that if he wrote a 1000 word feature, I mean in today's money, I read that that's like equivalent of writing 1000 word or I think I said page, but 1000 word feature and getting like $19,000. Yeah, like the same person who was sharing that and like had said that like the amount of money he made just from reporting on the Spanish Civil War bought him that crazy house. Like, wow, it's insane. But yeah, that documentary is very good and I can't wait to finish it. But I am definitely not rushing through it and I'll watch it again, I'm sure, but I'm just kind of savoring it. And I am reading the Sympathizer, which has been staring at me from my shelf for a long time because I got it for a really good deal and just had been meaning to get to it, but didn't really. I didn't really have a great understanding of what it was about because I just hadn't looked too Closely, because I just buy books so often. And then I heard it mentioned on. The guys were talking about on Take Note, and it was almost like it just, like, yelled for me off the shelf. And I picked it up, and I think the thing that put me over the edge, that they. Adam described it as a. Adam Webb described it as a spy novel. And I was like, oh, spy novel sounds really good right now. And so I picked it up, but it's very good. So, yeah, the author's name, it's. I'm not sure I'm pronouncing. I'm probably butchered that.
But I think it's just Nguyen.
Nguyen. Okay. So he. He won this book, won the Pulitzer Prize several years ago. So it's awesome. It's written from the perspective of a guy who's in jail, and he's writing it as his confession for something. So a lot of energy, and I. Yeah, it's. It's very cool. A lot of good sentences in there. I'm enjoying that a lot.
They use letters in a very good order.
He's very good at using the letters in order. Yeah. Put words together, make sentences. Is that a Tommy Boy? Top to bottom, left to right, put words together to make sentences. It's called reading. I pull that line out of my students at least once a semester.
But.
And then as far as listening, this is another recent find. But I went to, like, a thrift store in town and went to the records, which is always full of garbage. You know, it's always lots of, like, really disturbing, slightly disturbing Christmas albums and Herb Alpert and Tijuana Brass and obscure classical records. But I found, like, a perfect copy of the Best of the Everly Brothers, which is one of those, like, groups that I hear is, like, you know, all the early rock and roll bands or, like, the 60s bands are, like, influenced by them when they were younger stuff, and. And I should have bought it. And we have been, like, wearing it out on the turntable. It's like, you know, they did the songs like. Like, Bye Bye Love. Remember that song?
Yeah, yeah.
So it's, like, kind of their big hit, but it's a great. It's a great album, and it's a really good, like, palate cleanser to have playing in the house in the background. And it's a lot less dorky than you remember it being, probably.
All right.
And I am writing with a. Because of the Hemingway document, I'm using a very handsome cat pencil that I bought at Hemingway's house in Key west.
That has with a little cat butthole.
Yeah, cat butthole. It is a little hand carved wooden cat that's painted, that is posted on the top of this pencil which is also painted and decorated and it's beautifully sharpened with a hovel. So. And it is almost unusable because of the weight of the cat on the top and the, and the horrifying state of this graphite. But, you know, I thought it was a sensible choice. And I am using, I am using a. An erasable podcast ledger from Write Notepads. Oh, nice. Yeah, I found. Found an old one that has like 20 random pages at the end that I forgot that I didn't use. And so I'm finishing it off right here. So that's me. How about you, Johnny? Nice.
So from Les is last seen useful journaling 1.3 I was sort of going back to the books about journal writing, so I picked up how to Make a Journal of youf Life by Dan Price. Have you guys seen this book?
No, I've never heard of it.
It's the opposite of Writer Carroll. It's a lot of like, hey, don't write sad stuff in this book. Write that in another book. It's a lot of books, but it's, it was interesting and it's. It's like a zine. Like the whole thing is handwritten. But turns out he's like a famous scenester also, so I wish I'd known that going in. I would have appreciated it more. Maybe found some stuff to copy. And I just read a book that I got for Christmas called Burning the Books that was by his name escapes me. He's still a librarian of the Bodleian at Oxford. It's about like collecting knowledge and libraries and archives and also historical attempts to destroy and suppress knowledge. So it was really, really good. One of those like, oh, I better ration this out books. Except that the COVID looked like burned paper in a way that was really just kind of disgusting. So, like, I hope they put a better cover on the paperback because I had a lot of trouble finding reviews of it. Like nobody touched it, but he's like a big deal. And I read on Earth we're Brief, briefly Gorgeous by Ocean Huang, whose name I hope I'm not mispronouncing. Do you guys like his poetry?
Beyond that, that title poem?
Yeah, he, he, like, he's the best at titles like, yeah, everything that. All his poems, his books, they're perfect. I don't know how autobiographical it was, but parts of it were very hard to read. But Also hard to put down. So definitely good book to check out. I think Amazon had it for like 10 bucks. Like can't beat it. And like Tim, I was engrossed in the Hemingway documentary and I've been obsessed with Muse lately, which will show up probably in this month's Patreon playlist. I forgot how ridiculously good they are. And I'm writing with a Generals test scoring 580, which is such a damn good pencil on this nice smooth field notes paper which is the winter edition because the spring edition is still missing. Nice awkward silence
pulling out mine. What do I have going on? Been reading a lot of books lately. I finished a couple of them. One is a book called Four Lost Cities by Annalee Newitz. And they're an author. They live in San Francisco. I'm I think not too far from where I am. I talked about their novel, the history of an Alternate Timeline before. Yeah. Which was really good. Yeah. And I watched a Zoom Book Club meeting about this book. And Annalie Newitz is one of the founders of iO9, which was one of the Gawker science fiction blogs and they are a science writer. So in addition to writing science fiction, they have gone and reported on, visited archaeology sites and reported on four different cities in the history of, of mankind. And they, they talk about Pompeii. They talk about. Oh, what? I. I do not know how to pronounce it, but it is a. Is it. Oh, I'm going to pull up the, the thing here. A neolithic site called Sheltalhiuk in central Turkey, which is several millennia old. Talk about Pompeii. They talk about the city of Angkor in old Cambodia and something that is where St. Louis is today, which was a big mound city called Cahokia and just tells a bunch of stories about it. Tells how people live, they talk, they draw some parallels about like how these cities started to become abandoned. It's just a really engaging, interesting, just, just archaeology book about the history. It's a really good book. It's different from what I usually read, but I, yeah, I really enjoy it. I think that Annalie Newitz is a really good writer. I'll also mention a book that has been making the rounds lately. It's called Mediocre the Dangerous Legacy of White Male America. As somebody who's entrenched in white male America, it's definitely an interesting read. It's just basically about privilege and white supremacy and the history of the US and like how, you know, white people, white men have kind of come in and bungled things. They talk about Buffalo Bill and kind of the Wild west culture and how that happened. They talk about the kind of legacy of football, American football. It's. It's good. It's a. Just a good recounting of things of the history of the US and kind of like how, you know, oftentimes perspective we get through popular culture and through history class is different.
