This transcript was generated from an audio file by AI, and may contain inaccuracies.
Transcript
If anybody doesn't realize this Johnny is a doctorate in philosophy.
Let's revisit that little tidbit.
Yeah, I forget all the time.
Hello, and welcome to episode 229 of the erasable Podcast. It's been a minute, and I know. I think I missed the last one, but hopefully you've all been doing well and enjoying some. Some cooler temperatures coming down. It's finally starting over here. Thank God.
But.
But we're here to talk about pencils, not the weather getting cooler. And I'm glad to be with Johnny and Andy. See your faces again.
Yay. What would we call this if it was a weather podcast?
Just like the precipitable podcast forecast.
Yeah. Ooh, Forecast revisable.
Oh, yeah. Yeah. Precip.
Yeah.
Precipitable. Is that what you say?
Precipitable podcast.
Yeah. You guys doing all right?
Yeah.
It's a weird time of year.
Yeah. Is everybody going back to school in your houses?
Yeah, we're three weeks in.
Oh, wow.
Three weeks early.
Yeah, we started beginning of August.
Oh, wow.
It's still so hot.
Yeah.
Again, thank God. Yeah. Mom and dad can hardly wait for school to start again. It's like, it's Christmas song, but it works this time of year too. It's just, like, ready for it.
It's beginning.
And when you go out, like, autumn. Yeah, we had a good summer. We had fun and did some traveling a little bit, and then just back to normal life. And. Do you ever resume the fate of
the world car situation, Tim?
Yes. Yeah. Okay. That. Actually, that. That turned into a fun experience because. So he's referring to is when we were gonna. We were gonna record while I was on vacation, and it was like our first day at the beach, and I was gonna meet, you know, take them to the beach and then come back and meet them after we were done. And our car didn't start the first morning we were there. Just, like, wouldn't start. And so ended up asking this guy who was staying, like, renting a house across the street. I was like, do you have any jumper cables? He's like, I think so. And you start. Look around. He's like, but you need to get a new battery. He's like, how about I just take you? I was like, okay. You know this guy, Gene was his name. So I. I made Jean Parmesan references all week long after that, but he turned into this, like. He's like my, like, surrogate grandfather for the day. And, like, went into the place to get the battery and just like, followed Me in. I was like, I guess he's coming in. But then he, like, walked up and he was like, is there a warranty or something on this battery? Like, he's like, oh, yeah, there's a warranty. Now you have to take it to this one specifically. Or where does he, like, Gene? Yeah. And then. Yeah. And got into his car and he had, like. He worked for, like, some candy company. Like, he was like, pretty well off. Guy that works for this candy company. And his car had the Avett Brothers playing on the stereo, and he had disc golf discs everywhere. I was like, what in the world? Like, how did I end up meeting you, Gene? You know, and then we bumped into him on, like, a different island, a different day. I was like, gene. And he was like, oh, hey, Tim. So it did work out. And we got a new battery. Paid a lot of money for a new battery. And it's a great way to start a vacation.
Yeah, it's like, hey, remember all that money you're gonna spend on vacation?
Nope, nope.
Mac and cheese kids.
They'd be like, yay. Yeah, it's been good. So this week we're just gonna do. We're going to catch up and do a Fresh Points episode I love to see in our documents. We brought back Fresh Points of Bel Air. I feel like we haven't made that reference in a minute, but. Yeah, why don't we dive into it? And, Johnny, why don't you start us out? Sure.
So this has been my summer of, like, not reading enough, so that's sad. But I got to watch a lot of summer movies with the kiddos, which was cool. We watched Mall Rats, and I don't have. If you guys seen that during the fortune telling scene, Henry's like, no, no, it's older lady.
It's been so long since I've seen Mallrats.
Yeah, it's an older lady who uses a third thing on her chest to tell fortunes. And he's like, oh, my God. Like, well, you know, the good way. She's handsome for age. And I let him watch V for Data. Henry was, like, really, really, really into it. Not just the fight scenes. I think he liked the idea of, you know, taking down the bad guys. Yeah, we watched Pulp Fiction.
I can't believe you. Like, did. Did the youngest watch Pulp Fiction?
No, no, no.
Just Owen and I watched that one.
Okay. I was gonna say, not even Henry. No, no.
It makes somebody references something. Now you'll get them. I'm like, do I look like a.
That's a Gimp,
wake him up.
That's why you say this. Yeah, this is it. This is the. It's a royal with cheese.
And we have the. The family joke. If I didn't remember asking you a goddamn thing. No, no one gets it. Know that I'm not actually cussing at him, that it's just a movie quote.
My sister and I used to say lines from Billy Madison each other all the time. Like, you would do something and I would be, don't tell me my business, devil woman. And my mother would be like, why are you saying that?
Be nice to your sister.
So my. I mentioned that the kids are like, they liked my name is Earl, but it's like, we've seen the entire series, like, 10 times that they're.
My name is Earl.
Rosie has a little thing on her backpack that you use for rubbing a scratch off ticket because she likes my name is Earl so much. Makes me so happy. Like, it has so much staying power. I wish they'd reboot it, but we did watch the King of the Hill, I guess. It's not a reboot. They have it as season 14.
I need to watch that. Did you like it?
I didn't know that was out.
Oh, yeah. Yeah. I feel like when I was a kid, me and I related to Bobby so much, and I. I have not seen it, but, like, based on the previews is like, oh, God. I think. I think I still relate to Bobby so much.
So this isn't too much of a spoiler, but it gives the flavor. In the first episode, Bobby Butt Dallas's mom, while he's having some intimate time with the young lady, and she doesn't realize what's going on. It's really funny.
Oh, my gosh.
They bleeped out all the F words, though, which made me sad, as it always does. But they. They said plots of other words. But, yeah. So I think I finished Lore because Spotify is saying I have no more episodes, which is making me so sad because I don't know how to work now because it's so mellow and creepier. Like, yeah, I'm not gonna look behind me. I'm gonna keep working.
But.
But.
