This transcript was generated from an audio file by AI, and may contain inaccuracies.
Transcript
But. And it comes in a box like Baron Figs. But the box is a little beefier, kind of like unnecessarily Beefy.
Unnecessarily Beefy is my band name.
It's my memoir title.
That's what I say now. Instead of dad bod, I'm unnecessarily beefy.
Hello and welcome to episode 216 of the erasable podcast. Happy equinox to everyone out there in podcast land. We haven't gotten to rap about Tools of the Trade in a few weeks, so tonight join us for a slightly deep dive into what we've been up to and what we've been using. And at the end, we will talk about the next installment of the Erasable Book Club, which we haven't done in a while. So I'm really excited about that and this was an excellent choice. So thank you to Andy. So we'll get to that in a little bit though. But I gotta thank my buddies and welcome them here. Andy, Johnny, it's good to hear your voices.
Hello.
It's good to talk wise.
Yeah.
I'm hugging you both through the microphone.
Johnny, what did, what did you put in the. What is this picture that you just put in the duck?
Oh, that's Williams and Comps of Sherman. It's related to one of my tools of the trade.
Okay, okay.
Spoiler alert.
Yeah.
Yeah.
I almost very confidently was like Ulysses S. Grant. Why is he there?
Just a rugged Civil War looking guy.
Yes.
Yeah, no, Grant, like actually like tucked his shirt in and stuff and shaved his hair. Nerd president.
Yeah. So let's, let's dive right into it and let's, let's start with Tools of Trade. I feel like that's how we catch up anyways when we're just chatting with each other. So let's start with it. And Johnny, why don't you jump in and start us out, Tell us what you've been into. Sure.
I'm going to mix up the order of stuff that I actually consumed and start with the March, which was 2005 novel by E.L. doctorow, who I've always been a big fan of, but for some reason I didn't never knew this book came out. And I'm a big fan of the first half of Sherman's life. You know, the whole thing about killing all the buffalo later was not my favorite half of his life. But I don't know, there's something I like about him and Uncle Billy.
So I really hate those buffalo. They really had it coming.
He wanted to get rid of the natives. So he said, kill all the buffalo. They'll go away. And it worked. I mean, I guess you could have just killed all the natives, but it probably went a lot harder because buffalo don't fight back. Not usually, but. So I don't know if you guys are Dr. O fans, but, you know, he always writes his novels, you know, in a historical period, often with real people, usually in New York. So this was different, but it's. It has like, 15 or 20 different protagonists that it goes through, starting with after Atlanta and then all the way up to the surrender of Joe Johnson or Joe Jackson. Oh, my God, I can't remember. But, yeah, it's like Sherman's. Sorry.
No, sorry.
Never mind.
As a baseball reference, those of you out there about that one, the three people who get that, enjoy that. Shoeless Joe Jackson could have been one of the greatest baseball players ever bet on himself with the Black Sox scandal, was banned from Major League Baseball. Go on. You can.
You can keep watching.
You know, there. There are a few generals that are characters or officers. Of course, Sherman plays in himself a little bit. There's a really good line where a freed slave was going north with a Union soldier, and she's like, is it any different up there? And he just looks at her and goes, no. And that was one of the last lines of the book. This was really good. I think it was a finalist for the Pulitzer, but it won Penn, Faulkner, and it won the National Book Critics Award. So, yeah, I don't know. I'm embarrassed I didn't know about it. I got it as a gift. And on the other side of that, the other three books I read recently, the Library Thief, Fahrenheit 451, and the Bookbinder, or in England, the Bookbinder of Jericho, are all unconsciously related to libraries and books. But I don't have to tell anybody about Fahrenheit 451 or how I'm embarrassed that I never read it before. But did we talk about the Library Thief before? It's sort of a contemporary novel, but, yeah, that's. It's. I don't know how you could talk about it without spoilers. So I just will say, if you like books and if you like the power of libraries, you should read it.
If you like stealing libraries.
Yeah, that would be
how. You son of a gun. I'm in.
And most of the book, you're like, what.
What.
What do you mean, library thief? Until the very end. But I haven't finished the book binder. Because now I started our other book, but the book binder was. It's by Pip Williams, who wrote Dictionary of Lost Words was some sort of like famous with Reese Witherspoon pick. But I, I forgot about its existence and came across a video of Pip Williams binding her own book and was like, ooh. So is the library of lost words
the one about, like, there's a group who is basically putting together the Oxford English Dictionary. I think it is something else.
That's the history of Right or. No, that is about that. Nonfiction.
Yeah, though there's something along those lines in the book binder, but it's not. It's a supplement to the Oxford English Dictionary. No spoilers, but yeah. Otherwise I just like, watch way too much British tv. If you don't have Britbox, I don't know why not. You can't watch the responder, which is Martin Freeman, like dropping F bombs, like eye drop stubble. It's like crazy.
What are you gonna do when you run out of Britbox, Johnny?
You don't.
They in Infinite tv, they only have three channels. So how many shows could be left for you to watch?
No, they, they are. It's owned by ITV and the BBC and they keep taking their shows back from other streaming services when the contracts were out. But then they have all these cool new shows and you know, you're like, oh, man, it sucks that that was a six episode season. But, oh, this other show's out and this is the time of year all the. A lot of the good stuff is coming out on PBS until what, the new year when All Creatures will be back. But Vander Voic, I'll finish the new season today, even though it's not out yet. But if you have, you know, your PBS passport, you get it the first night. But I don't know if you. Have you guys seen that show before?
Which one?
It's called Vander Voic. It's about the eponymous detective, but it's set in Amsterdam, but it has an all British cast. But they film in Amsterdam, which is cool, but Darren Da Silva, who I really like, has a big part in there. He's the medical examiner who drinks too much, has a lot of tattoos and plays saxophone to dead people. My kind of show. Yeah. I mean, I could go on and on about British shows, but I will not. And mostly I've been listening to stuff that'll start playing on Spotify when you're finished listening to what you're listening to. And Spotify identifies it as dark metal, but none of it's metal. It's. I don't know, it sounds like people who didn't grow up in the 80s making 80s inspired dark techno songs. But sometimes I'm covered in glue and I can't get up to change it.
And yeah, I mean, who hasn't been there?
Yeah, same.
Or you know, if you're like, you're like washing dishes and you're like,
yeah, yeah, sometimes blood, you know, who knows?
That was this morning.
Yeah.
I'm going to stop.
What have you been writing with Johnny?
I got a narwhal Nautilus and I don't know how to pronounce it, Celadonia Green. It's one of those Ebonites. It's very dark green and I have blood orange in it from diamine, but they hold so much damn ink that that's all I've been using lately. I should probably fill something else up. How about you, Mr. Andy?
Well, I had a couple long plane trips recently and which I'll talk more about in freshpoints, but I took that time to watch a couple full seasons of TV which like in the old days that would be like oh, how can you have a plane trip that would. You can watch a full season but nowadays it's like eight episodes. Right. So on the way, on the way to Europe I watched all of the latest Doctor who season which is very good. It is just really fun and just kind of like there was one episode that was very bad called Space Babies and the rest of it was just. Was.
Was pretty good band name called it.
Yeah Space Babies was not very good at all. It was kind of their just like very quirky kind of standalone episode. But yeah, it was, it was really fun. Nakudi Gatwa, who is the new Doctor is so good and so energetic and yeah just really, really enjoy his portrayal of the, of the Doctor. So I watched that on the way there and then on the way back I watched the Acolyte which is the new, the newest of the Star wars seasons that haven't watched it as it. As it aired just, just to, just to have something for the plane. I, I don't know. I, I'm a way bigger Star Trek fan than I am Star wars. But lately Star Wars TV shows have really been just like killing it. Like you know the Andor is just Andor season one is some of the best television. I think I've seen it a long time. Even like the Mandalorian's really good. I think. Yeah, the Acolyte got a lot of criticism like some of it was fairly poorly written. The pacing was a little weird. I. I thought it was good. I don't know. I. I really liked. I like it when they go outside of like the. The regular old story, right? Like the whatever with Darth Vader and Luke Skywalker and stuff like that. So I. Yeah, for the same reason I like Rogue One and Andor. I really like this.