The history of, you know, America, basically.
Yeah. It's just. Yeah. Turns out everything's racist. Everything is reported, like, created and changed and reported on through the eyes of white male America. So. So the author, Ijeoma Lo, also wrote so youo Want to Talk About Race,
which is a really good book.
So this is kind of her follow up to that. And I'm writing with a pencil that I know that we'll Talk about the Blackwing 223. Won't get into too many details there in my Leuchtturm notebook.
What color is your Leuchtturm?
This is still my same one that I've been using. I'm almost, almost finished with it. It's because that dark blue red dots 1.
Oh. I was gonna say you could probably find whatever color it is in that pencil to match.
It's true. That is true.
Couldn't resist.
Yeah. Actually, this. This journal looks really good with the Lake Tahoe Blackwing 70 73. Just like those. Those deep blues, I think look really good together. And I don't think we've ever had like a really good scarlet red blackwing. Right.
The TWA ones. Yeah. It was maybe too bright.
That's a good point. Yeah.
Yeah. When you're saying it's scarlet, I'm thinking like blood red.
Yeah. Yeah. This Red Dots notebook has a really good. Just like bright. Bright red. I think that would look really good with the TW pencil. For sure. Yeah. Cool. Should we get in fresh points? Tim, what do you have going on?
Sounds good. Well, I want to start with super exciting news. It's just an update on Plumbago 8, which we've been working on, which is the. If you haven't heard about it is the music issue. So we've got people submitting both written stuff and music, recorded music, and it's going. It's going really well. I've been really impressed with the stuff that I've heard so far. We've gotten some around 10 music submissions and then a bunch of written submissions. And if, when you're listening to this, it'll probably be, what, the 15th? Something like that. 14th or 15th of April, which means you've got about two weeks left to submit. So get in touch with us if you want to. If you want to do that. We've got everything. We got a really cool spread of submissions so far. We've got people doing. Using stationary sounds to create a track of music, like a rhythmic stationary track. There's. We got a couple people doing something similar to that. We've got singer, songwriter kind of stuff that's coming in that is really great from some familiar, familiar names in the group. It's. It's been a lot of fun. Andy, how are you feeling about the. The written side of things?
I'm feeling great. We have a few really good memoir pieces. Somebody's writing a fictionalized account of some experiences through music that they've had, which is cool. Have a comic by Diana Oakley, who writes the Mad Pantsor comic, which has been in every issue since issue two is back, which is cool. So just got that in today. Yeah, yeah, this is going to be a really good issue. I have some leads I'm trying to track down on designing a cover and I don't know how that's going to go yet, but I really excited about that too. So, yeah, definitely wrapping up submissions and especially, like, just something I'll mention. I would love to see submissions from people of color and from women and from non binary and transgender people. I think we have one woman submitting a song and yeah, I would love to see just some more musical submission diversity from our folks. But yeah, it's going to be good any way you look at it. Yeah.
So if you're out there and you're thinking about submitting something, but maybe you're on the fence. I mean, we're definitely taking like a zine approach to this and so don't think that you have to have some kind of like, crazy recording set up and, you know, some professional quality thing you just get in touch with with us and, you know, email us. It is a bago magazinemail.com. it'll come to all of us. If you're dealing in music, then you'll talk to me and I'll talk to you about recording and what you can do and what I can do on my end to help you. So we'll, we'll do our part to push you over the edge to, to written and recorded or composed and recorded or whatever it is. We're here to help you. And we've been really excited about the stuff we've gotten so far and are always open.
I guess one Thing I want to mention is if you are an illustrator or an artist and you want to just provide an illustration that goes along with some of the stories or written pieces that we have, please get in touch. And also if you are interested in writing some liner notes, like a short little interview or something with a few of these musicians that are submitting, please get in touch as well. We want a little written companion to the. The album in the zine. So we're definitely gonna definitely love to see. See some volunteers there. So. Yeah.
Yep. So you got about two weeks from when you hear this to, to get some things, you know, pitched and, and some hopefully submitted. So just reach out to us as soon as you can. We'd love to hear from you.
Yay.
And other thing. And this is. This kind of rolls into our interview with Noah later on, but I wasn't here the first time that Noah was on the show because I was doing stuff with membership podcast and I missed it. And so I just recently know was super kind enough to along with some of the samples we're going to talk about was able. Was able to send me a hovel which I had never had before, which you guys have had in hand for a while now. And it's actually going to. What I'm about to say is going to sound a little out of place when you listen to the interview because just a little like, you know, inside baseball or whatever. We recorded the interview with Noah like a week and a half ago. So in the meantime, since we interviewed him, I've gotten really good at the hovel and I love it. Like I'm just obsessed with sharpening. I. I just, I just walk out onto the deck and sharpen a pencil with a hovel. Like whenever I've got like a dead few minutes and just like, you know, freehand, I started doing it that way and I just, yeah, I love it. I use it all the time. So I'm in love with this little, little sharpener and I didn't think I would actually when I first got it, I was like, this seems a little fussy, but it's not. I mean it's kind of. It was just like a touch thing. It was like a feel thing. Once I got the feel for it, it was super satisfying. It was better something like. It's like what I wish it felt like when I was knife sharpening, you know, because. Which I do like doing that as well. But it's, it's nice feeling. I wish it was something that I felt a little better like carrying it around with me, you know, but it's such. It's such like an heirloom, beautiful piece of machined brass that I. I just leave it at home and leave it on my desk. But that's. That's it. I just was gonna say that I'm just loving that. I'm loving the hobble and I've. I'm sharpening, like, pencils left and right like crazy.
You're so much better at it than I am, even after two years. So just, like.
It's just.
I don't know what it is. It just, like, clicked with me or it's just like it scratched. Some kind of, like, primal itch to use a knife to sharpen the pencil.
I challenge you to a hovel off for charity.
You're on.
Oh, for charity.
I can show. Never mind all of the paint off of a pencil.
You focus so much on the fact that you can. You haven't asked if you should, though. I just. I just butchered the Ian Malcolm quote from. It's from Jurassic park, but it looks
so old and, like, beat up.
Mine's already. Yeah, looking pretty rough. I love it. It's good. Gets my. This is a throwback to an early episode, but my caustic hands have already started turning the brass, like, different colors. So, yeah, I'm usually covered in coffee oil. That was episode title of, like, episode eight or something, wasn't it? That was, like, a really long time.