So I mixed up what year it is, and I thought that Tool's album enema was 30 years old. This year it's not. It's 29 years old. But we've had some teenager issues. And Owen and I were talking about a lot of, like, existential philosophy, and we were talking about Nietzsche and the idea of self overcoming, and I realized that animas about that completely. So I've been listening to it over and over again lately. Not like Pink Floyd where their supplemental messages just like, wow, all these cool new levels because everyone always give it like a union interpretation. But like, yeah, I like the nature version.
If anybody doesn't realize this Johnny is a doctorate in philosophy.
Let's revisit that little tidbit.
Yeah, I forget all the time. But yeah, like, I don't know, are you guys made of James Phoenix or maybe James Keenan or Tool fans?
Not actively. I've heard some songs but just as. But yeah, I know you've. I've gotten and listened to it for the first time in years from you mentioning it.
But yeah, I mean they do cool stuff. They're like play the drummers playing one meter and the rest of the band's playing another and they start coming together. You're like, oh my God. But if you want an intro made of James Keenan's third band, Pucifer just had a retrospective that came out called in case you were napping. I think it's a good representation of their stuff because their, their art and their album title. Some of them seem like a joke, but their songs aren't jokey. They're really, really good. Really well written and like some really cool lyrics. A song about like, just listen to the remedy. It's very good. I will stop ranting about Mayor James Keenan because everybody's always fanboying on him. He's just a regular dude.
I feel like Tool's always been a little too like hard for me. Like, like just it goes hard. And a lot of those like kind of bands are just like, just when I was a. Was younger was just like too much. So I just didn't appreciate it until like, like I was out of the kind of like the range of that kind of like forming my musical taste.
So yeah, Pucifer is a lot lighter.
Okay.
Like there's a lot of like techno influence and stuff. And they have two singers, which is cool.
That's cool.
Yeah. But those are all my tools of the trade. Oh, what am I writing with? I'm. I have a new pen. Killarney. I think they just call it the Killarney from Levenger. It's like this dark green and when you turn it, there's blue in there. And they used chrome trim but they used the gold trimmed nib, which they don't usually do. It's like perfection. Yeah, they're doing the thing where they're like, hey look, every week we have a New true writer. But every once in a while we'll throw away a fountain pen. So we finally came out with that and a really cool burgundy one for fall, which they call Bordeaux
Bordiex.
There's a green ink in there. I know you don't like bluish green inks. That's like. It's got so much blue, it's almost teal, but I like it. It's also really pretty.
Yeah.
So I'll. I'll send you a picture, see if you'd like a sample of it.
Yeah.
But that's all. That's all I got.
I was trying to think of lately what I've been. Been up to. Been reading some books. My two favorite San Francisco based sci fi authors who are actually partners, they both came out with some new books lately. One is by Annalee Newitz called Automatic Noodle. And it's really good. It's a novella. And I was having dinner with a friend who is also friends with Ottalenewitz, and they were talking about how like, they took everything that this, this mutual friend hates about San Francisco and makes like a fun sort of like, like narrative around it. It's about like a future where there's like a ghost kitchen that's entirely run by robots and something gets shut down. Like their. Their owners kind of like go bankrupt and the robots like shut down for months and reboot and suddenly they're trying to like, figure out how to. Also they're like sentient robots and they try to figure out how to like make. Make a shop, like a viable business out of it. And it's just. It's very. It's short and it's very sweet. And it kind of reminds me if anybody's read the Murderbot series or seen the thing on Apple tv. It's about like, kind of like autonomous beings that have sort of like their own agency, which is really interesting. So it was a novella. I was reading it, like, I started reading it on the way to like, Fly to Canada for a wedding and Erica's family. And I like, finished it before we got there. I was like, why is it so short? Because I was reading on my Kindle and it's like, oh, this is a novella. And then just started the other day, a book by Charlie Jane Anders, who's also just one of my. One of my favorite sci fi authors, period, called Lessons in Magic and Disaster, which is not sci fi. It's kind of. Kind of a somewhere between fantasy and like magical realism, I think. Like, it's kind of magic Is as part of everyday life and just a very kind of like sweet story between mother and daughter and there's just some kind of fun mechanics along the way. So I always pre order, pre order books from her. When it comes out. She like signs them for one of the big bookstores in town. And there's always a little thing like oh hey, like do you want me make a doodle in the book? And so I was like, I usually am something like, oh yeah, make a cat holding a pencil or something like this. So this time I said, please doodle your main character but as a cat. And so she did. And she also put in a pencil because I think she remembered my name. So that was really.
That's really sweet.
Yeah. And other things going on I'm trying to think of like I don't think there's any like big media that I'm watching. But I desperately needed a catch up on Star Trek, Strange New Worlds, the new season. Because it's looks very good if you don't know because there's so many Star Treks nowadays. Strange New Worlds is like a kind of return to the single story arcs. And it's fairly campy. Like even though it has a much better like the like budget is much better, it's still like pretty, pretty campy. So it's, it's a lot of fun there. Yeah, that is it for me. How about you, Tim?
I've done some reading on the trip which started on the trip which was good. And I finished one of them. One of them. It's a book called Sky Dog, which is a biography of Dwayne Allman from the Allman Brothers, who, yeah, sort of like on lists of greatest guitar players of all time. But he died in a motorcycle accident when he was like 24. It's like really kind of crazy, but that was a really good read. I really enjoyed that. Like I've always liked the Elman Brothers, but I never knew like the whole story. And so it just kind of get like gave me a bunch of cool stuff to listen to. And they're one of those bands kind of like Leonard Skynyrd that gets like misappropriated, you know, like they're both. They were all just like a bunch of hippies like in both of those bands really. So it's like especially the Almond Brothers. Like they were.
Yeah.
But anyways, that was really good. And then I started I wanted to read some kind of crime novel. And so I picked up Slow Horses at a lo, a little local bookshop in St. Simon's island, where we were visiting. I started reading that, which is what the TV is the first in the series of the TV show with. What's his name? Serious Black. Gary Oldman. Isn't he? Yeah, he plays, like.
For some reason, I was thinking Jim from the Office, but I think that's a different. That's a different sort of thing.