Yeah, I didn't like it in the beginning. I thought like, a lot of the acting was really bad and the characters were like, why did you give that guy a personality and kill him right away? But by the end, and then the stranger came on, it was like, oh yeah, like cool. Like, season two of this is going to be awesome.
I did like how. I don't think this is a spoiler that the. The stranger has a helmet. A helmet and kind of like breathes funny. And they, they kind of explained a little bit about like why he. And maybe they didn't really talk about like, Seth too much there, but it seems like maybe this is like a prototype Seth or something, why they're helmeted. And it's just to kind of keep. Keep the rest of the Jedi out of their head. And then you just breathe funny because, like, it just all kind of reverberates around in your head. So that was, that was kind of fun. Just like a proto Darth Vader.
Now I have to get back to it. I was like. When I first heard about it and I watched I think the first episode or two and was not like super turned off, but was just kind of like, ah, I'll get to it later. Just busy. Like, I'll. I'll watch the mouse. But the one thing with all my Star wars nerd friends that I was always talking about was like, before all of these series started coming out, I was like, gosh, I just wish there was like a series that was about like the early Days of the Jedi, like earlier Days of the Jedi. So when they announced this, I was like, oh, hell yeah. Like, this is gonna be great. And then it just didn't grab me.
But now.
Yeah, you guys did that sounds. I mean, I just, I wanna, I wanna see it. I know it's not. Not gonna be returning for another season, right?
That's. Yeah, they. They canceled it just because of low ratings, I guess, and they kind of left the show on a. A little bit of a cliffhanger. Like.
So.
Yeah, it's. It's interesting. Like another, another thing it does, which I feel like the Andor also did, was it just kind of, like, showed that it's not sort of like this black and white world of, like, you know, Jedis and Republic equal good, and Empire equals bad. Like, they kind of portrayed the Jedi as, like, almost like these holier than thou kind of white knights. Right. Like, they're going around and said, like, oh, actually, like, they are kind of, like, very political and act like they're above it. And they also, like, are humans, for lack of a better term, and, like, cover. Cover up dumb stuff that's kind of imperialist. And I. I do appreciate, you know, adding a little bit more of that depth, because that's something I. I don't know if Star wars had a whole lot of. And, like, to begin with, like, it was very black and white.
It was very.
Just sort of like good guys and bad guys, you know, like an old Western. Right, But.
Or like now. Yeah, because political climate. But the lead learned English for that part because he really wanted to be in Star Wars. Like, that sucks.
And then.
Yeah, no, no, no, more.
Yeah, yeah, he was. He was great.
Maybe they could do a spin off with the Stranger. I would. I'd watch that.
Yeah, yeah, that.
Actually, that would be better. Maybe it's a blessing in disguise.
Yeah.
With apologies to the person who played the twins.
It's gonna be like a Mandalorian Boba Fett kind of situation where they just kind of pivot into another story for a minute. Maybe this time they.
Watching that one episode. I'm like, wait, are we watching Boba Fett? Like, literally wasn't in this episode. I'm like, I really like the guy who plays Boba Fett.
He's awesome.
Things that come out of his mouth are hilarious.
Speaking of sequels and things like that, last night I went to go see the new Beetlejuice movie. Oh. And that was. That was really fun. It was. It was really good, I think. Yeah. It's funny. I feel like, you know, Jenna Ortega is how old? She's a teenager and she's already been typecast. Like, like, this character was, you know, not too far different from, like, Wednesday Addams, but when not a writer, you know, treat as always. Michael Keaton is in his, what, 70s? But he's still doing a really good job. It was. Yeah, it was really fun. It was not as. I don't know. I. I remember the original Beetlejuice being scarier than Maybe it was, but, like, the new movie didn't. Wasn't at all that scary to me. I probably should have watched the first one before I went to see this One, but I liked it. They had a lot like, they. They did a lot of practical effects, which is fun, which is good. So I enjoyed that.
I heard some interview. They did that on purpose, like, where they like everything was very, like, analog special effect kind of things. And there was like a very. Yeah, of course, a very. Some of us, I think, reason for ever doing that.
Yeah, I think Tim Burton is, you know, that's. That's kind of his jam and he just kind of gets whatever he wants because he's Tim Burton, which is great, like, as far as I'm concerned. But yeah, I did appreciate, like, the sand worms were just as kind of like, cheesy and claymationy as. As they were back. Back in the original one. Yeah, that was fun.
They were funny. That would be a good tattoo.
Oh, just a. Just a Beetlejuice.
Yeah.
Yeah. I also have been watching a lot of just randomly Antiques Roadshow and Qi on YouTube. They have full episodes of, like, both the American and British Antiques Roadshow. And the algorithm has decided. Well, because I keep watching to show. Show me them all. And then. Do you guys ever watch qi?
I don't even know what that is.
I don't know what that is. It's.
It's a British quiz show and it used to be hosted by Stephen Fry and he had. He, you know, left to do other things because he was doing it for a long time and now it's. Her name is Sandy. I don't remember her last name, but I think that she was like one of the commentators on British Bake off for a while. And it's. It's basically there's four, like, comedians or actors or whatever, and it's. It's. It's allegedly a quiz show, but mostly it's just them being funny and like, like fooling around. Like, it's. It's fun. It's. Yeah, it's. It's very British. So, Johnny, you know, I don't know if you can watch quiz shows on Britbox. I don't know. I mean, they have eventually.
Yeah, the weather and stuff.
Okay, weird. Well, eventually you're going to run out of, like, fiction. So then you can start on quiz
shows and once you finish the weather, you can move on.
Yes, all of the weather. Yeah.
I mean, they think it's depressing. I'm like, Colton, Randy, Brigitte.
Yeah, please. I've been reading some books, started reading the book club book, which we'll talk about here in a little bit. But I just finished. I bought a graphic novel called Calexit the comic. It's basically about a completely fictional future where there is a fascist president who wants to deport all the immigrants and California basically like breaks off from the union to like become a sanctuary state. And it kind of talks about like the warring factions within California and like, you know, the government sort of like going to war with California. Like the federal government going to war with California. It's, it's very grim, but it's a very good book and completely unlikely. Would never happen.
Yeah, that would never happen. It might not happen in like a month.
Yeah, finished on the plane. This really good but weird book called Drunk on all your strange new words. Which is, I think I, I saw it at Powell's in Portland when I was there and I just took a picture of it and like found it later. But it's, it's about a. It's a science fictiony near future where there's aliens and the way that they kind of communicate with humanity is through special kind of psychic translators. And this is sort of about a. It's like a murder mystery that's kind of set in a world where that happens. So it's pretty, pretty good. And then. Do you guys, do you guys ever read or know what the book the Power Broker.
I've heard of it.
It's a, it's an old book written by Robert Caro about. It's a biography of Robert Moses who was like that, that urban planner in who like planned Central park and Golden Gate park. And he was arguably this, this author argues is like one of the most influential people of his time, which was, you know, the late 1800s, early 1900s. And he just sort of like maintained power and kept a low profile and just kind of like just lived in this little empire and it's. Apparently it's a really, really, really good book. Like a super good biography. And it came to Kindle for the first time. So I downloaded it, I think like 99% invisible did like a huge multi part series on it. So it's, it's supposed to be pretty good. So I might, after we're done with Harbor Club book, I might may read. Might read that.
You know, it just became available finally just now on my Libby account. Was the nuclear war book that you had read.
Oh yeah. Oh God.
Reminded me of that when you were talking about it that just. I just got the audiobook so I'm.
Hey Tim, how's. How's your anxiety levels and do you want it to go up?
Haven't started it yet, but you know that's what I'll. I'll start listening to that after I drop the kids off at school. And then I'll be like, I'm gonna
go pick them up, then start working on your. Start working on your underground bunker and then abandon it because you realize it wouldn't save you.