Remember that?
That was the. Is when my. When I first got my. My Midori bullet pencil and it, like, immediately started to, like, turn brown as soon as I touched it. Yeah, but you're on gamer.
Yeah, I was tempted to polish mine for the challenge, but.
No, but the thing is, we got to decide if it's going to be, like, who's going to sharpen a pencil or who's going to do some goofy crap and, like, do. It's like trick shooting. It's like the difference between, like. I feel like you're. I feel like I am just some, like, really solid, like, forward on a pro team that, like, scores points quietly and you're like the Harlem Globetrotters and you're, like, doing, like, needlessly stuff.
Get on his level.
If Michael Jordan was on the Globetrotters, that's my Hubble game.
Oh, yeah. Okay. Well, yeah, whatever.
I only barely understand what that even predict that a statement means.
Well, it meant enough to hurt my feelings. So you're. I'm the Michael Jordan. So. Yeah. Loving that hovel. And last thing I've got is.
Yeah.
So Blackwing's been busy.
They have.
With a couple.
Paint shop has been busy.
Yes. Yeah, the paint shop has been busy, and they've got. So we're gonna talk about the 223 later, but they just announced. What was this, like, two days ago? Something like that. But very recently announced their partnership with the Indie. Like, Indie Bookstore Day. So, Andy, you had sent this to me. I hadn't seen it until you sent it over. And I love the idea of it. Of course. Right. Like, I mean, partnering up with indie bookstores is like a perfect, like, home run of what they should be doing and who they should be partnering up with, which I love that. But I hate this pencil.
Yeah. What was that sharpener called where you could, like, connect two different pencils together?
Oh, yeah, I know what you mean.
It was like some sort of, like, Tetris situation, but looks like they. They did that.
Yeah. It looks like an accident kind of.
It's not a happy little accident.
No, it's just. I don't know. I don't like to be. I don't like to dump on things, but I just. I really. When a good cause isn't enough to make me buy a Blackwing every time, when it costs $27 and it's like, I know that not that much of it is going to the cause or whatever, you know? Like, I. This time I just. I'm going to pass on these, but they just look with that, like, kind of sort of like barf yellow eraser that's on it. And I'm just not a fan of this at all. And I was a little disappointed because, like, I want to buy something that's associated with, like, Indie Bookstore Day, but this one.
And I would love to see more design rationale. Right. Like, how. Why does it look the way it does? Like, the. The lower fourth, the third or whatever is like kind of a palomino orangey red.
And then it's almost like coral or something. Yeah, it's like.
Yeah. And then there's a really nice blue. Like, the colors in of themselves are really great, but there's this weird, like, stripe set.
Yeah, it's like those tattoos that the dudes get on their forearm. Like the. Yeah, the, like, stripe to, like, the loop all the way around. Like.
And I think that stripe would look really good on the feral or up higher on the pencil in the.
I really don't understand the white background on the type. Like, white. White text just on that blue would have been better. And then move that line up. And I just wish it was a solid color too. I don't like the. The dual color. It's like just because they can, you know.
Yeah. Partnership. I'm still trying to figure out the partnership too, because, I mean, what it seems like is only independent bookstores are going to be selling these black wings, right? So somebody posted a picture of the like.
Okay, so it's like.
But is there. Is there a certain amount of money that's going to independent bookstore?
I don't think that's the case. So I got a feeling what basically is happening is that if the Indie Bookstore buys 10 dozen of these to sell in their store, that means they're going to make 30 bucks or whatever, you know, Like, I don't know what the profit margin is on black. On black wing.
They'll have people calling them up. Can you ship them to me? No, we don't do that.
Yeah. So me. I should have put. I should have done that one second. And. Because all my. My, My ecstatic hovel talk should have been the end of my. I don't want to end on this fresh point. I gotta find something else. Let me look at my desk. Hang on.
Why don't you take the. The first one on my list? Although that might be even less.
No, it's okay. It's okay. I was just desperately here. Oh, no, no, it's okay. It's okay, guys. I just didn't want to end on that. I do. I mean, it is. It is cool. Here's one. I'll end on a positive. How about that? That's like something like a therap.
Like the.
It is a firm graphite. Right. Which it's.
Yeah.
It's not common to see a custom black wing that's with the firm core, which. That's cool. Like development. So that means that that's possible and that's like out there. So that now they're going to start doing customs with, you know, a more diverse, you know, kinds of. Because they went from. It started out with all balanced, right. And then so now this is just one more. So that's. That's a cool thing.
Yeah.
Yeah, cool. That's all I got. What about you, Johnny?
Well, the new blackwing is out, and so you've been in my place with my kid. Charlotte has a loft bed and the other ones have bunk beds. So Henry held his up to the border along the wall and it disappeared because it matches the border and a nursery. So, like, I have a theory that this pencil was going to not be the ugliest Blackwing ever made. And instead was going to say something about this machine kills fasc.
Yeah.
But everybody guessed it, and they went, hey, let's make something so outlandishly.
Stop the presses.
Yeah.
Nobody will guess what this is.
I would.
And then instead of taking the blue or yellow in it, let's give it an eraser that's the color of dirt. Like, not even potting soil. Like, the kind of dirt you don't want to see.
If it said, this machine kills fastest fascist, I would have gone into, like, hoarding mode, and I probably would have.
Oh, yeah.
Tons of those.
Yeah.
Which.
It's on the box or something, which, like, you know, you can show your box to people.
Yeah. We live in a world where taking a stand against fascists is a political.
Yeah.
I don't understand why they won't just make pencils. Why does everything have to be political? It's like.
Yeah, I heard somewhere that someone accused Blackwing of being very social justice warrior
type because they don't like fascism.
Yeah. Or like, oh, women's right to vote, man. That's a liberal issue. Yeah.
Wow. How dare you? Yeah, so, yeah, I have. We've. And Henry. My Henry has gotten in on this with me, but we've been referring to this edition as the. The Hot Wheels Playmat edition.
That's perfect description.
I will say. I. I did fix that. I sent you guys that picture right where I fixed mine.
I couldn't see what you fixed.
I. I used a black Sharpie and blacked out all the white lines in the middle of the road, which really makes it look like a little, you know, halfway decent. There's something about those lines that makes it. It just like, pushes it over the edge into kind of hokey. I'm still not using them, but.
Yeah, my kids didn't want any of these. Like, hey, you guys want one of these? They're like, no. They turned their noses up.
Rosie just takes it. Just cracks it in half and drops it on the floor.