I don't think so. Yeah, but. So it's like. It's. It's a story about. Have you guys watched the show? Okay. I haven't either, but, like, I just don't know if you would be, like, I already know this, but it's basically detectives in London, like, who work for the. Whatever the Scotland Yard or whatever they call it, or who get in trouble or, like, mess up real bad, like, get put into this, like, crew. It's kind of like timeout where, like, they have to go and, like, work for this team in this, like, really weird location and get these strange jobs that they have to do, and they have to kind of function in the shadows. Like, one of them, you know, missed a detail and let, like, a bomb go off in a subway, you know, and another one screwed up a case by X, Y or Z. But it's good. I enjoy it so far, so I'll. The writing's really good, so I can imagine wanting to continue the series and. Yeah, Jane and I just watched the new Mission Impossible movie, Final Reference.
How many Mission Impossibles we up to? 8.
This is the last one there. 8. Or supposed to be. Well, because the. The last. The seventh one, it was in two parts, so, like, seven. Eight. So the. The last two movies are one. And the total running time of both together would be, like, almost six hours. I mean, they're. They're long, so. It was good. It was. It was crazy, but it was. It's basically the most recent ones are based on this, like, AI thing that's just kind of lost control and is, like, taking over stuff. Yeah, exactly. It's called the Entity. And so Ethan Hunt has to, you know, save the entire world and do some really crazy stuff.
Jump off a plane in a motorcycle in order to save.
How about dive down into a submarine that's like 500ft below the Bering Sea and then swim out without a suit on because he can't get out otherwise. So he survives. All I want to know is, where does Ethan Hunt find the time to dye his hair? That's the only thing I kept thinking about that in that movie. I was like, there's no way Ethan Hunt would be like, guys, just give me like 30 minutes. I gotta touch up my roots. You know, like, seeing you're looking at him, you're like, you. Your hair is a different color than it was in the first movie, and it looks fantastic. And I know that that's not it anyways. My. My brain does that kind of stuff when I watch movies. And so it's like, why didn't you.
It's like, either just go gray. Like, it's great.
Like, yeah, that'll help you blend in more. Yeah, we're gonna be like, who's this dyed hair? Like, oh, yeah, let's take it. But the movie is great.
Okay.
I loved it. And we're big fans of, like, spy movies in general, so it was good. And then also on that trip, I bought the new Tyler Childers album. It's called Snipe Hunter that he did with Rick Rubin produced it, which is pretty cool. And I've really been enjoying that. There's jokes going around about him where it's like, if you were to give me his debut album in this album and ask me which one did he make while on cocaine, I would definitely be wrong. Because it's like his old stuff's really mellow and this one's wild and it's. It's a lot of fun. My favorite song is called Biting List. The. The first. I got the. The lyrics here. The first verses. To put it plain. I just don't like you. Not a thing about the way you is. And if you. And if there ever comes a time I got rabies. You're high on my biting list.
Play that for my cat.
So funny. Yeah. So I've been enjoying that. I'd want to kiss my wife I'd want to hug my baby but when my goodbyes are through Foaming at the mouth, high in the hackles Mother, I'm gonna come for you there. We'll have to typewriter bill that one, but it's worth it. Yeah. Really enjoying that. And. Yeah. Oh, have you guys played pips yet? Have you seen this? The new New York Times game. There's a new New York Times like, game, like with Wordle and stuff, and it's a domino themed game where you, like, they give you, like, parameters and you have to organize these dominoes to make it work. It's really fun. I like it.
Okay.
So doing that. And I am writing with this. It's pen, but I got this on the trip as well. It's the Lemi ball paint ballpoint. It is great. I Love it. I want to get a new refill for it, but it's got a weird like proprietary refill size. So I don't know what I'm going to do, but I really, really like. It's like a matte black. Yeah. So I think that's it. She's my usual notebook, but you guys want to jump into fresh points?
Yeah.
Yeah, go for it, Johnny.
Sorry, I meant to hit the mute button. So this summer I had an internal. A well paid intern.
An intern who's related to you, I
can't say because they're a minor. Yeah, but so my intern was assigned to do the crap I don't like to do, which is listing books. So usually if I have like, I don't know, 60 books on hand, 12 are on my website and the rest of them are just like sitting in a pile. Like, so I would just take a fountain pen and as legibly as I could write, write everything down and give them to the intern. And intern would type them up and I would paste everything. And then I was like, this is stupid. So now the intern does all that. The only thing I do is edit photos and write the copy. So like now I'm not surrounded by unlisted books. They're all listed. So I can just make stuff like, awesome. So if you're doing a creative endeavor, people under 18 will like do anything for 20 bucks an hour.
Do they get a. Do they get college credit for this?
I guess I could. If I did that, I would have to use my employer ID number with the IRS and make them pay taxes. I mean, not that I didn't do that
obviously. Yeah, yeah.
But I think they're going to stay on for the year. So like super happy about this. So we, when we were going to record last week, we were going to talk about back to school memories that we had. But I was hoping we could spend a minute talking about back to school stuff now because it's so different. It's like three boxes of tissues, two things of Clorox wipes. I'm like, oh my God, like, what?
What?
Why just ask me for a hundred bucks? That would be great. But so they had specific things. Like Rosie's teacher wanted them to have a pencil case that goes into a binder, a 2 inch binder, which I think they're mixing up with a 1 inch binder because 2 inch binders are huge.
Letter actually.
Yeah. So Henry got one. He's like, why'd I get this one? I'm like, oh my God, you just Got. I got the same one, but so Henry said not mechanical pencils, and he's in seventh grade. I feel like this is significant because. But I feel like by that grade, no one uses wood pencils anymore. And, you know, it's a pain for the teacher. They've got to have the sharper in the class or, you know, the big electric one and everything and messes and kids getting up like this. This speaks of a certain dedication to wooden pencils that I appreciate. So I wanna. I can't wait to meet this math teacher. Be like, dude, do you listen to you ever heard of erasable? But so then I was trying to get the kids to pick a good sharpener because you know, they'll come home like, well, I couldn't get up and sharpen my pencil. I'm like, oh, for the love of God. Like, I have a million pencil sharpeners. Why don't you just take one of
the three people on earth who can really, really help here.