I'll just hide under a desk like my kids are probably being told to do at school. So that was it. I had totally forgotten that I even asked for it, like, as, like a. A hold. And like, nine months later, it shows up as like, oh, damn it. I guess I'm doing this now.
Go on this journey. Yeah, good luck.
So that is.
That's it for me, Tim. How about you besides.
Besides learning about nuclear apocalypse, Besides emotionally preparing for. For listening to that book?
Yep.
Yeah. So I'm reading. I'm reading several things at once right now. I've been to. Trying to just be really intentional about setting time aside during the day to read. I think I got into a habit of just only reading, like, at night, I think just with how my days go and just with being busy during the day and with kids, I was just, like, only reading, like, a few pages at night, which was fine. I enjoyed it. But trying to set aside some time during the day. And I just started the next entry in my rock and roll book club of one with myself. But I started reading a book called Sky Dog, which is a biography of Dwayne Allman from the Allman Brothers. And he was. I don't know how familiar or whatever you guys are with the Allman Brothers,
but I guess not very much.
Yeah, so they're kind of like a pioneer of, like, late 60s, early 70s, what's now called Southern rock. But they apparently hated that name. Like, but they were. So it's. It's a really incredible book. And Dwayne Allman was this guy who basically, like, started playing guitar at, like, 13, died at 25, but just totally changed everything, especially with slide guitar. Like, he plays electric slide guitar, like the blues, and is just incredible. And one of those people you listen to and you're like, how does anybody figure this out on their own before YouTube? Like, how does he get this good? But he also, like, before the, you know, aside from the Allman Brothers stuff, like, as that was trying to take off, which he really didn't. He's one of those people in history, like artists who is known for things that became famous after he died, because he died in a motorcycle accident at 25. But he also was a session musician who Played on, like, Aretha Franklin records and all these, like, amazing R B and soul records. The book is really, really good.
So I feel like the only, like, all in Brothers songs I know is like. Like Rambling man and Melissa maybe or something. Yeah. Yeah, okay. Black Hearted Woman is on there. Like, I'm just looking at the song list right now, and, yeah, I haven't thought much about it.
The Live at Fillmore east album when I was in high school just kind of took over my brain, and it's still there. I still listen to it a lot. That album is probably the best live album I've ever listened to. So, yeah, I was just looking for another guitar player biography, and that was one that had kind of been on my periphery that I was. Want to check out. So I'm reading that I just got one in the. In the mail today that I'm. It's gonna sound really boring, but it's actually like. I think it's the most I've spent on a book in a while, which wasn't like a ton. It was like 50 bucks. But it's a. It was a used book on thrift books that I paid $50 for, but it's out of print. But it is universally like, the top book in this world. But it's a book called Fender the Sound Heard Round the World, and it's about Fender guitars. And it is, like, definitively like the Fender book. Everybody, you know, who I've talked to has read it or have, like, read about it. Everybody's just like, this book is just the best thing that's out there about Fender guitars and amps and. But it went out of print, like, a while ago. But I've been watching it on thrift books and ended up finding a copy for, like, $20 cheaper than it usually goes for. And it just came in today, so I'm going to start that soon.
Speaking of which, like, just watching Antiques Roadshow, like, people will bring in a Fender guitar, and sometimes it's like, oh, well, this one is like, you know, has this. This chip here, and this logo is one that they use for this. So, like, this one is only worth, like, 20 bucks. And then they have one that's like, oh, this. This one is, like, just a perfectly average one, except it's in this one light blue color, which is the same one that, like, John Lennon had. And so therefore, this one is worth $40,000 or something.
Yeah, yeah.
Just. People are so deep on vendors.
It's wild. It's wild. And they're. They're extra wild than, like, other brands like Gibson and stuff. Because they were basically made to be easy to fix. They were like the early 90s vendor SU or, sorry, early 90s, like, Subaru of, like, guitars where it's like, everything's right there. You can fix it all yourself if you really want to. It's right there. So people swap out necks. You can, like, because all the necks were bolt on, bolt off, Whereas, like, Gibsons were glued into place. So it's like people swap things. They changed out parts, they customized it, they did all these things. So, like. Yeah, so there are all the. There's this whole weird world where it's like, oh, this Telecaster is from 1956 and it's worth $4,000. This one's worth from 1955, but it has the right decal and they didn't change the tuners. So it's worth 70,000.
Yeah,
the fenders are really, really durable. So, like, there are older ones around my. One of my bandmates, one is Les Paul. He's always like, man, if I drop this, I'm out a couple thousand bucks. I'm like, what? Like, you should see all the P bass spots where I've dropped it. I mean, I've never dropped a base.
I'm sure you haven't.
Yeah, just dropping the base.
Drop you slap it. A base. You do that all the time.
Yeah, I dropped a five string once in the middle of folk group practice in high school. That made a really ungodly sound. In a chapel.
It's ungodly in a chapel, man. You're going straight to hell.
No, man. It's probably sound like the devil.
The friar laughed. I thought he was gonna pee his pants.
So aside from that, I have been listening to a lot of Neil Young, which is never a bad press. I love me some Neil Young, but, like, he's one of those artists not unlike the Rainful Dead, who I've talked about before, that, like, there's really no end point. Like, you can just keep digging and digging and digging. Because I've heard stories of him, like, showing up to recording sessions with his band, and he'd be like, I got these eight new songs. And they'd spend all day and, like, the next day working on them. They take two days off. They come back, he's like, all right, now I got these 10. They're like, what about the other eight? And he's like, we're gonna move on to these 10. You know? So he just, like, writes so much music and so I was really enjoying that. And I watched. So there's a song the Birds made famous, My Back Pages, which is a Bob Dylan. Like, a very, very early Bob Dylan song. And they recorded it. The Birds recorded it, and it became, like, kind of a hit when they did it. And every time I put it on, you know, like, Spotify or Amazon Music or whatever, it comes up as this version from the Bob Dylan 30th anniversary concert, which has, like, George Harrison and Neil Young and Bob Dylan and Roger McGuinn from the Birds. And everyone, like, everyone is on St. They're all singing it together. It's really good. But I was like, you know, I can't believe I've never watched. There has to be a DVD or, like, a recording that I can stream. And I found it and, oh, boy, was it recorded in the 90s. It is fascinating. It wasn't great. Like, there were parts of it that were really cool. But, like, it is the most 90s concert I've ever seen, which is just, like, bad. Like, fashion. The guitars, they're playing things. The people like. Usually whenever they do these, like, tribute shows, they always have, like, modern artists up against, like, the classics. And so it's like Neil Young and Stevie Wonder and, you know, all these. And then it's like, oh, John Mellencamp and Sinead o'. Connor and, you know, which are. They're all, like, great artists that were performing, but the performances were so 90s, like, so I thought, you're gonna show
me, like, see and, like, Milli Vanilli came out or something.
No, it wasn't that bad. So it was really fascinating to, like, watch them kind of, like, navigate this whole thing, which I. Knowing. Knowing, like, the band behind them, like, oh, gosh, well, that's Steve Cropper and, you know, Linker's playing drums and, like, all these, like, guys that I knew played with Bob Dylan. But the one thing. And like, the sort of big moment that I didn't know happened to this concert. But you remember when, you know, the very famous. When Sinead o' Connor tore up the picture of the Pope. That was a week before this concert happened.
Oh.
And so she was asked.
Snl. Right?
On snl. Yeah. And she was asked to play at this concert. And I'd heard this story from, like, books that I'd read, but I didn't realize this is where it happened. So I got to see it. But Kris Kristofferson was, yeah. The artist there, and so that's where it happened.
Yeah. So Shenanigans like, encourage her to come out and.
And they're. The fans are like booing her. Like, they're just like audibly, like so loud booing her. And she like can't start the song. And then you see this big, you know, handsome man walk out and he like puts his arm around her and you can hear it from the microphone that's like a few feet away. And he says, don't let the bastards get you down. It's like, oh, that's so cool, you know. And then she like sings like an acapella version of some song and then just walks off stage. Like, doesn't do the other two she's supposed to do. It's like this really wild moment and you can kind of see the whole band and like everybody kind of processing it as the night goes on. They're like, well, that was pretty messed up.