I like the design in, like, the. The art. Right. Like the. Like spread out of a canvas. You know, it's a very sort of, like, you know, expressionist kind of, like, road. Right. With, you know, kind of green hills and shimmering byway or whatever the heck.
Yeah, that would be.
Whatever that is.
It would be an amazing sleeve tattoo for somebody with a lot of guts and a lot of money. Yeah.
So. So wrapped. Yeah, wrapped. Wrapped like that kind of around an arm would look really good, but wrapped a long way around a Pencil. It just doesn't. It just doesn't do it.
I do like, I always. I do like when you. They have a design where the dozen pencils, like all of them look different. I do like that, like where the, the printing lands on different colors. Like, that was pretty cool to see those lined up at the top.
But yeah, I don't think that's on purpose.
Well, I don't care. I like it. But yeah. And I just like thinking how cool it would have been if they would have done like, even to like stick with the open road kind of thing. If they would have done a pencil that was similar to the, the volume four that had some kind of like textured matte finish that was like a road, you know, and just doing like solid yellow lines down one side of it.
Yeah.
You know what I'm saying? Like, so it was like a black, like a black matted with the dotted like road lines in the middle and then black wing on the other side.
Like.
Yeah, that would be pretty cool.
Yeah. Yeah.
When Eris came, I declared them the ugliest black wings ever made. And somebody said, what about the jade ones? And I said, did you hear me?
So you're like, oh, yeah, did I stutter?
I will take the jade ones four times for a year over this thing.
Yeah, man. Couple big swings.
But yeah, I really like that composition book that they. I haven't seen it in person, but the comp book that they put out to go with it, that's the other
thing that like kind of pissed me off because I was like, why wasn't that the extra. Give us a notebook. Like, those can't cost that much. Like, I mean, postcards, great. But I mean, I don't know, I just. I might have been a little kinder if it was like they would have thrown in one of those notebooks or something with. For subscribers, even though I'm a subscriber and I got mine like a week after that was like they announced it on, on Instagram. So it was like, yeah, spoiled. And then I got them like 10 days later.
Yeah, I just got mine. No, I got them Friday.
I'm a liar.
Yeah.
Yeah.
I think that I'm on their crap list because mine always seemed to seem to come late lately.
Well, here you are. I wonder why.
Yeah. Ever since I said that the eras were the worst put together pencil that was more than 50 cents. I didn't say that.
The thing about that composition book is a bunch of people got theirs and it was sort of like banged and wrinkled And I was looking at the product shot on their website, and if you look at their product picture of this notebook and you look at the bottom, there's like a little wrinkle squish down there. So it seems like. It looks like there may be just kind of, I don't know, just a little fragile.
Oh, I see it.
Yeah.
I mean, the font and the colors on that. Pretty awesome.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Oh, I like that one a lot.
I actually assumed it would be more expensive than that. Yeah. But then I'll have to use one of those pencils.
No,
this is as negative as we get.
Yeah. Sorry, guys.
Sorry, everybody.
No, it's not your fault.
No, I was just apologizing to the listeners. Sorry, ladies and gentlemen.
Yeah, I'm getting really superlative. Ugly.
Ugliest.
Silliest.
Yes.
No, I mean every.
You know, nursery themed.
Yeah, yeah. All series have to have an ugliest. That's how it works.
Yeah, it's true.
It's like Buddhist monks with their, like, sand art. Right. You got to make, like, one imperfection somewhere in the middle.
Yeah.
I hope the next one's just, like, super simple. That's where they shine, I think, that are really.
Yeah.
Straightforward.
Yeah.
Yeah.
So folks should have gotten their issues or their copies of Disposable Number two by now. I only got one back so far last time. I think I sent them out in mid December, Right. As the big mail explosion was hitting and I had no idea it was coming. And I was still getting ones that were returned in, like, late February. So hopefully it's just the one. And I know who that is. We'll get it taken care of. But if you didn't get them, then drop us a note and I'll get one out to you and.
And remind people who you like, how you.
Yeah. If you beck us on Patreon at $5 a month or more, you get disposable four times a year. And we should call it recyclable, because if you don't want it, you know, maybe we should. Yeah. And speaking of zines, that's all I have to talk about. So I put out all 12 issues of pencil Revolution in one volume. That is cheaper and way easier for me to mail. So if you don't have them, save yourself some money and go buy that thing. And by the time this comes out, my April issue will be out, which is called Reduce, Reuse Revolution. And it's about eco pencils and also how none of them are actually eco pencils.
So.
Yeah, that's my short, short zine plug. And that's it.
All right. Well, speaking of zines, I. I'll briefly talk about 404 magazine. I. Yeah, I so sent out. I think I talked already about issue two that has been going out. It's really. Love the color of it. It's really glossy, which is something I wasn't anticipating when I ordered it, but. So this month is National Poetry Month. If you remember, last National Poetry Month we had the amazing poet Kiki Petrosino on talking about poetry. Just kind of in, just in general and you know, writing poetry and having a zine that where I take like interface writing and I sort of turn it into poetry. I was trying to think of something cool to do for National Poetry Month. And I think that means for issue three. We are, we would love to see your original poetry that is inspired by error messages and new product tours and just like words that you find in digital interfaces and websites. So I already have a few really good submissions. I have a poem by a friend of mine about wrestling with a chatbot to try to get them to put her in touch with a human. That's really good.
Sounds biblical.
Yeah, it does. And very existential, right? Like, am I talking to a human being or am I talking to a robot? Like, sometimes you can't tell. I have a few other really good ones. I'm going to be working on some myself. So whether or not it's like in free verse poetry or a style that, you know, you choose, or if you're trying to do a limerick or a sonnet or whatever, I would love to hear from you. Johnny. You gasped.
Oh, I was, I was thinking limerick and you said it.
Oh, yeah.
What is your policy on blue language?
Let me finish this form.
Can I use the F word?
Depends on the context. I might be willing to go for it.
I can always invent a context for that.
Yeah. Yeah. Let's talk Excellent Blue language. So, yeah, 404 magazine issue, issue three will be really good. If you go to 404 computer, you can read more about that. Wanted to give a couple quick updates. One is about the if you're a patreon subscriber at $10 a month or more, you and you have signed up before April 1, you are getting a T shirt. Really? You should have gotten a T shirt. I sent a bunch of them out and except maybe for some people overseas, they should be. They should have arrived by now. If that is not the case, please get in touch with me. And finally, something we are trying to do here to do more of is start doing transcripts of episodes. So I think I've talked about this before. I don't know if I've done it here, but there's a, there's a new editing app that I'm using called descript, which lets you edit audio. Sort of like you're editing like a word processing document. It kind of generates an auto. Trans. Auto generates a transcript for you. And it's not super accurate, but it gives you a baseline transcript to work with. And we have a really, really wonderful group of volunteers, dedicated erasable volunteers who are taking 10 minute chunks of this transcript and copy editing it. So we, we did this for episode one. 160. I'm sorry, 159 and 160. And if you go to the episode page on erasable us, you can read the transcripts. So if we have people who are hard of hearing or deaf or just plain don't want to listen to us blather on, they can read us blathering on. Yeah.