You can reach one from anywhere in my apartment. Like, they're it.
So I tried to sell them one, like, cool brass ones. And I'm like, well. But then I got to do it over the trash can. I'm like, no, you can do it over your coffee cup. But then I remember they're at school and I can't do that. So they set up on school the
Kuma make them lattes.
I'm surprised they. The long point shark or the two two step one where they redesigned it and it's a little shorter and actually closes better. They picked that, but I had to show them how to use it. Like, check this out. Two steps. Like, don't lose those blades. So we'll see how that works out by the end. And my last thing is I was putting Henry's paper in and I'm like, look, if this paper is garbage, I can just print you good paper on or lined paper, on whatever kind of paper you want and punch it and put it in there.
Henry just wants to fit in with his classmates. He doesn't want his fancy, fancy father's paper. Okay?
He's got like, he's got big hair. He got picked on a little yesterday for that poor kid. But like, it's. I. I seem to remember when we were in school, like, loose leaf wasn't great, but. But now it's like tissue paper. It doesn't even like, sit flat in a book. Like, what happened to the world? Like, I feel like it's killing kids commoditization.
When.
Yeah, when I was in oh, yeah. And Illinois, we. They had at the bookstore 8 1/2 by 11, loose leaf paper. That was really nice and the lines are really blue and it was really thick. But like, that was 20 years. 20 years ago.
I did the thing I do where like, I go after, like, back to school is done and everything's like super cheap and buy goofball notebooks to, like, use and, you know, for songwriting or things that I just don't have to think about because it's like, it can look the stupider the better. But anyways, I bought this one, which is a five star notebook, which was like the gold standard when we were kids. It was. Gotta have five star. Gotta. The paper is garbage. It is one star. Yeah. And it's. I mean, I can see through it. Like, it's so. It used to be like all smooth and if you're.
If you're not watching the video, literally, you can see through it. Yeah.
Yeah, it's. Wow. Yeah, you can see my arm kind of moving around, but it's. Yeah, I was. I was bummed out. They also have like, cheap. Anyways. Yeah.
It's a conspiracy by Google to keep the kids on the damn Chromebooks.
I think you're right. Speaking real quick aside like, Tim, if somebody wanted to see the video for this but can't, how do they do that?
They go to Patreon.
Subscribe at any level.
Yeah, you can watch at any level on Patreon and you can watch us make goofy faces at each other and mute to cough and show each other things that are on our desks, so. Or cut your nose off, which Jody seems to be trying to do. Yeah. Yeah.
Oh, one more bit of this is just sad. So at. When we all got together In Baltimore in 2020, we got to go to my favorite place in the city, Mount Vernon Marketplace, which is a food hall.
That was great.
But yeah, unlike other food halls, like, it had like twists and turns, so it felt huge. And every vendor had different beers and ciders and then they had a place that just had beer and cider. So, like, you could just sip on a cider, walk around, see what you want to eat. And, you know, things have been closing since the pandemic and now at the end of this month, it's going bye bye forever.
That really sucks.
Super sad. So, I mean, can you guys come here before Sunday?
Yeah, Sunday.
What are you doing tomorrow?
Same as last time. Last time I was in Baltimore for work and saw you, Johnny. But like I.
Or.
No, that was. It was the last Time. And the first time that I went to Baltimore for work, I dragged everybody there for. For lunch. It's like a whole team went there and ate. I was like, oh, we should go to that place. And one of them was from Baltimore, and they're like, oh, yeah, great idea. And we went. And every time it's like, there's something different that shows up. And it was always delicious. That's really. Yeah. Big bummer.
I mean, there. There are places that were there that are in other places now. But that was such a cool central hub.
Yeah.
And like, you know, right in a central area of the city and everything. So. Sad face. Is.
Is that, you know, brunch place, golden west still open?
Oh, yeah, yeah. That place will never, ever close.
That was great.
Like, it's junket.
Yeah.
Went there recently for, you know, all day brunch, so.
Good.
But I did hear they're going to use it for barracks when the president sends troops to Baltimore, like he wants to do, but not those barracks. It's going to be our governor and his forces with his big middle finger on his hat, like, no, don't do that. But I'm sorry, Cut that out.
It's fine.
Yeah, the vibe here is like, come on up here.
Get your. Get your Baltimore accent going.
Like.
Yeah. Have you guys been following that? Like, our mayor is our mayor and our governor just, like, kind of going off. No, the governor was like, come on the streets of Baltimore with me or take our name out of your mouth. I think he's a combat veteran, a Rhodes scholar. Like, dude, he's gonna be president. Like, thank you for giving him all this national press. Yeah, those are.
It's like Kris Kristofferson, like, one of those people where it's like, they do everything. It's like Rhodes scholar. I was in the army. I do this, like, now I'm a mayor.
Yeah, yeah. People gave him credit. Not from Baltimore. He's like, no, I live here because I want to.
Nice.
But those are all my fresh points.
Okay.
And controversies for the day,
I guess. First thing I'll mention, got the new Black Wings volume edition in, and it is the Blackwing 292. It is the Keith Haring edition. And if you can see the. Can see the video, I'm holding up the pencil. It's like a white base, and it has all the little Keith Haring guys. I don't know what else to call them, just little guys on it. Um, I was disappointed. I think my favorite Keith Haring thing is the little dog Little barky dog. And I think that maybe the dog's on a notebook also, like the heart. Little heart guy too. And it's, it's, it's fine. I think they did a pretty good job of like wrapping it so the, so the seam is like on the edge of the design, but they still made it look pretty, pretty seamless.
It's a roll on print so they can line it up.