Yeah.
Anyways, so I don't recommend watching the whole thing. Not. I don't think it's like required watching or whatever. But you should watch that clip on YouTube because it's pretty fascinating to see that whole thing happen. And Christopherson is just so amazing. So to see him come out and just be like, you know, you're fine. Like, don't listen to him. They don't know what they're talking about.
He wrote a song about Cindy o' Connor later, didn't he?
I think so, yeah. I forget what it's called.
Yeah, yeah, I love that guy.
And then I think that's it. And then as far as writing with, I have been reading the book that we're going to talk about soon. I was in between field notes and it got me like Jones in for like kind of a Moleskine style notebook. So I ordered paperage, which I talked about, or Paper Age, whatever we want to call it. They sell pocket hardbacks that are like pretty much identical to moleskine. They're like 10 bucks for two of them hardback. And so I got those. And yeah, it's identical and it's awesome. And so I've been carrying that around and loving it and writing mostly with my gosh, now I'm forgetting what it's called. The. The Uni ball. Is it the one? Yeah. The UniBall 1.7 in black. The black barreled ones. That's the best pen in the world to me right now. I just use it all the time. And then in fountain pen land, I've been using this Mahjong. What's with the M5? What's that? A knockoff of Johnny, it's a. Oh, the pilot.
Is that. Is that the retractable one?
No, no, no, no. It's. It's a screw on. It's kind of like a. More like it's a piston filler screw on. A little big. It's bigger. But anyways, I got lazy and it had like a little bit of pearl noir left in it. And I didn't want to clean it out, but I wanted to use it right away. So I filled the rest of it up with the Diamine Aurora borealis, which is like this sort of like blue green. And I love, love it. It's so good. And I'll never be able to recreate it again, so I'm just savoring it. It's this like the best dark green ever. It's like. It's like a dark green, but it still pops off the page. And so I've been using that a lot and I really love it.
So I can't find the M5.
Is that me? I could. I could have that name wrong. I'll. I'll look it up in a second and then.
Is it clear?
No, no, it's black here. Give me a second. But T5, let's see. So this is the brand that, what they used to be called.
Moon Man.
Moon man, that's right.
But then Ko Pen. Yeah. Because they suck.
Right? It's the T5.
Oh, that's pretty.
It's the black T5, which has been like a favorite pen for a while. I didn't swap the nib out or anything. I had a goulet nib on it for a while, but I put this back on, luckily.
Why would you take a goulet nib off this week?
I. It was before this week, believe it or not. But it would have been gone this week.
No, that we didn't.
It was just a feeling. It was like, man, this thing's ugly. Get it out of here. Threw it across the room, threw it into the garbage disposal. So that's that. Well, let's. Let's go to the next section. Let's get into freshpoints. Let's talk about some more specifically stationary related stuff. Johnny, you want to start us out?
Sure. I only have one update. We were talking about this before we recorded, but I don't know what the hell they call it anymore. It's like the social media group that is run by Bullet Journal and it's membership based, so there's no. There are no ads, but there are like exclusive videos around tables and stuff. So they had one last week where they unveiled this new artist edition of the bullet journal 2.0 with the artist there. And I. I don't know like what we're supposed to do about it because it's not like public yet, but we have them. Or at least I am holding mine. So I don't know if we're supposed to put it on social media, but it's black, comes in a box, it has holographic ink on it. It's, you know, it's still a leuchtturm book inside, but like, it's the coolest looking bullet journal ever. So when it does come out on October 1st, like, go get one. It is. It was expensive. I think it was like almost 40 bucks without shipping. But they pay the artist, so I'm assuming that's why. I hope that's why. But yeah, you know, the newer ones have like really heavy paper, fewer pages, lots of bookmarks, and they have a booklet in the back that explains everything about bullet journaling. Like you would have bought that book if you didn't already know that stuff. But it's a nice inclusion and they always match. So.
Yeah.
And like the rest of my life is making books all day, so it's not that fun to like use them.
I not to be this guy.
I don't write enough. But I will say, if one of my co hosts needed a pocket notebook that was not moleskin, they should call me next time.
Okay, Johnny. I've had a lot of like the modern age. I was just like two day shipping.
Yeah.
I could get that out. And like, Johnny, do you have two days shopping?
John, can we get Johnny prime my
diary, journal, notebook, whatever you want to call it that I'm still absolutely in love with is the one that you gave me in Baltimore, the one that has the marbled cover. Like, I am absolutely gonna get another one in that exact same, like, format because I love that thing. I've got like a quarter of it left. What were the dimensions on that? It was like, it was like four
and change by seven, but a little taller. Yeah, now I'm doing seven by like five and a half, which is like really a nice hand feel. Does it feel narrow?
But I was just saying I don't, I don't want to be that guy. But with the whole like, with the bullet journal thing and like the price of the notebook and all that, like gets great that he's paying the artist, but he's gone on a very simple idea.
Like.
Yeah, he's not exactly reinventing like, anything. Like, as this is going on, so I don't know, he still has to pay his bills, and I just. I appreciate it, but it's also like, come on.
I assume Ryder Carroll has, like, a huge coke habit and he's just trying to.
Yeah.
I don't know. He's really calm. He's, like, so mellow on these videos. Like, he clearly does not like being in front of a camera, but he does a really good job. Or I mean, maybe. Maybe I'm wrong and I'm picking it up wrong, but he seems not completely comfortable with it, and I appreciate it all.
And I haven't gotten that vibe from him, but I'm just like, yeah, these things.
He's really cool to hang out with.
I'm sure he is. Yeah.
But he keeps adding stuff and changing stuff in the. Like, the way he does bullet journaling. So I wonder if, you know, our vision of that book will be out one day. Because the book was really good. But, you know, he's very serious. He always, you know, writes in black, dresses in black. Just, like, he doesn't draw in there.
Oh.
If I can add one more thing, I discovered Tim and I have, like, waxed about black inks before, and Pearl Noir was always one of my favorites from Giorban. But Diamine's onyx is, like, ridiculously black. And unlike lavender, black will perform on crappy paper.
When are we going to see, like, a Vantablack ink?
I don't know. That would be cool.
Like, something that just, like, eats, like, 99.9% of the light.
This one's pretty close. This is, like, pretty close.
Yeah.
They'll rate them the way they write paper. Like, this is 94 white. Like, this is 94 black. Like, this stuff will cure a headache. It's so dark poured in your eyes.
It's fine. Yeah.
And it's diamond, so a big bottle of. It's like, 15 bucks.
Yeah. If you're feeling over stimulated, just get like, a jeweler's eye thing and look into, like, a circle you made of Pearl Noir and it will just suck all the overstimulation out of you.
Okay.
It's like.
Well, it's like sensory deprivation chamber.
That's what I was thinking of. Like, sensory deprivation tanks. I mean, everything's gone.
I'm gonna do it tomorrow. I hate Tuesday.
Say it will drive you mad after 20 minutes. Yeah.
Yeah. So how about your. Your adventure?
Yeah. Was that.
Was that a prompt, Johnny?
Yeah.
Okay.
Like, since you got back, I didn't want to text you would be like, andy, tell me all about your trip over text.
Yeah, yeah.
Play by play.
Well, let's see. Minute one drove to the airport and. No, it was good. It was. It was a lot. It was just like. I walked probably, gosh, like, eight miles a day. It was. It was a lot. We went to Sweden first, and Sweden, yeah, is. It's a really, like, Stockholm is a. I mean, I went during the summer, like, when it is, like, pretty warm. Like, I can't imagine, like, just the brutal. How brutal the winters could be, but, like, it is during the summer at least. It's. It's just a really, really nice place where I. I really feel like I could. I could see myself living in a place like that. Right. Like, they had really good public transit. We decided to take, like, the train from the airport into the city center, which is, like, 30 miles away, instead of a taxi. And I was like, oh, I hope we can get a train. But, like, the trains go every 10 minutes, right? And it's. It takes, like, 15 minutes to get to cross that distance, and it costs, like, $12. And just. It's really easy to get around, and it's really clean and every. I mean, everybody speaks English, which is really useful.