So if we're better on paper is what you're saying.
That's true. It's true. If this is something that you are interested in helping with, we would love, we would love your help. So get in touch and we can figure out how this workflow is working. It's kind of still an experiment. We are not to the point where we can release transcripts at the same time as we're releasing episodes. We're maybe like a week or so behind, but it's. Yeah, it's a good start. Yeah. All right, guys, should we, should we get into, get into the main topic? Yeah, get Noah on the horn. All right. And for our main topic today, we are joined by a familiar voice. You may remember Noah Beer from Maker's Cabinet, who came on the show in 2019 on episode 111 to talk about the Hubble, which is that very solid brass plain pencil sharpener that we've, we've talked about a few times since then. So we're going to chat about a really cool new pencil related project launch with him and also some of the things that they've launched since then, which is, you know, we have, we have in our hands. So. Noah, welcome.
Hi. Nice to meet you guys. Not me.
Yeah, see you again. It's been. Wow. It was only in 2019, but it feels like, feels like a lifetime ago.
Yeah, A lot has changed since then.
So Noah, for people who may not have heard that episode, would you tell us a little Bit about yourself and maker's Cabinet.
So my name is Noah from London. I'm one of the of maker's cabinets. What makers create beautiful drawing and writing tools that last a lifetime or more? Currently, we heat main products, including the Hovel pencil sharpener, the Iris drawing compass and the sri, a folding ruler. And what we try and do is to create products which inspire creativity, are a joy to use, and you keep them for a lifetime so they continue on your creative journey for the whole of your life. And they're made and durable and to just be.
And they are very solid brass, so you can also bludgeon somebody with it if you want to.
That's a secondary feature.
Yes.
Put that on your website.
Is it.
What.
Can you legally carry the Striya in the uk?
Yeah, I think so. We did play like a bit like a butterfly knife because you can flick it open and I haven't had to ever use it or get anywhere near someone that would test me and make me pull it out.
We're Americans, so we just want to turn everything into a weapon. So, yeah, these are.
Yeah, so it's. It's interesting to hear when we talk on the Erasable Group about, you know, carrying a pocket knife to sharpen your pencils, and folks in some other countries are like, we, we can't do that.
I think three inches is the. Isn't that the maximum size, at least in the uk?
Yeah, I think you can. I think you can do that. And I think that if you are someone like me who will carry quite a wide selection of pencils that a police officer has never seen before and you can tell them all of the characteristics, they will probably believe you, that you're a pencil nerd rather than a, I don't know, an aggressive individual.
That's a good point.
So it doesn't just feel like a long time since you were on Erasable. It's been a while, insofar as the products you guys are putting out. So since then you've put out two of your three products. Can you talk to us about the Stria ruler, which is the brass ruler that folds in half that I can't put down and that my son won't put down and it's going to fall eventually.
It has the most satisfying little clicky sound inside of it. Yeah.
Oh, my God.
When you.
It's my new fidget toy.
So with the stria, we launched it on Kickstarter and designed it after the second product, the Iris drawing compass. And he thought of doing a folding ruler was because from our previous campaigns, we'd sort of built up a little bit of a community of followers and people that were starting to send us ideas for things they'd like us to have a go at designing. One of the things that popped up quite a lot was a folding ruler. And we were reminded of the plastic folding rulers we were given or we used in school, often minutes until they snapped. I do remember trying to play like, what's it called, Smoke, when you, like, put it against your desk and you strum it. But I'm sure that wasn't great for its structural integrity. So we thought we'd make one that was really, really durable and satisfying. We thought about different methods for it to fold up and we want a rotation. And from our experience doing woodworking, which is also where we found our inspiration for the hovel pencil sharpener, we used sort of tail joint for the form of the hinge. So one of the arms rotates around the other one and there's like a dovetail hinge. So we've also put inside of it, as the guys have already mentioned, some, like little grub screws which click into place at 45 degree angles. So it makes a really satisfying sound so that you can easily. But it also makes a bit of a nice fidget toy. So not like this, but in some Zoom meetings, you will hear me clicking. Click, click, click, click, open, open, close. But yeah, just to have on your desk and around you whilst you draw.
And Johnny, I don't know if you got this, but yeah, we can hear that. That's amazing. Did you understand right off, as I did not, what that little screw is that came with it? I did.
Is that super nerdy?
No, I mean, that was. I had to ask Noah before you got in the call. So there's. There's a little brass, a neural screw that comes with it that you use to sort of like tighten the. The hinge on the stria that. I just like it. It. I. I had no idea what it was for, but that, yeah, it makes a lot of sense. And then, Noah, what did you say about what you can do, what else you can do with this?
So you use the little thumb screw to adjust the hinge so you can make the resistance of the arms tighter or looser. And then we were having these little hex office and we kept losing them because they're so small. So we thought, why don't we put it somewhere where we will never lose it so you can basically stow the little thumb screw in your hovel. So know that you've also got your thumb screw for adjusting Austria.
That's really clever. I, I have been getting ads for just like crazy on Instagram for the next thing, which is the iris, which is I, I mean, I understand sort of the action of that iris, but only in the context of cameras.
Right.
I have never, I'm not really much of a drawer, but the idea of using an iris to draw circles is just such an interesting idea to me. Can you talk a little bit about where the idea came from for that, how this came into the world?
Uh huh.
Yeah.
So funny. When we were first starting out, my two business partners, Ben and Odin had met for the first and then went round to Odin's for the first time to see his student dorms. And he walked into Odin's bedroom and the room was filled with drawings of circles. And what Odin was, had done was he was trying to master the technique of drawing a circle perfectly with no aids. And I can imagine this, and I've seen Odin's drawings and I can really imagine that they probably weren't that close to a perfect circle. So we knew that there was something there. And that like the traditional drawing compass where you have the hole in the center of your page, was not something that we enjoyed using. And that what we would usually use was little cups, paint tins, just anything that was round and around our desk as well. So what we wanted to do was create something that would give you that same sense or like that same stencil use, but was scalable. And then we ran with cameras one day and it struck us that the aperture was a really great, great way of creating a scalable stencil. So you would just set it to the diameter of your choice and then take your writing instrument, preferably a pencil, and use it to draw a circle.