Yes, sorry, roll on print. Not a, not a wrapping, but like you can see in the video I'm holding up, you can kind of like see that, see that scene. And it does a pretty good job of not like looking like it's a seam. So, yeah, good job on that design. I don't know, I. It sounds kind of crappy, I guess, but like, man. Keith Haring's estate puts licenses everything. Like there's a Keith hearing everything. And so this seemed like a little bit of a easy reach for Blackwing, but at the same time, like, it's still. Yeah, it's nice. I. It's a nice kind of like book into like the Basquiat pencil and the. Oh, who's the lady with the, with the. Yeah, the color, the dots. Yeah, yeah, that one. Like, I appreciate that they're working with artists and artists estates, so. Yeah, it's, it's, it's, it's one for. To have on hand. The one that I think is more interesting. Tim's going to talk about here in a little bit, but appreciate this one coming along. And it looks like you can buy like the designs that I, that I like. The Keith Herring ones that I like on some of the notebooks. So there's that, like, little heart guy.
Their extras for this one are pretty awesome.
Yeah. Yeah. I think the dog's on the sharpener.
Right.
Like, they're doing a one stage sharpener with the. Yeah, so that's cool.
And you can buy it all as kit for 95 bucks.
Okay.
Look, the sharpener, the caps and pencils.
Yeah. One that I have not. I almost bought it when I was in Paris, but I didn't. Blackwing did a, did a Peanuts collaboration. So through Moleskin they did, like, it's weird. The Moleskin store is selling Black Wing X, like Snoopy, like Peanuts, which is a really interesting, like, combination of everything. But that one. I need to pick that one up. But also so many, so many black
wigs, so many pencils.
Yeah. Collab with moleskin for cherry blossoms.
Yeah, the cherry blossom. I saw that.
Oh, pretty.
That was really pretty. Yeah. Another thing that's not exactly pencil related, but is something I think this audience would like. I've been wanting to just play around with film photography a little bit and so I just found. I watched a YouTube video of somebody reviewing this, but I went on B and H photo and bought a Kodak Ektar 35N, which is a little tiny film camera. Somebody described it as basically this is a reusable disposable camera. So it's real cheap. This was like 40 bucks and it is a half frame camera. So instead of like taking up like a full space of film, it takes up two half frame spaces side by side. And so what's interesting about that is you can fit like if it's a 36 exposure roll, you can fit 72 pictures on there. But the other, the other kind of weird thing that goes with that is if you are holding the camera like horizontally, it's going to take like a vertical picture and if you hold the camera vertically, it's going to take like a landscape picture. Oh, unusual.
Okay.
Because of that.
So what's the brand again?
It's a, it's, it's Kodak. So it's, you know.
Oh, it's a Kodak. I didn't.
It is, it is, it's called an Ektar E K T A R. And I just had such a sense memory when I was loading in the camera, the roll, like the film roll, I just like stick it in and just like put the like little film leader into the little slot and turned it and there's like, you can take a picture and then you wind it. And it also makes, let me see, get this here. It makes a very satisfying. Did you hear that? Okay, maybe it filtered out the click. But also the winding is very good. It doesn't sound like that came through in the microphone, but it is very satisfying to play with. So haven't developed this film yet. There's a website called the darkroom.com that you can do that with. That I might do.
But yeah, there was. We watched the Nashville soccer club play a lot and they did 90s night and so they had this video they put out where it was like all their players looking at like pictures of 90s stuff. You know, doing the thing where they're like, do you know what this is?
Yeah.
And one of the things was a little film canister. All of them were like, like a garbage can. I don't know. Like, is this a one of those? It was like the black, the black one with the gray top. They also had like My favorite was they had backyard baseball, that computer game. Do you remember that?
Oh, yeah. The little like. Yeah.
They're like, I have no idea. I've never seen this before. And then one of the other players walks up and he's like, are you kidding me? And he like lists the whole roster. It's like, that doesn't. I appreciate that.
That's.
That camera's cool. I'm. Yeah.
I mean, it comes in a bunch of colors.
Yeah, yeah. Really good looking colors. Yeah. Um, I initially just was attracted to them because they looked really cool. I also, like, have been getting into the rabbit hole. Apparently there's just a whole bunch of like. I don't even know how to say it, like, boutique films out there. Like, that's not Fujifilm or Kodak. You can get like little brands that have different kind of exposures. And I'm just like, the little like, itch in my brain is going to not buy them all and try them all. Because like, you can't just switch filter to filter. You have to use up a whole ass roll of film first.
You. Yeah, yeah.
And you can't just turn around and look at it and go, now I'll do it again.
Yeah, yeah. That wasn't good. Yeah.
And it's expensive to develop film now. Like, if I wanted to do. To do this at the dark room and like get the film developed and send me back negatives and also like send me scans, it's like almost 50 bucks. Like it is for a roll of film. For a roll of film. Dang. Granted, this, this is a half frame camera. So like the print, the number of prints would be double. Right? Like they'd use that. But still, that's, that's a lot.
Is that like how much like whatever Walgreens would charge to or is that like a different thing?
I don't know. I've been hearing nowadays, stay away from Walgreens and Walmart and Target and things like that because they just don't sort of re. Like, have a human that's looking at the film being developed. So.
Yeah, yeah, I have. We have a friend who's a photographer who's like, not like, I don't know what this means. I'm not a Walmart person. But she swears she's like, if I have to go somewhere, like Walmart has like matte printing in store. Oh. But I think it is like, yeah, it's just all automated, you know, it's not like there's some.
Maybe I'm being a snob about it
person in the back, like dipping Robin Williams.
Just like.
Yeah, yeah.
Also wanted to mention this weekend is the San Francisco pen show, which is exciting. I did not go last year. I was traveling during the pen show time. And so I think I'm going to go this year and I really need to save some money. So my budget is zero.
They might have something cool. Yeah, I think they're a sponsor of it.
Well, the.
Or that's a California pen show.
The one that I definitely am not going to buy something from, but I'm going to want to. Is Ian shown Just came out with a full. He took that mono nib. We really have to have that guy on this show. Took the full Monarch nib and just turned a pen. Turned it into a pen. And so like the whole kind of unibody design is like, just goes down to the nib kind of. What is it? The. What's. There's like a sailor pen that did that. That I was really into. What's. What's that called? The.
Oh, I don't remember.
Crap.
My brain is not working. Parker.
Like the Falcon that does that. It looks so cool.