Did you feel like you were in the future?
Like, well, it seems like it would be in the future, except that you walk past a building and it was, like, built in, like, the 1600s.
Right?
Right, yeah, it was just like an extremely. Just, like, functional place. And, like, San Francisco, pretty good public transit for, like, U.S. standards. Right? Like, it's no New York, but, like, it's. It's pretty good, but just nothing. Nothing compared to, like, how kind of fully built out, like, the underground rail was. And. Yeah, it was. It was really cool. I. Gosh, what do we do? We ate a lot. I drank a lot. I drank a lot of beer. Fancy beers and. And coffee. Could find coffee everywhere. I feel like my. My only, like, reference for Swedish, like, the language was ikea. And.
Can you please point me to the pencil cups?
Yes.
And it was like. I kept seeing the word malm everywhere. And I was like, mom, you know, like, this. The desks. And malm means, like, island, right? So you see, like, soder malm, and that means south of the island. And so it's like, oh, hey. Like, that is something beyond a piece of furniture.
Huh?
Huh?
But really, really good museums. In Stockholm, there was. There's this museum called the Vasa, which is a. So apparently in the 1600s, the Swedish were, like, a Like a naval power. And they would build these, like, really amazing wooden warships and they would, like, launch them. And they spent all this time on this, like, really big, elaborate warship. And it had, like, all this, like, like, statuary on it and all these, like, gun cannons. And it. They, like, got to the middle of the, like, harbor and it sank just immediately. And they knew about this, like, warship for, like, hundreds of years afterwards, right? Like 300 years afterwards. They just didn't have the means to get to it. And finally, in the 1950s, they had, like, good sonar and they could, like, resurrect the ship. And so they, they lifted this, this, this ship up and they brought it back to the harbor and they built a museum around it.
That's so cool.
And it's, it's just this, like, amazing. And they, like, have all this. These preservation techniques. And so there's this. This giant, giant ship just in the middle of this. This building. You walk in and you can't really go onto the boat itself. But they do a really, really good job of, like, you know, it's a relatively simple, straightforward thing. It's like this old worship that they are restoring, but they have so much, like, content and so much stuff kind of, like, around it that's like, here are some skeletons we found, and here is what that person might have looked like, and this is what that person probably did, and this is the kind of thing they ate. And, yeah, it was just really fascinating. I think that was my favorite museum.
Two things come to mind. First, one, I'm not going to talk about, because it's in the book, and I, I want to wait until we talk about the book, but, like, you're. You mentioned the shipwreck and a couple days ago, so I found out that. I don't know if you saw this over the summer, but they found Shackleton's ship that he died on. Did you see this in the news? I totally missed this. They found it had sank off the coast of Canada. My dad was, like, obsessed with Shackleton growing up. Like, I have. All the books are in my garage, on my bookshelf, My garage. Like, I have all the books that he read. He gave them to me and I was like. And I'm still planning to get to him, but I was so excited when I found that out. I was, like, texting it to Jane. She's like, easy, buddy. Like, don't care that much. I know this is. I know you're excited. And I was like, no, but they found it. It's like the One. It's the one where he was like. It all ended. They didn't know where he was.
A spin off podcast where we just talk about like, Shackleton ship.
Yeah, man. Henry's reading who was Ernest Shackleton right now. Who was Series of books. I got it for him like a long time ago. And then I got this news and I was like, oh, Henry, they found it. Didn't you read that, that book? Did you finish it? And he's like, no. And he like went and grabbed it and started.
Nerds.
I've got.
When you finish that, we'll read the thousand page version from grandpa in the garage.
Starter Shackleton.
Yeah, yeah, Sorry. But yeah, that sounds super cool. And I've been. I forget where I was, but I went to Europe and it was in a similar museum somewhere that was like all based around like a sunken ship that had been pulled up. And it was like one of the coolest things I've ever seen.
Were you in Stockholm?
No. No.
Okay.
It was somewhere else. It was, it was a small ship. It was like a. I see. I mean, it was maybe like 30ft long.
Yes.
It's like smaller thing, but it was, it was a really cool experience.
So, yeah, it was really fun. We got. Got some tattoos as like a little souvenir. That was fun. Wait, what? Oh, didn't I send this to you? No picture. Apparently I didn't. I. I got. So I like to drink coffee and Erica likes to drink tea. And so we decided she got a tattoo of a coffee plant and I got a tattoo of a tea plant.
And it's just a nice little.
Yeah, I'll send you a. Send you all a picture of this. Yeah, she has a few tattoos that she got just as a souvenir on vacation. I was like, that's a really fun thing to do.
So it's like the ultimate passport.
Yeah, exactly. So that was Stockholm. And then after that we went to Barcelona and Barcelona was way more, way more chaotic and just like so busy. Just like so full of tourists, but also just like, also charming and just, just, just the architecture is incredible. Like somebody. Gosh. Who was talking about that Ta. Nehisi Coates book, the between the World and Me, where he went to like to Europe for the first time. And he's talking about the door. Do you guys read this book? Like he, he saw just a random door and like, I don't remember where he was like Spain or France or something. And he was like, this door is just like incredibly ornate and has so much history and this, this door is older than my country. And he was like, and that's just the door. Like, I felt like that about just walking around Barcelona. Like there was just in the middle of like the Gothic Quarter, which is the sort of like narrow streets and like alleyways. There's just a cathedral from the 1300s and that's still standing. And you can go around the back of it, just see sort of like this brick that's been overlaid with other brick and like just, just been kind of rebuilt and knocked down and yeah, just amazing architecture. Just really intense statues. And of course like the Sagrada Familia, which is like kind of the big famous church there. That's not that old compared comparatively. Like it was built. It was started in like the 1800s, but just. Also just an insane looking building.
So cool.
So cool, but pretty insane. I did find. I feel like this is a crowning achievement. I found a press penny machine. They don't have pennies. It's a. It was actually a €5 or €0.05 Euro.
Like, like you're there for like 20 minutes trying to shove a penny into it. You're like, take my money.
So you put in a euro coin and then like a euro nickel. So like a 5 cent piece which is made of copper and you could press that out. So I was like, yes.
Like, it's not going to fit in my penny book.
It is like a little bit different of a size, so I'm going to have to figure out what to do about that.
So.
Yeah, so, yeah, that was, that was really cool. We had just amazing, like paella and. Yeah, it was, it was really neat. I. We went during. We were there over sort of like the Catalonia national holiday, which I don't know if you're familiar with Spain or not, but like. So the state of Catalonia is sort of like has a completely separate national identity from Spain. Like, they speak Catalan.
They don't.
I mean, they spit. There's Spanish all around, but like everything is also in Catalan, which is sort of Portuguese, sort of Spanishy, sort of Frenchy, and went to a museum just about the history of Catalan. And it's, it's like this autonomous region and there were, there's protests and there's like political prisoners and it's a. Yeah, apparently there's, there's been a little bit of unrest, but there's always like just a very distinct kind of national identity. So it was like Spain, but also it wasn't Spain. So that was kind of an interesting thing that never really thought Much about. So didn't like, have any really amazing stationary experiences. I guess the, the biggest one was I was at like the hotel in Barcelona was just right across the street from. From this like, four story stationery shop. It's one of the. Apparently one of the biggest in Europe. And it's really cool. It wasn't anything that was like, super different that I haven't seen. Although I did pick up some really interesting Uniball pens I have never heard of. Maybe you guys have. Have you ever heard of Uniball? I eye. Yeah. Okay.
They're the vision pens, aren't they?
Yeah, they're. They're slightly different. Slightly different takes on the vision pens. So I, I did find one that looks like the, the. The Vision Pro Elite ones. It looks just like that.
Except.
Except they have my green. They have the, the old green that.