Do you want to know what my favorite little hidden feature of this thing is that I just realized this morning when I was playing with it is on the back of the iris. The, the words iris and then the maker's cabinet logo are like laser etched on it, but only when it comes to an almost close do they show up. So it's like a little movie animation, right? Like you're closing the iris and then all of a sudden the words just sort of like come together.
Yeah, it's like you're in little stop motion before your very eyes.
Yeah.
So what are some 10 millimeter mark? So if you ever want to find it easily, you can just easily scale down to that and then just do that. Check out the back of it.
What are some use cases for this iris? Is it based off of. Is this based off a design like the. You know, the hovel is based off a wood planer, or is this like kind of an original design?
It's an original design. From what we know, it's the first use of a aperture for drawing a circle. Most apertures aren't round, as you'll notice from cameras. So what? We had to make sure that the circles were as close to being round as possible with it and drawing circles. You can also use it to measure circles, measure a pipe and put something around it. It's great for that too. So, yeah, it's good for drawing circles, but also measuring round things too.
Oh, that's really cool. So, you know, that thing has a lot of moving parts, and I can't imagine how complicated this was to design. But with the hovel, you used to post on Instagram a lot of your, like, prototypes, and they were 3D printed and such, and the hovel is so precise in the way that where you grip it and the angle of the blade. So I'm wondering which one was harder to design and sort of manufacture.
I think it was definitely the Iris. I think that with the hovel, we found it very difficult because it was the first thing that we had taken from idea to production and that had taught us a lot. But then the Iris, because there are many more moving parts in it, there's a bit more. There's a few more, like, processing involved with it. It's not just one material like the hovel, there's also the stainless steel that's made it a lot harder. And people often ask us, like, whether it's taken a lot of maths to design it. And I think that if we had initially, initially started it with the most precise maths, then it would have been a lot easier. But I remember with one of our first prototypes, we wanted to add the scale, which helps you to. And the way that we had done that was that we had opened the iris, closing it by a millimeter at a time and marking down to create this. Yeah, it was pretty difficult to produce. But now, after we've produced and we've made the second version, which is what you guys have, it's become a lot easier. And you may have also noticed that there have been some fakes produced on Amazon.
Yes, yes, I have noticed those.
Yeah. So when we just finished our Kickstarter campaign ads where they had used our videos, which was actually my hands using the Iris and Ben My business partner filming me using it, and they used these ads, sell a fake version, which is vastly inferior in quality, often breaks. And also, it's just a piece of rubbish compared to what we've done. It does. Yeah. Yeah.
I remember I had a conversation with just online with the Baron Fig guys, and they have people who, like, you know, would replicate the Confidant notebook, like, well, after they. Yeah. And, yeah, it's. It's. It's amazing how quickly those can pop up. Right. Like, people are. I mean, even, you know, even though it is a vastly inferior product and it breaks, like, you have to admire how fast they can sort of, like, make that happen.
I know it's something to admire.
I think copies of the Parker 51 copies for the new one actually came
out,
the Parklet 51. So what is the difference between the first and the second iris?
So with the first iris, it didn't have a texture on the top. And there's a couple of reasons why we hadn't added a texture. Firstly, it out, and we love people. So when we ended up mass producing it, it also had a different sort of finish to the one that we had done ourselves. So we found that people weren't getting enough grip on it. And we actually had a really. Where Adam Savage from mythbusters had bought one of our irises and was showing it on his channel and that we would have a look at that. And we thought, if Adam Savage, our, like, God or our, like, role model, is telling us to a design change, then we've got to listen to him and make that change for all this. So the new version has this extra texture, which makes it much more easy to grip. And then we've also added a little bit of grease and changed the tolerances so just so it moves extra smoothly and satisfying.
Yeah. Nice.
So, aside from the brand, what's changed, if anything, about the hovel since we last spoke, or I guess, I mean, I unfortunately missed that episode, but since I listened to that episode in January of 2019 when you. When you joined.
So not much has changed for the hovel Marvel itself. We've kind of worked on the accessories with it, but not much has changed with that. However, there has been a lot with the brand that's changed. So we changed our name, so we're now Maker's Cabinet, as you guys introduced before, and that made much more sense to us than our previous name and was also a lot easier for us to spell when we were on the phone to people, too. So that was. We finished university, which was something that happened last summer, so a lot of you don't know.
But.
But whilst congratulations, thank you very much, Shout out to the class of 2020. And that was quite nice. So we've also just moved into a new office space, so anyone listening is invited to come pop by for a coffee at some point if you're ever in East London. So that means we can do developing the products and it's just nice working out of our, like student dorms buyers too. So we brought some more people onto the team. So I don't know whether this is okay, but I thought I'd just shout out Will, Alex, Sharina and Tricia, our new stars who are really like giving us some expert that we didn't have before.
Welcome to the team, everybody. That's awesome. I was going to be in London in June of last year for a conference which of course didn't happen. So someday I will again be in London and have coffee with you in East London. So going back to the hovel a little bit, do you. So this is something that we noticed and actually what we named our episode last time after it gave us a point that kind of looks like the Eiffel Tower. Do you get so many photos of people showing off their extreme pencil points?
Yeah, 100%. So many. I think we were even inspired by that that we've started to make these little postcards with our friend Brie where we show a whole array of different points that you can achieve. So you can make the Darth Maul where it's sharp on both ends, or the mohawk with the flap that like shortened end and then led the impaler, which is like the really vicious.
Noah, can we use that postcard as our episode title cover art?
Of course, yeah. Yeah, I can send it over to you. I was amazing. I was also thinking, I don't know how, but maybe we could give you the design file. I don't know if people want to print it off or something too. Maybe. Yeah, the postcard to everyone in the group. But if they could print it off, that would be nice.
That would be amazing. Yeah, you could sell prints, make a poster of just like really weird. I don't know if you saw our last episode cover art, episode 159, but Johnny had a very strange, disturbing point.
Oh, yeah.
That wasn't from a. Was it?
I think it's pretty awkward. It doesn't necessarily change the art each week.
Yeah.
So I'm sorry that I'm not listening on your website or the Patreon. Sorry.
About that.
You don't want. You don't want to see this particular point. I don't think you made that with the Hubble, did you, Johnny?
No, I made that with a pocket knife, but usually when I do it with a hovel, I'll leave like 2 inches of wood so that I'm holding wood the whole time and it feels really nice.
Nice, yeah.
So speaking of extended pencil things, you have an upcoming release that is a pencil extender slash holder. Can you talk about that a little bit and tell us why it's different from the limited number that are already on the market?