Nishiki, Is that N I s H I k. I think that's the one I'm thinking of. No, that's not it. Um, I'm sure all of our pen listeners are yelling at. At the right now because. Well, there's that one. I was a little obsessed with it, as you can see. I remember the name really well, but like, it was just the whole. The whole thing. But the trouble is if you ruin the nib, you ruin the whole pen.
Right? But.
Yeah. So Ian shown has one now and it looks amazing. And given that the Monarch nib itself is like 500, I can't imagine how much the whole. The whole pen will be. But it has like a cool little like vacuum, like intake it. Yeah. Looks really neat. So definitely going to play with that. But Anna should be there. I don't think Brad is coming this year. Joe, the gentleman stationer, I think will be there. So looking forward to seeing the crew jealous.
Yeah.
Come out. We'll do a. You can stay with me. We can do a. Do a live recording. It's probably too late for this year, but.
So tempted.
Yeah.
Well, maybe we can make it happen next year.
Be fun.
That could be cool.
Yeah.
Three days. He's on Amtrak.
Yeah. Yeah, exactly. Three days is. Is a. I feel like that's a. Like, does it take three days?
I think it's a little more.
I was gonna say that sounds really.
And hotels in between and everything. Right.
You'd be so well rested.
That's true.
Wonderful.
But sleep all day.
Yeah.
Last thing I'll mention is just something I've really been enjoying. So Mike Hurley, co host of the Pen Addict and owner of Relay fm, the podcast network. So he's been doing for a long time this. This podcast series called Cortex with CGP Grey. And it's really good. And not. I don't listen to it regularly, but the last few episodes have been just sort of like a special. A special series. He's calling it State of the Workflow. And if anybody remembers, back in the Lifehacker blog days, they used to do this thing called this Is How I Work, where they would interview, like, Ira Glass and all sorts of paper people, and they would talk about their workflow. And this is kind of.
That.
Just a discussion with some creatives, some highly productive creatives. He talked to John Gruber, who runs Daring Fireball, which is like a tech blog. He talked to Simone Geertz, who's a really cool. She's an artist and has done just really interesting products. So, yeah, really goes in depth about, like, how. How they work, like, how they think about, like, organizing their thoughts and how they put that in production, what equipment they use, things like that. So if you're like me and you just love that kind of content, go to the court. We'll have it in the show notes. Go to the Cortex site and have a listen the last three episodes. And they're. They're pretty long. Like, they're. He talked to Jon Gruber for like an hour and a half, almost 100 minutes, talking to Austin Evans, who's a YouTuber. Yeah, just a really neat, really neat series. That is it for my fresh points. How about you, Tim? Check that out.
I'd like to listen to that. Yeah. Yeah. So I'll start with. I got. Somebody just mentioned narwhal. I did get my narwhal triad. Yeah.
It's so pretty.
It is an awesome pen. I dropped it. So it reminded me I hadn't been using fountain pens too much lately. And it was like, oh, God, now I gotta get up my. My jeweler's loop and, like, figure out, like, what's out of line because it kind of like, will, you know, hard start sometimes. But that was because I'm, you know, butterfingers. But I. That's posted. It's nice and short, but it's, like, beefy. It's a beefy penny.
Yeah.
I mean, it's it's thick, but it's triangular. And I. I really. I think it's amazing. So I've been. I've been using it pretty much there.
Remind me how much they cost. Really inexpensive.
20 bucks.
Okay.
Yeah. Totally worth it. I got the. I don't know what they called it, like, smoke or something. It's like a clear, black, translucent kind of thing. It came with a refill, like, of their ink. And it's interesting. I don't. I just have never seen this before. But it also has. It had this empty one on the bottom, but it's. It has a hole in it. Like, you can't use it, but it's, like, supposed to be in. Oh, here. To kind of like, prop up the other.
Steady. Keep it in place.
Yeah. To keep it from sliding out. So, I mean, you don't even notice it. You can't see it. It just looks like there's, you know, it's clear inside.
Which nip size did you get?
Medium.
Okay.
Leverager does that. They, like, use it as a selling point. That'll hold another cartridge out and about.
That's. That's what I'm gonna do next. But, yeah. Yeah, it's. It's not a super beefy medium. I'm just showing an example on the screen of just kind of like a handwriting sample. But it's. It's really comfortable size.
They've been doing.
I love it.
They do fat nibs now. They started doing extra fine. And they're the regular size because in all their other pens, all the nibs are interchangeable. So. And they even do colors. So if you get one with an iridescent, you know, medium nib and you want to find. They sell that. Yeah, I'm not expensive.
I'm definitely planning to get another one of these. I want to get a second one in, like, a broad. Like, if. Do they have a broad in this?
Not for that one.
Not for that one.
For the regular ones, they do broad and double broad and stuff.
Because this nib comes out to. Anyways, you put a. I wonder if
it's like a Schmidt or something that you can switch out.
Yeah, probably. It looks really familiar. Doesn't look. I mean, it has a really cool design, by the way, on the nib.
Oh, that's cool.
A little starburst, maybe.
The regular ones. I think it's the number six, Tim.
Is that.
It's hard to tell on camera.
Is that.
Is that the black or is that the chocolate?
Is the black nice?
I've been.
Been looking at the blue. The blue one. The blue one's cool. That's. That was between the two of those. Yeah. Myself. Yeah, I dig it. I like it a lot. I've been using it pretty much every day.
Maybe I'll buy one of those at the pen show if they have it.
Yeah, I'm sure they will. Yeah. They're really. I mean, 20 bucks, you can't. It brings up that whole conversation of like the best bang for your buck. Like starter fountain pen that like I would be happy to use forever. And I talked about the, you know, we've talked about the pilot Mr. A lot. And the TWSBI basic, you know, ones or whatever. And this is probably my new favorite of that category because it's way more comfortable to hold than a metropolitan like the pilot one. Yeah. It doesn't have that big metal band around the side.