I love you, Evergreen.
I did find a. Next time I go, I'm gonna. Or if I know anybody who's going and be like, I need you to buy like 10 more of these.
Yeah.
So I didn't do a whole lot of stationery shopping, but I did do something I think I talked about wanting to do here before, which was just like, do a little bit of travel journaling. So I bought that HP sprocket. And it's also really good, by the way, for printing out, like on the go, like little selfies with groups of friends. Like, I. In both Stockholm and Barcelona, I hung out with some. Some friends who live there now and we would take like a selfie at dinner and then I would just like print out like little copies they hand to everybody, which is kind of fun.
That idea of that, since you talked about it, has been festering thinking about it. Because that sounds really nice.
Yeah.
Like, yeah, yeah, all the steps. No, just like to just like to take a picture and like, that's one of the, you know, things about like, the digital age is like, if I take a picture of my kids, it's like, oh, I have to go on Shutterfly or I need to like, yeah, this place. Or I need to do all this stupid. It's like I just. I just want to have it.
It doesn't have to be perfect.
Like, I just want like a little picture of it. But I also don't want to buy this hipster thing. It's going to cost like 20 bucks for 11 pictures or whatever.
Like, yeah, Instax. Well, this is kind of the best of both, right? Like, yeah, yeah, I have one too. This is kind of the best of both because you both, you have both a digital copy and this physical copy. So. So yeah, it's, it's really nice. I used it a lot for that travel journaling. I, I would take pictures because you can make little collages. So sometimes I would put like two pictures on one and then like cut them apart and stick them in different places in the notebook and kind of write around them like on a page. It's kind of fun. So, yeah, highly recommend that. Yeah, just had a really good time in, in Europe. I would like to. I'd love to go back there's. I mean, you know, I only went to two places in this just like incredibly. Just like rich, dense place. But yeah, the density was also really amazing. Just like houses just right next to each other and buildings that like they like go up more than just, you know, a few floors. Right. Like just so many people packed in one spot. Which actually kind of like for infrastructure reasons, like yeah, public transit was so good.
Did you bump into any of those like spots where it was like, these places are three inches apart. That one and that one were built 500 years apart.
Yeah, right. How did you see any of that?
Yeah, like.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, there was some of that. Like both, both Old Town Gamla Stan, which is the old town area of Stockholm and also just the Gothic quarter in Barcelona had a lot of that. Like this building. This building was built. Yeah. And it just clearly in like the 16, 1700s. And then you know, this is like a fairly new ish looking apartment building right next to it and just wonder how, how they made that work. It's also really funny. Like Barcelona is so touristy and they had just ridiculous like, you know when you go to like a place like like Times Square in New York or like the Fisherman's Wharf in, in San Francisco and they have just like shops that sell just like really dumb T shirts. Like Barcelona had this just like times ten. Like you could. There's this one story that sold I heart shirts like I heart something or other. And there was like I heart Barcelona and things. But there was one that just said I heart sluts. There's one that was like I heart big boobs and just like who goes on vacation and just like buys an I heart?
That's the one I wanted. Yeah, okay. Yeah, like yeah, yeah.
I don't think the world knows how much. I don't know if I want this
one or this one. No. Yeah, that one. Okay, let's just pick one. I'm happy with it. It's so Weird on the airplane.
Yeah, exactly. It's just all over the place. And yeah, it was. It was so, so weird.
But that reminds me, I went to a. We took our kids to. It's like water park. It's like the Dolly Parton water park in Dollywood. Yeah.
Yeah.
And there was this guy there who just walked in, which of course I notice it like times 10, being a former teacher now, but like, it just said his teacher was wearing a teacher that just says, pay teachers less. I was like that. It was so simple. There was nothing else on it. I was just like. Part of me was like, okay, man. Like, I don't know whether to punch you or shake your hands.
I would wanted it with some sort of really high irony that I just didn't get.
Yeah.
That's why. That's, of course, that's where I spent the next 45 minutes in my brain. I was just like, okay, so maybe it was like, you know, he really liked teachers and he went to teacher school and they sold this shirt for fun at their school. It was like, you know, of course I was trying to figure it out. No, but the look on his face, I think it was real. So I think it was. I think he meant it. That was just like. He looks like the kind of kid who was an engine in school. Anyways.
Faster. Just trying to turn our kids woke.
Yeah. Teachers less.
Yeah, Just stuff like that. It was.
It said, cut teacher salaries.
Okay.
Which kind of changes it. That's what it was. So it's like, that's even more aggressive. That's like, oh, well, geez. You know, not like, just pay. No, cut teacher salaries. It's like.
Yeah.
So I wonder if they sold that at that shop in Barcelona.
Hopefully there's.
Yeah.
So they did eat a lot of really good, you know, cured. Cured hams and olives and. Yeah, it was delicious. So highly recommend.
That's awesome.
I'm really hungry.
Like, almost 10 o'. Clock.
Gotta wrap this up. That was it for me.
Yeah.
Tim, how about your fresh points?
Yeah, I've only got two, but the one. And I've got. I've got some props here. Listen. You hear that?
Yeah.
So these are two things. So I have been spending some time, as we've talked about before, and Johnny's done this, but like learning more about ADHD and just kind of diving in, trying to learn like, what it means because it's different for every single person. And I was diagnosed and kind of like been learning about it for the last like three or four years. A lot. And it's been super helpful.
Let me ask you, Tim, did. Did Ernest Shackleton have adhd?
Probably.
Okay.
I'm just guessing that all my heroes have adhd. That's the T shirt I'm gonna make. All my. All my heroes had adhd actually would be a great shirt.
That would be a really good shirt. Yeah.
Yeah. So I heard this. It was a stationary related metaphor for ADHD and one that is connected to something we've talked about before. But the guy was explaining ADHD and like ADHD versus a neurotypical brain. He said, this is a neurotypical brain. And he picked up a Parker jotter and he held it in front of the screen and he said, this is a neurotypical brain. You have a decision in front of you. The decision is symbolized by clicking the pen and it comes out. And that's the thing that you do. You're like, this is the thing that I know I need to do. And he clicks it, he says, and you take care of the task that needs to be done. You're done. Right? And then he said, for the ADHD brain, it's more like this. And he held up and I'm holding a, let's see, 10 color multi pen. He said the ADHD brand is more like this. And he said, this color is. I have something I need to return to the store. This one is I need to take the trash out. This one is I still haven't mowed the grass. This one is my boss need me to email him about this or whatever. And goes through and he does his. Has like six or whatever. He's like the. And the concept was basically like there are all these different colors and you can't like figure out which one it is that you're supposed to click. You can't figure out which one it is that you're supposed to click. Or you can't. It's not easy or not that you can't figure it out. Like you're literally unable. But just like the challenge is that you have to very consciously think about, like, I'm not thinking about one thing at a time. I'm thinking about 10 things at a time. Right. And so like, and. And it was like a life changing moment where like when he like described it that way, I was like, because I'm not the typical kind of hyper, you know, like where people the. Not the stereotypical. You know, how it's talked about is like, oh, well, you're full of energy and all this. Like, no, it's not really me.
I'm very tired.
Yeah, I just exhaust myself because I'm always trying to push 10 thoughts out at once, you know, like, all the time. And I guess it's because he was using stationary to make the point. It hit home. And I thought that was helpful and I wanted to share it because I thought it was interesting the stationary related, but also, hopefully it helps somebody because it's like, I think for me, like, having some of those kind of, like, models to think about it, because one of the biggest problems I have is, like, talking to other people and, like, explaining what it's like. I mean, I talked to my mom, right? Being like, she's like, oh, you don't have that. Like, you don't have to deal with that. I'm like, no, I do. Here's what it's like. And it's hard to explain it, but things like that help me, you know, just kind of make sense of it. Like, this is why I can hyper focus on one thing for a while when I'm not distracted by other things. But if I have to make a decision, it's hard. It's. It can be hard for me to figure out, like, this is the direction I need to go or, like, feel that kind of like.