Yes, totally. So. So depending on when this podcast is going out, it might be live on Kickstarter and what it is called feral. And what it is is a pencil extender which will take your tiny nubs and put them into this, like, beautifully crafted holder and extend them. The reason why we had come up with this was because I had noticed a lot of people comparing their nubs and their nub jars in the group, and I thought that there was really something missing because all of the extenders were kind of antiques. And as lovely as they are, I thought we needed a new one. So what we did was we take. We put them into this beautiful collet mechanism, which is sort of lined in milling machines, and then it basically hugs the pencil tightly, full length, and get all that graphite out.
Hmm, That's a great idea. It has a great title too. Just the Ferrule. Just very simple.
Yeah, it is. We wanted to just shine the light on that little bit that often gets overlooked on the pencil and out the ferrule. So the ferrule is the thing that you keep, and it's because it rests so nicely in your hand and it's doing all but the graphite is just sitting there nicely inside, working away.
So how big of a pencil nub fits in?
So we're gonna have our own that come with it. They're a little bit small, but you can sort of take any. Used a quarter of it or so. And then you can also. Yeah. Between 7 and 8 millimeters inside of it.
How heavy is it? I'm curious, just imagining, compared to your
striat, you know, you can also bludgeon somebody with.
No, we've actually tried really hard to make it not as light as possible, but to make it as balanced. So it should be about 45 grams, so it won't be so heavy in your hand. And also you've got the wood in the pencil, which is sort of balancing it on Your page too. So you're in your hand and it'll be more heavy than a normal pencil. But some people like that. It means they can be a bit more cursive or with their handwriting or when drawing too.
Yeah, yeah. And so like you had mentioned, like once a pencil gets to a certain length. But does it. I mean, does. Does it have like an aperture or whatever that opens up enough to fit like.
Like
slightly larger, like diameter pencils or mainly just like any traditional size pencil?
Yeah, so it has it. So the collets will open up between 7 and 8 millimeters. So most pencils are within that range. It won't. It won't fit. One of my favorite pencils, which is the. I think it's called the Vik. The Viking Micro or Micro, which is like this tiny. Tiny. It's even. It's like half the size of a golf pencil. Pencils that are within that. Well, all pencils in that size. That hex, round, triangular, whatever, those colored pencils. If you can get a makeup pencil that's that size, that will go in there too.
So I know that back in 2018, you had some really interesting photos of brass pencil holders on Instagram. So it seems like maybe you've been thinking about maybe the basics of this for a while. What. And correct me if, you know if I'm wrong there, but what made 2021 the right time to roll this out?
Yeah, you're right. I can't believe you spotted that. But yeah, we were playing with that just around the same time as the iris. We thought it could be a really cool thing to go with the iris. It might make drawing the circle easier. And then we sort of found that it does a little bit, but not really enough. And then we sort of thinking. Started thinking about how we would hold the pencil in place and which we've used with the collet. It is something that is quite technical and precise. So we put it on the back burner until we sort of had the capabilities and knowledge to do it it. And we're now at that point since we've. We can devote all our time to it. We've got the team available to help us with it. So the best time to do it because it would also with the other products too.
So on your website you have pictures of black wings and you guys sell black wings. So I have to ask, because this is erasable, what are some of your favorite pencils and pencil accessories that aren't made by you?
Yeah, so we are. We are big fans of black wings. And I've got to say, I think iron pencils was one. They came out with Never Walk Alone pencil. It just meant a lot to me. Never really seen a pencil or felt that much with a pencil. So that was one that I really like. And I think that I'm not likely to ever use or use them. They'll just be on my desk as a reminder. But anyway, I do have some other pencils which I do really like and I have a thing for the naturals, so. As in the Blackwing naturals, but also just other natural lacquers. So the Viking Rolo is one of my favorites. And there's also. I don't. But there's like a, a tombow that's a recycled tombow with this like really crazy finger joint.
Oh yeah, yeah, I love that one. Is that the, the 9550? No, that's not that one. I know which one you're talking about. It's great.
Yeah, it's so cool. It's. I, I just like stare at it and twist it in my hand and I can't think of how they've managed to do that.
Have you, have you ever used a Tennessee Red? That must be.
I have, yeah. That was also another one that, that I, I love because the smell is just amazing. I wish I could bottle it and wear it. And I ordered from, from Musgrave. It's often quite expensive to buy things in the UK from the States. So when I do order things like them, I have to buy a load of things all at once. So yeah, I got that whole box which sits proudly on my desk and then there's some other little things that I'd love to try. And I've seen the, the Caran d' Ache sharpening machine and there's like this, this new Eve's Klein blue one which I think looks really nice and I'd love to try it out because it's like potential competitor to the Hovel, but I don't think it's quite the same. And then little accessories. There's a notebook brand which are like a London based brand called Mark and Fold. And it's just really, really high quality notebooks. And the person that. Her name is Amy. Sure. She's like done a whole like master's degree in paper and like did a whole thesis looking into like what paper is best for certain people. So like you can tell with them that like they've really, really crafted the product and that like the notebook is just so satisfying to use.
No. Is that Markham Fold. The name of the company.
Yeah, Mark and Fold. So it's like MrK and then A plus symbol and then F O L D. Hmm.
I don't think I've. Have you guys heard of that? Tiny team?
I've never heard of that. Yeah.
Yes, I will. I'll go look. Look for it. That would be. That sounds fun. I really. I think that there's a lot of. I hate using this word because it's such a corporate buzzword, but I think that there are a lot of interesting sort of like, synergies between Maker's Cabinet and Baron Fig. I would love to see some sort of a collaboration with the two of you.
Yeah. I think I should try and reach out to them at some point.
Yeah. I think what your two companies make are very complementary to each other. They don't really make highly mechanical things like the iris or the hovel, and you don't make sort of the consumables like they do. So I think that there's some really interesting overlap. Yeah, cool.
Well, I will. I will have to think about that. Do you know the guys that. Do you know the guys from them? Because I know that they made.
I do.
Did they make it? They made like a special erasables, wood pencil.
The Squire.
The Squire, Yep.
Yeah, yeah, we've had. We've had. It's actually been a little bit since we've had them on the show, but, like, yeah, we've. We've had them on quite a bit before and, yeah, we kind of got to know them around the time that the Confidant was released, which is their big sort of signature notebooks. So. Yeah, yeah, yeah, that would be a fun collab. We're just assembling our dream team, our fantasy stationary team here,
Tim, the Hubble. We're wondering, is there any plan for another type of sharpener, like maybe a more conventional style sharpener in the future?