So. I got a new narwhal recently. I don't know if this is going to show up. It's the horizon and the color is called French Chateau. Sounds fancy. It's really sweet. But they have their regular pens that sort of look like Twisby that caused Twisby to sue them are like not expensive. Really, really good pins. If we talked about this one here before Twisby went after everyone that sold narwhal, I'm like, you can't sell our pens and narwhal anymore. And then that's not legal in the United States. So there are people that won't sell Twinsby now.
Interesting.
I mean, have you guys been noticing all of the tariff talk? Like all the local retailers who are just saying like paper. Paper and pencil in Chicago had a really, really interesting like just like big thing about like all the things they have to think about and the way that ordering works and like all this stuff and why prices are going up. And like the stationer in the uk I think that she mentioned that she's not going to be shipping to the US anymore.
So.
Yeah, it's really real. It's affecting real people.
Guitar center, my. Which I'm at three or four times a week down the street. They, they. I was talking to those guys about. Because I just noticed when I went in I was like, there are so many guitars in here. And they're like, yeah, like as soon as the tariff news hit, we got a stock up notice. They're just like buy everything. Yeah, all you. It's all used. Like they're just buying up all this used stuff, you know, getting good trade in prices. So they have stuff to sell. And they don't have to order, you know, guitars that are made overseas. Like American guitars, they've got plenty of. But like, all the Japanese guitars and stuff, like, they've slowed down orders on those. Yeah.
Oh, man. The Japanese paper I use has gone really expensive.
Yeah. Yeah. But I also like cheaper guitars, so. And I like used guitars, so it's like, not the end of the world, you know, it's like, oh, well, that $8,000 guitar from Japan I won't be able to buy now. Darn it. Dang. I was. I was planning. Going to break open my piggy bank.
Yeah.
Anyways, speaking of guitars.
Got your kidney.
Speaking of guitars, I actually have one before that, which is a short one, but I did get my first branded bullet journal from. So I got the. This cool green and I really love. I've never bought one of, like, the official ones. And I've gotten back into bullet journaling, which is Always makes my life better because I. My brain is a swirling, crazy mess most of the time. I got one of their little pen loops in there, which was. I was so excited to find that because I showed you guys my. My new stylus for my scribe, my Kindle scribe that I. I lost. The one. I left it on a plane, the one that came with it. So I bought the Norris, but it doesn't fit in the, like, included loop in the case. And I was like, wait a second night. So I bought two of those from the lectern ones and just slapped it right onto the COVID And so now that's solved.
I always put a lecturer pen loop into my Baron fig notebook whenever I start a new one. Yeah.
Yeah, it's. It's great. So I. I didn't. I couldn't put it, like, inside on that, so I just literally, like, slapped it on the front, but it's just black, so it blends in. But now I can finally take that thing around and not lose the pen over and over again. Or my kids keep picking it up because they think it's a real pencil. And they're like, what's this? And they leave it somewhere.
As long as they don't sharpen it.
Yeah, exactly.
Yeah. All right. And now. Yeah. So I also have. Andy got me. Helped me acquire some of the Blackwing Fender collaboration pencils. So if you haven't seen these yet, are these. Now are these available?
Like, I think they're generally available. I don't know if they're sold out.
Okay.
But then notebooks aren't.
Okay. The notebook is super cool. Um, so the, the pencil itself though, it's balanced core, but I haven't mind minded that so far. And has a new eraser color which is fun. They call it cream.
Oh yeah, that looks good. I like that.
Yeah, it's a nice like soft yellow color. I guess it's, it's supposed to look like the, the knobs on the. An old guitar, like the plastic volume knobs and stuff that are on it are usually in like a cream color, especially the old, old ones. And I think what I really love about the design is it's, it. It's the second time they've made one based on a Fender Stratocaster, which is like kind of funny, but also they like did it right this time. And the other ones looked great. That was like that original one. I love Bob Dylan one. Like I love.
I think they mentioned that their email. They're like, hey, like, like we, we learned some things about the design process for these since the 725.
Yeah. So they basically it's a sunburst finish. But the, the middle, the brightest part is just the color of the wood. Instead of painting it or using coloring. So it's just black fading into which is what the original sunburst, like how that was made, which is a really cool detail. And then also that means that when you have a set of them. So I pulled them all out, it's a little pencil ASMR for everybody. They're all a little different because it's all based on like the tone of the piece of wood.
That's neat.
So they're not, they're not all. They're identical in where the fading is like that's just I assume wrapped on or I don't know, whatever.
But listeners here don't know. The first ever Black Wings volume is A. The 725 was A. Based on a Stratocaster and it. I think they, they learned some things since then. But basically the sort of brightest yellow part was at the very tip. So the moment you sharpen it, it just like doesn't quite have that like big sunburst anymore. So.
Yeah, so this is like a true sunburst kind of like how Fender would do it.
Which is cool. I love, I love the sort of like fading on that notebook.
Like.
Yeah, yeah. So there's a matching.
Yeah.
Notebook which is really, really sharp looking and it seems like thinner than the other. What do they call these that have the thing on the side where they call their notebooks? Slate. Slate. That's what I was gonna say. And I was like, that sounds wrong. But no, it's slate.
It's funny, on their website they don't. I wonder if they're not calling them slates anymore because there's no mention of slate.
Good.
They should rename those illegal pads.
Next step. Next step. And I am a big fan because blank paper. So blank paper is awesome. I think this is new too. They've added in like an index at the beginning.
Oh, yeah.
Which is nice. So you can sort of use it. I mean that you could still use it as a bullet journal, but it comes with an index where you can put down page numbers and stuff. So. Yeah, I love it and I thank you, Andy. I can't wait to use it. It'll be my next notebook for sure
when you get through that one. Star.
Yeah, no, that's. That's not happening. That thing is. That's going into the kid pile. Once I brought it home, I was like, oh, damn, I'm glad I only paid like A$25 for it. But yeah.
Have we talked about this before? They did Rock and Roll hall of Fame. Pencils and notebooks.
Oh, I didn't know about the notebook.
Yeah, they're really good looking.
Dang wing. Rock and roll. That's. My son's gonna get together next year. My parents take every grandkid on their 13th birthday. They take them on like a two week trip somewhere and they're gonna do like a tour up to like some places. Like they're going to go up to like Niagara Falls and then they're going to come back through Ohio on the way back and they're going to take him to the Rock and Roll hall of Fame. I was like, cool.