And as you're describing that, I'm just thinking like, well, doesn't. Isn't that the way it works for everybody?
Because, well, Andy, we should talk later.
I feel like I want to add that the 10 color pen has, like, three colors that don't work and you
don't know which one of them is a pencil.
I don't even know what those colors are.
One is a pin and just puts a hole in your paper and you're like, what the hell?
I don't know.
Yeah, I was gonna say, like, a hot dog comes out when you push that one.
No, the desire for a hot dog. Yeah. Like, I'm like, I'm balancing my budget. Oh, shit, I'm hungry. A hot dog. Like, right now I need a hot dog. And I'm a vegetarian, though.
Oh, my gosh. But it was. It was super, like, helpful. And like two hours before, I had been reminded of that amazing scene from Malcolm in the Middle where Bryan Cranston, it's like, people talk about as being like, the best depiction of ADHD ever in television. And where he, like, comes into the house and he checks. Like, he tries to turn on a light and the light bulbs out, and by the end of it, he's like, outside in his underwear changing the oil like, but he hasn't changed the light bulb.
That's my life. A lot of these.
Because it's just like a series of like. Oh wait, hang on. Oh, I gotta do that.
So.
Yes.
Who knew that. Who knew that the dad from Malcolm Middle would turn out to be like one of the most like celebrated, intense actors out there. Right?
Absolutely. I love it. Makes me so happy.
Definitely not Malcolm.
Yeah.
Jane Kazmirk had a moment.
Yeah, she's great.
So that's that other thing. Oh yeah. Blackwing. There's a new black.
Wait, you're talking about pencils now on this show.
Have you guys heard about pencils? There's all kinds out there.
Isn't this volume 25 the gift wrap edition?
This is the. Oops. I made a Blackwing edition. So Blackwing71 tribute to Frank Lloyd Wright came out recently, which is a cool topic. So architect, very famous. The houses that he made, buildings that
he made are kind of a shitty. Kind of a shitty guy.
Yeah. As a lot of people were back then.
Yeah.
But he was definitely. Yeah.
Like did he have 80s? Probably.
So there's the other T shirt. All of my, all of my antagonists had adhd.
All the shitty guys from the olden days.
Yeah. Yes. So I don't have these in hand but just to like introduce them. So he like it's extra firm graphite which is cool. The copper colored ferrule, which is a cool thing. The, the pencils though came in and four different versions. Right. So it's like a natural finish and it's done with a. Correct me, Andy. Roll on. Is that what they're calling it?
A transparent finish?
Transparent roll on wrap finish.
They roll the wrap around.
Roll on. They roll on the wrap on.
Roll on the paint them.
Yeah, I miss paint. Remember paint? I mean they do paint.
The guitar player who says like, remember when they used to have chords and songs? Like he always talks about that. I was like, remember when they used to have paint on pencils? So yeah. Curious. Johnny, I'm assuming you have these in hand? Andy, do you have these?
I do, I do.
Okay, so what do they like in person?
I will say I really like. There is the thing that, you know, it's kind of overlooked. It has a nice orange stripe on the ferrule, kind of a la golden bear. So I do really like it when somebody goes to like a little extra and puts like a little, little painted stripe on the feral. So that's cool.
Yeah, that is a good point. I mean that does look good. And, and I am definitely hyper fixating in on the. One of the erasers is kind of like a dark copper colored eraser, which, like, that makes me happy. And I wish I could buy, like a whole pack of those because I like that.
I, I don't know if there's, like, any other things. Like, the copper feral is like, it's funny, I didn't even know it was copper until I had it sitting next to a black wing, a different black wing with a regular gold feral, because it's not super coppery. And like, I don't know. I, I don't. There's some concepts that are really hard, especially when you're talking about, like, artists or designers or something like that, to, like, translate that to pencil like that, that Basquiat black wing and that Woody Guthrie blackwing. Like, they didn't look that good because they were trying to, like, translate this thing, this visual thing to like, a little round barrel, very small.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
And I think that's the case here. Like, I don't really know what the design is that they're wrapping around these pencils. Right. Like, Sorry. Rolling on the pencils.
Yeah.
And it's, it's definitely cut off because, like, it's hard to, hard to do. Right. Like, like, you can see the seam. So I, I, I would guess if I were to unwind this and roll it out, like, there would be a pattern that would be relevant to, like, arts and crafts movement or something from a Frank Lloyd Wright house, but I just don't see it. Like, the colors. Yeah, the colors are nice, but this, the fact that it's kind of much like the Basquiat pencil, where there's like, these designs that are kind of overlaid on the, the wood, it just doesn't, it just looks kind of weird. And that's the case here. Yeah.
Like, when Field Notes first started doing those, what they used to call them, the seasonal editions, they just played with color, which I appreciate it. Like, I thought that was cool. And then Black Wings sort of did that for a while, but, like, I don't, I don't know what the hell the shades are supposed to be, but I really like the colors. If they'd done, like, you know, wash, stain in those colors and just made the whole pencil that color, those would have been, like, absolutely gorgeous. Probably cheaper.
Yeah, well, yeah, I have no idea.
That is, that cannot be true.
Here's a question. How hard is it to remove a roll on, wrap on?
Oh, I assume there's heat involved to get it to stick to the wood.
Yeah, they're not like the old foil wrapped ones where there's just a piece of plastic that you can, like, pick apart and roll off. But it's part two.
I'm basically figuring out how I can buy 10 dozen of these, take that off and press on Blackwing 211 and sell them on ebay. Could I do.
Could I.
Is there a way to do that? No, I'm just kidding.
Some of the natural ones and sand them.
Yeah. You son of a. I mean,
take all of your 71s.
We're gonna start our.
Turn the 7 into a 2 and then add another one onto the end. Like a. It'll look like a kid who is trying to, like, change their, you know, C minus into an A plus or something. Like, it's gonna say 211, and then we'll put them on eBay, selling for 400 a dozen.
Just a massive black wing counterfeit ring.
Yeah.
I mean, I hope this isn't a spoiler. The subscriber extra was a. A cutout sticker of that famous. I guess it's a print that has all of his pencils on it.
I always thought it was a puzzle, but, yeah, I think it's a print. You're right.
That was pretty cool. Yeah, that would actually, like, make a cool tattoo, but probably somebody would hate you for asking for it. Oh, my God.
Yeah, I think you're right. If. I mean, there were so many good, like, Frank Lloyd Wright colors, right? Like kind of that deep orange and some, like, grays and like, dark woods. And if they could have just like, like, maybe. Maybe they could have stained the wood, right? Like a kind of this deeper cherry wood. Like that American cherry.
Even like a color wash. Like IKEA sales.
Yeah, like that.
The way that. Just pick the colors.
They did.
Because the colors I thought were pretty cool. I really like those blues.
That was the. I like the blue.
Like, actually, like.
Yeah, all the colors. Like, part of me was wondering if they had done this and just picked two of them, one or two of them, and just done them all the same. I mean, maybe that makes it harder because they have to match more and we'd be bitching about that or. Sorry. Yeah, we'd be complaining about that if we. If that's what happened. But like just almost like a pickle lane kind of thing. It's like if they were all. For me, if they were all that, like, orangey color and that kind of like minty, like, dark. Mint green color. The darker green. If they were all that Those two colors would be like, oh, these are kind of cool. But something about seeing all four of those together. I was just kind of like.
Yeah. And I. I do, like, you know, it's extra from graphite, which I. Which I appreciate. So.
Yeah, it's a.
It's a good. It was a. The design.
The.
The theme didn't seem super cohesive. Right. Like, the. Well, sorry. The design. The execution on the theme didn't seem super cohesive, but, yeah, it was. It's. It's. It's okay. It's a. It'll be a, you know, a pencil. I'll probably, you know, use one down and then stick it in the archive.
Yeah. They super reminded me of the Basquiat ones because of the wood showing through the wrap. But I remember the wraps used to have a white primer underneath, so I wonder if this is a different process.