Sorry to disappoint, but not really. I think that we put a lot into the Hubble and we honestly think nothing's going to beat it in terms of sharpening. I think that we are the best at using it in the world, us three and I didn't. So we're probably biased, but I don't. We're really not into conventional sharpeners. We're really over the. The rotation and much more into the plane.
Yeah, yeah, it's. I just.
You.
Thank you so much. You sent me one and I got it yesterday, luckily, and I think it was maybe two days ago, but I've been playing with it pretty much constantly since then. And it is, it's super fun. Like when you hit that kind of like hit your stride with it and suddenly it all kind of clicks in. You're like, oh, now I understand like, I know I understand like the feel or kind of like the, the how, how much touch and feel it has to it as opposed to just kind of like the brute force of other kinds of, of sharpening. And so I, I really enjoy doing it. I'm still trying to, still trying to master using it on like a, like a black wing, the matte kind. But yeah, I love it.
Have you tried it with the bass?
Yes, yes. That's mostly what I've done. I haven't actually tried the freehand style yet, so. But I'm still, still learning and still enjoying myself, so.
Good to hear.
Yeah, I think the world is ready for one of those sharpeners from like the 1930s where you put the pencil in and you, you like turn a crank and there's like, it turns the pencil a little bit and there's a little like blade that comes down and chops off a little bit.
Then it turns the pencil a little bit.
Yeah, comes down.
Maybe you can think about bringing one of those back because those are a lot of fun.
Yeah, I've seen these. I don't know if you've seen them. That's going viral. Which was of a double edged razor blade that would like get turned on a stone and sharpened and then flipped over.
Yeah, I've seen those.
So I think that we should have to think about a blade sharpener so that we can have a blade that you keep forever. Just sharpen it when it's dull. But we don't have plans for that yet. But we can always have a think about that.
We'll have you on again in 2023 and talk about it. So speaking about the future, I guess the last question we have here for you, something you talk about a lot, especially in regards to these things you sell, is the idea of a future, a future antique and something that will last a generation or more. And it's interesting that we're, it's a cool idea to think about that we're using a tool for like a certain amount of time and that we can pass it along to somebody else. I know that Johnny's talked a lot about how his kids like have already decided what they want when he's dead. I don't have kids so I assume it'll just be an estate sale. What is it like to think about people who will be using your products a generation or two from now, even if, hopefully not not. But even if your company is no longer around. Like, what are some design considerations for that?
Well, I think that we, we try and design things that they are somewhat future proof. Like there's not much you can really do to your hovel to destroy it. And if there was something you could do, we try and help you fix it or replace it rather than it just being completely defunct. But I think the idea of having something that lasts so long is just a really nice pleasing thing when so much of our lives is just sort of throw away or consumed or consumable. Sorry. And I'm really hoping that one day I'm going to be visiting like one of the malls that I visited when I went to the States a couple of years ago. Hopefully not one of your like estate sales in the future. But. But like I really hope that one day I do lots of pencils, my designs and. Or like one of the team's designs and the life that it's had and our creative tools, how they may have been, I don't know, imbued with the user's creative spirit. It may have been with them at their like, lowest and their highest moments. And then there's also. I really love the idea of that you hear these stories from the Second World War, soldiers whose lives were saved with their like trusty Zippo in their top pocket. And I would like, love to think that one of our products was doing the same for someone. Hopefully not involving any guns or bullets, but just that one of these things is there as like a lifesaver and it's someone's life as one of those items.
Oh man. Kids, your grandkids sharpening your pencil on a hovel that has a bullet in it.
I love the idea of just running across something that you made in kind of an antique mall, something that's treasured. Yeah. No, before we go, is there anything that we did not cover that you want to talk about?
I don't know if you like what I've said and you're interested to hear about or see the feral. You should just check out our Kickstarter campaign. But yeah, it's really great to speak to you guys again and well, I love the community and. Stay well everyone.
Yeah, our pleasure. And thank you for getting one of our T shirts. I hear that you got the T shirt in a really lovely kind of like pale pink.
Yeah, I did. It's going through the USPS system, so I'm Holding. I hope it's here.
Good luck with the hat.
It's totally fine. I know it all too well. But yeah, I just checked it just before I joined the Call today and it's just coming through New York, so it would have traveled a lot more than me this, this past year. So I can't wait.
Yeah, well, no, where can can people find you and then Maker's Cabinet on. On the Internet.
So you can find Maker's Cabinet on Instagram. So just Akerscabinet. You can find our website, www.makerscabinet.com in the group, in the Erasables group, you can find, you know, yeah, just, I'd love to chat.
Perfect. Well, thank you again for your time and yeah, we can't, we can't wait to see these ferals. So Johnny, where can people find you on the Internet?
You could find me@pencilrevolution.com and on social media at Pennsolution. Right.
Tim, how about you?
You. You can find me on Twitter timwassom and I'm on Instagram timothywassum.
Nice. And I am @andy WTF and Twitter and Instagram as wellfly. This is the Erasable podcast. You can find out more about us at our website at Erasable Us, this episode is episode 161 and you can find a transcript and show notes and the recording at erasable US161 you can find us on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram as erasablepodcast. Come join our Facebook group, which is facebook.comgroups erasable. It's a really great community. We also have a Patreon. If you feel like supporting us, we could really use your support. Patreon.com erasable and speaking of which, we have several people who support us at the producer level, which is $10 a month or more. And those folks are in no particular alphabetical order or whatever it is. Larae Smith, Phil Munson, Nate Rabeck, Donnie Pierce, Bill Black, Miriam Burkhout Dave Harry Marks Allison Zepeda, Diana Oakley Tom Keakley, Andre Torres Kyle Paul Moorhead, Andrew Squish, Alicera Jamelia, Stephen Finsale, Greg Broughton, Aaron Willard, O.A. pryor, K.P. millie Blackwell, Chris L. Hunter McCain, Bob Ostwald, Michael Diallosa, Adam Prebala, Jacqueline R. Myers Tana Feliz, Ann Sipe, Joe Crace Measure Twice Michael Hagen, Chris Metzkis Studio Delger John Boehner, Bill Clow Random Thinks Jason Deal, Dave McDonald, Mary Collis, Alex Jonathan Brown, Andre Prevost, Kathleen Rogers, Bobby Lutzinger, Fourth Letter Kelton Wiens, Scott Hayes, Hans Noodleman, Terry Beth, Jay Newton, Stuart Lennon, Dave Tubman, Chris Jones, and John Wood. Wow. So thank you everybody for supporting the Erasable podcast, and we will talk to you again soon. Do you like our podcast? Most people like our podcast, but if you like our podcast, David will turn it off.