Jealous.
Yeah, but it's a cool thing they've done. Yeah. With. With all of them. And he's.
I'm 13. Three. Yeah.
Tomorrow I will. Oh, no. One more year.
Oh, yeah.
How old am I? I don't remember. 38.
Oh, your birthday's tomorrow.
I forgot you have a birthday. Damn, that's embarrassing. How old are you? I think I'm 37.
If you can't remember, you're 35.
No, I'm 37 because I'm always. I know. Jane turned 40 the year before, so she's 41. And I'm always minus four, so. Got it, everybody.
Okay.
I'll be 46 this weekend.
Oh, yeah.
That next big birthday. So, Andy, did you get a single of this with your subscriber box? Because I did.
I did.
They came with really Nice surprise.
Yeah. I think that they were just proud enough of it. Where. And I'm sure they know their. Their audience, but. Yeah, I got an extra tube in my subscriber box.
That's awesome of that.
So I also, like. I'm not really, like a big guitar guy, but I just love the design of them. So I also bought myself a box because. Yeah, they're so good.
Yeah, they're great. I've already been using this one today. Yeah, I love it.
So if you're listening, Black Wing, do a bass version. Do like a nice P base.
Just.
It'll be this. This long.
And don't sell them to anybody except me. I'll buy the whole run.
Blackwing X, Johnny Gamb.
There's the Rock and Roll hall of
Fame because it's base. Yeah. For the Rock and Roll hall of Fame, they did a notebook and a pencil and they're like. The custom box looks really good. These look amazing.
If you want to act on this before the podcast goes live. They're on sale.
Yeah. 25.
25 bucks for a dozen of the. The Rock and Roll hall of Fame 2023 set, which is like black and white.
That's bonkers.
It's a great deal. Yeah. And you can click and walk this way for 15 off. So little Aerosmith reference. Cool. Well, yeah, so I. Yeah. Thanks for sending those, Andy. Oh, and, you know, we should finish with.
Oh, yep.
So in the package from Andy where he sent me the black wings that he'd gotten for me, was this ocelot chocolate. You want to tell us about it? And then I'm going to open it and taste it.
I picked that up at present. Correct. In London, when I was in London. I actually have one for Johnny, too, but I just haven't sent you anything recently, so I needed to do that. And it is pencil chocolate and it has, like, notes of cedar and pine in it. And like, I'm interested in. Yeah. Tim's review. He's sniffing it right now and gave it.
I just gave it a sniff. I'm gonna. I'm gonna go a little deeper into it. You can see on the back, like, all the, like, nibs. Yeah. So there's like, sections that have.
I assume that's cocoa nibs and not pencil nibs. I'm hoping.
I sure hope so, but we'll find out.
Could be palladium coated fountain pendants.
Yeah. All right, here we go. So, yeah, it has. It says creamy dark milk chocolate sharpened with pencil inspired flavors and scattered with roasted nibs.
Be sure.
To chew it directly on the microphone so we have that asmr. I think Zoom is editing out that sound.
Bummer.
How is it? Pretty good.
Okay. The. The cedar is, like, pretty subtle. I have a feeling that depending on the bite, that's gonna change.
Yeah.
I mean, it's definitely the kind of chocolate that you'll eat. Like a little piece of be like, all right, I'm good. And then some other time you're like, I'll have a little bit more.
Yeah.
But it is good quality chocolate. Like, the chocolate tastes really great. I love that. Like somewhere between milk chocolate and dark chocolate. That.
Yeah.
You know, whatever percentage. 50 to 60 sweet spot tastes so good. But thank you.
Yeah.
So, yeah, pencil flavored chocolate.
I feel like we've had pencil perfume around the show before. Like, at least on my blog I reviewed two different people making like a pencil smelling perfume, but I've never seen pencil chocolates, so.
Oh, yeah, that bite.
Okay.
The cedar hit hard on that bite. Yeah. Actually, yeah, I enjoy it now I'm chewing and I need to read or incense. The details. We need details.
Details.
It's too vague.
What tree species.
Damn it.
Cedar oil and pine oil. That's all it says. Yum.
I use a soap that's similar to that. It's very nice. I've tasted it by accident. It tastes terrible.
The chocolate might be better then. So you'll enjoy the chocolate. All right, so we're gonna wrap things up. Thanks for listening, everybody. If you want to join our Facebook group that is still going strong@facebook.com groups erasablepodcast. And you can join our Discord, which the link will be in the show Notes to the Erasable Discord. And if you'd like to support us on Patreon, we send out a free gift every year and you get access to content that's not as widely available, including the videos such as this that we record. You can watch the video of the recording and we also sometimes will do bonus content podcasts about focusing on pens, which we have called indelible. That we do that one every once in a while. It's been a while. We're due for another one, so we should do that soon.
Oh, also, if you go to Erasable Us shop, you can buy hats and you can buy pins. Still going strong.
Excellent. Yes. So check out the shop at Erasable Us SL Shop. Or go to the website and click the link and you can support us on Patreon. The Link is also erasable.com US Patreon. You can find it on our website of course to help us make this a a viable endeavor for us and pay for our hosting fees and keep us in pencils and we really appreciate the support that we get and I'm going to read off our producer level patrons from Patreon. I have Chris Barry, John Scher, Ellen Dana Morris, Liz Rotundo, Melissa Miller, Angie Aaron Bollinger, Ida Umphurs, David Johnson, Phil Munson, Valerie Drew, Tom Keakley, Andre Torres, Paul Moorhead, William Modlin, John Cappellouti, Steven Franscali, Aaron Willard, Millie Blackwell, Michael Diallosa, Tana Feliz, J A F X In the Midwest Ann Sipe, Chris Metzkus, Mary Collis, Kathleen Rogers, Hans Noodleman and John Wood. Thank you so much to our producer level patrons on Patreon. You can join them@erasable US Patreon. Thank you everybody for listening and we'll talk to you soon. Do you like our podcast?
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