Yeah. Yeah. I think they only had a couple. Or at least, if not, their white primer was, like, really, really thin, and so you couldn't really see it when you would sharpen it down.
Yeah. I mean, people have really perfected. I can't imagine these wraps. Or cheaper. Or at least not that much cheaper.
Yeah.
Which, again, I could have. No idea what I'm talking about. Maybe they're, like, super cheap.
Yeah.
But they did some legal pads, too, that.
Yeah.
I didn't get some interesting grids. And at the top, they were red, which I thought was actually pretty sharp. I don't know how red ties.
It's like an isometric grid on here. That's cool.
Yeah, that was pretty neat. Usually they do another version of the hardcover book.
Yeah, that's cool. And those do look good.
Yeah.
I would have been really cool if they came out with, like, an extra. Extra firm core just for this one.
Just like a fork. Oh, yeah. Because of an architect. Right?
Yeah, they're just like. It's called the needle grade.
Yeah, that would be cool. That would definitely have been a. A perk. Just something different.
But, yeah, it's so expensive.
Cool.
But I. I did notice, like, I feel like this bear is remarking that these things have gone up to, like, what are like, 30 bucks a dozen now? They started at 15, but 32 a subscription is still $99 a year, so, like. Yeah, I actually didn't know that. I thought it went up because mine just auto renews, but that's pretty cool. I dig that.
Yeah. If I was just buying this on the website, it'd be $32 for a dozen.
Dang. That's Even better deal.
The thing that I don't quite understand, I'm just gonna be like Andy Rooney complaining about everything now. But, like, the. The dollar add on for, like, shipping protection. Yeah, I don't think I've ever seen that from any other website.
Bullet journal used to do something like that if I'm right, but now instead, they donate it and they let you pick where it goes. Okay, so, like, there's an alternative.
Why don't you protect my shipping without me paying an extra dollar?
Yeah, it's already protected, bro. It's called, if I don't get it, you send me another one.
Yeah. What's the deal with shipping protection?
Well, there's that, right?
Should we talk about the book?
Yes. Oh, yeah.
Yeah.
All right. Oh, my gosh. Tim just sent a picture of Asha. Oh, what a sweet face.
That is the face when I'm working in my office when she's just like, stop ignoring me. And she jumps up, up with her paws on the arm of my chair and just pats me on the arm until I start petting her and I start scratching her, and her eyes just roll back in her head, and then she just stares at me. So I just thought I'd share that with. That's right. Now she's just like, this is really late for work, but okay, fine, let's. Let's start petting me.
Like, yeah, I'm not a cat person, but that is a cute cat.
She's really sweet. She's great.
All right, so we are going to do another book club, and we're going to start the next time we record. So you should go and get your copy either from the library or from your local bookstore or if you have to, Amazon. That's what I did, just because it was the easiest and I wasn't really near a bookstore. But we're going to be talking about a book called the Notebook, A History of Thinking on Paper by Roland Allen, by Nick.
No, sorry.
Yeah, different. Different. The Notebook. So it's. It's a little bit about, like, the history of the Notebook. He talks about, like, Leonardo da Vinci and Frida Kahlo and Isaac Newton and Marie Curie and talks a little bit about, like, the. You know, the benefits of that over, you know, digital note taking or not taking notes, like, letting AI take notes. So it seems like it's a little bit of a combination of, like, the science and the history of. Of notebooks. And didn't find out until. Until one of you guys sent me the link that he was on John Dickerson's podcast about talking about it, which is, you know, a perfect, perfect thing. So maybe, I don't know, maybe we can get him on our podcast for our future edition. But we're, we're going to discuss it next time we record. So, like, two weeks. Ish. Probably in the group, we'll put out a little call for like, hey, tell us your thoughts about this. So, yeah, if you've already read it or if you're going to read it, just pick up a copy of this and we will talk about it together.
It's one of the early chapters. He talks about urine more than I was expecting. Yeah, but you'll have to read it to find out why. Yeah, I mean, they had a real
concern, concern about those rags being dirty and they thought PP made it less dirty.
Don't spoil it for them, Johnny.
They got Johnny.
Oh, no. I thought this was a thing like that people used to go around collecting rags.
Yeah. About that in the mark about paper.
Yeah, yeah. That was like a common thing.
Yeah, Well, I mean, that's what people
do that people knew about before they realized that wood was cheaper and just as good. Almost.
Yeah. But he's, He's a surprising. It's a surprisingly funny book.
Yeah.
Like, I don't know if you've.
I don't know how far you guys
are into it, but, like, there are parts where he just. His phrasing that he chooses. You're like, sometimes you're like, okay, he's playing playful right now. Like, he's just like, kind of almost like letting loose a little bit. But I. I'm kind of shocked. I'm. I'm like 75 pages into it right now. I'm a little shocked at some of the parts that I've like, finish. Like, I've kept reading. I'm like, this has been about accounting, but I am, like, pretty fascinated by this.
So, yeah, I'm gonna copy that chapter from my brother who's an accountant, bro. It revolutionized everything we have. Capitalism. Thanks to these cool notebooks.
Capitalism.
Oh, yeah.
And he, he in that chapter, he like, very subtly just says, yeah, well, they were busy inventing capitalism. Like, wait, what? Let's expand on this a bit.
Yeah. Yeah. So good book. I can't even remember. I think I just saw. I think. I think maybe Amazon gave me, like a suggestion. Like, give me this book as a suggestion.
I was like, somebody at Amazon was like, send it to that wealthy guy.
Yeah, he'll. He'll tell the whole podcast and everybody will Buy a copy of this.
So I shared this with you guys before we record it, but I was listening to that podcast in the summer, walking to get Rosie from a cooking camp, and I didn't have a notebook on me and I didn't write it down and I forgot all about it. The irony, like, all day I'm kicking myself, like, dude, I could have read this like two months ago, three months ago.
So you get at your local bookstore if you can, and if you can't, you know, Amazon can get it to you in like a, like two days. So anything else we want to talk about, guys?
Good talking to you guys.
I feel like we barely talked about pencils this episode.
It's true. Yeah, I talked about guitars a lot, which is. Seems like it's becoming a thing.
So sorry about that.
I'll try to check that.
What is it?
It's the.
The. What do you call it? The Strummable Podcast.
Strumable Stringable String.
Ooh, Stringable podcast. Yeah. There you go.
That'll be our. The offshoot where I just talk about guitars and the off.
Off shoot.
Yeah.
Cool. Well, thank you for listening. We have some supporters we want to thank from Patreon. If you go to Erasable Us Patreon, you will find our account there where you can get access to some exclusive content, some also some special merch and things that we. We share out with people who are supporting us there. And thank you to all of you who are supporting us at the producer level, which includes John Schroeder, Ellen Mac Tucker, Dana Morris, Paul Moorhead, William Modlin, John Capellouti, Stephen Francali, Aaron Willard, Millie Blackwell, Liz Rotunda, Rotundo. Sorry, Melissa Miller, Angie Aaron Bollinger, Ida Umphurs, Michael Diallosa, Tana Feliz, Ann Sipe, Michael Hagan, Chris Metzkus, Mary Collis, David Johnson, Phil Munson, Valerie Drew, Tom Keakley, Andre Torres, Kathleen Rogers, Hans Noodleman, and John Wood. So these are all people who are supporting us, the Patreon at the producer level, which is $10 a month. So thank you so much to everyone who's supporting us on Patreon. It helps keep this. Keep this going and dream up fun stuff to. To share with you all. So thank you so much for your support. You can find us at racebowl Us and you can find Patreon at racebowl Us Patreon or on Patreon. So the show notes will be available online or on whatever podcast you're using. We encourage you to write a review like our podcast star. Our podcast. Whatever it is that your podcatcher of choice uses to to help us, that really does help to help us break through the algorithm to be heard by more people.
What did you say to be found.
Oh, I literally thought you went beep, beep, boop, like, or like, made like computer noises like. Yes, exactly.
Algorithm.
Thank you. Must be binary. Thank you. This has been episode 216 of the raceball podcast and we will talk to you soon.
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