13: Becky Wilson

SO ep 13 tk 1.sesx_mixdown

[00:00:00] John: [00:00:00] Welcome to episode 13 of stationary orbit. I'm your host John West and today's episode is a discussion with Becky Wilson. Who's in the top 20 on the FPC dot Inc leader boards to talk about ink collecting and the current ink market. Hello, Becky. Hello. Nice to have you on the show. 

Becky: [00:00:15] I am absolutely delighted 

John: [00:00:17] to be here.

I'm very excited about the show. I've talked to other folks about mail art and pens and a little bit, uh, definitely on the vintage ink side of things, but this is definitely going to be something where we're going to talk about and geek out about all the different colors of inks and the different types and  manufacturers of inks

I'm excited about this one. Yeah, that'll be great. I'm going to get this one started. How many inks do you have to own to make it into the top 20 on the fountain pen companion 

Becky: [00:00:46] on, I don't know. I know I am. What am I? Number 15, 16. 

John: [00:00:53] You were 15 when I was starting to put this show together and you had just gotten nudged.

I think it was [00:01:00] Friday. 

Becky: [00:01:00] Well, I did get one bottle of ink ink this weekend. Alrighty. That might not be accurate right yet. Oh, see, now I'm tied for 15th on the leaderboard. Oh, there you go. Five Oh nine gets you into the 

John: [00:01:12] top 20. Exactly. How many purple inks do you? 

Becky: [00:01:16] I had to go get my, uh, colorings and actually sit there and count these swabs.

Cause I had no idea and it is 137. 

John: [00:01:26] There you go. Yeah. Not as much of a percentage as I might've thought, but that's still really impressive. Yeah. 

Becky: [00:01:32] It's a definite area focus. I mean, overall collection, do 

John: [00:01:36] you have a storage system for your inks? 

Becky: [00:01:39] Chaos generally got a plastic bookshelf that I just mound, the ink bottles.

I 

John: [00:01:48] think that tends to be the, the common mode, especially when you start getting into the upper levels of ink ownership. Yep. 

Becky: [00:01:55] It's like, okay, go somewhere. Let's let's figure it out. Yeah. I need [00:02:00] to go to Ikea or something and start getting something actually. But yeah, 

John: [00:02:04] I think at some point in time, I think Ana Reinert with a desk, yeah.

I've been mentioning something about one of the IKEAs and yeah, the fact that it's just about the perfect height for some of the drawers for ink bottles. And I've got a bunch of various boxes, like cigar boxes and that kind of stuff filled with things, samples that are sitting around. Yeah, I 

Becky: [00:02:25] think it's the Alex that they recommend.

John: [00:02:28] Yeah, that sounds right. Once 

Becky: [00:02:30] I feel up to venturing out to an Ikea again, I think that's probably on my list. Nice samples. I'm pretty okay. With samples. I keep in, I've got three or four test tube racks and they stack, so that's not bad. 

John: [00:02:43] That is cool. Where do you get the toaster Brooks from? I just ordered them off Amazon.

Okay. So you mentioned your, uh, having to go get your colorings to see how many purple samples you have. How many colorings have you filled? I've 

Becky: [00:02:54] completely filled five. I'm working on my six. Then I've got [00:03:00] only a little sliver up the sixth 

John: [00:03:02] on the previously mentioned Anna Reinert I'm. Sure. Thanks you. 

Becky: [00:03:07] I am a constant 

John: [00:03:09] customer.

I need to get to swabbing more on my samples. I actually have the codex system and I've got a bunch of those cards that I need to get inked up and into that into my Rolodex. Yeah, 

Becky: [00:03:22] actually, uh, some of the cards currently on my colorings, which I have arranged by color are from you. When you were switching over from the coloring to the cadets, I still have 

John: [00:03:32] those.

Oh, very nice. Good. Yeah. For anybody out there that doesn't know the colorings and codex are a product from Anna Reinert and the well-appointed desk, and they are a very specific paper Anna found, and apparently Anna had the look high and low to find this stuff, but it's a paper that is really fun. Pen, ink friendly and shows off a lot of the.

Main characteristics such as sheen, [00:04:00] shading, shimmer, really well as she has it in multiple forms. And one of them is the coloring where everything has a one hole punch in and it has a little ring snap ring on it that you hold all the cards together. And I, what is it? A pack of a hundred? Yeah, I think it's a hundred of those.

And then she has the codex, which is stamped with the holes in it to fit in the old Rolodex. Yeah to fit in the old Rolodex machines. So I had to go out and buy myself an old 1950s vintage metal Rolodex for mine. That's so cool. Uh, it's a, it's a great way of doing it. And it's another nice little step back into to some vintage analog stuff with the old Rolodex.

And I 

think 

Becky: [00:04:42] it's a lot more convenient to flip through it and, and check your colors that you've got than the way I've got it with. Just rings that I have to sit through and probably not to lose track of and 

John: [00:04:51] yeah, rethink mine because I put, started putting everything in by a manufacturer. Which means you can't compare by [00:05:00] color.

And so I'm going to have to redo that and start reorganizing mine by color. I believe. 

Becky: [00:05:04] Well, I know a few people, I know like a, Kimberly keeps two different setups, one by color and one by manufacturer, which is admirable, but, uh, more effort than I'm going to go to. 

John: [00:05:14] Honestly. I agree. So what do you think of the current ink market?

Becky: [00:05:18] I am very delighted by it, obviously, because I keep throwing all my money toward it. I've really like the way that a foreign inks are a lot easier to get than they were just a couple years ago with vendors like sugary and Vanessa of course, is a good resource for us to get some of the, uh, Korean and Taiwanese inks that were previously kind of difficult to get.

John: [00:05:41] Yeah. It's, it's definitely interesting. How much of a commitment VNS has made towards getting some of the offshore brands into there? 

Becky: [00:05:50] Yeah. Then like at least once a week, I go and arrange bottled eggs from new to old so I can see what is new, what do I need to get? What samples [00:06:00] do I need to try? 

John: [00:06:01] Sure. I'm going to have a shopping list after we're done with this episode.

Becky: [00:06:05] I can put you in places if 

John: [00:06:07] you want. I don't know if she's still doing it, but I thought at some point in time, Lisa van ES had made a commitment to, I think she carries all the  inks. 

Becky: [00:06:17] That sounds right. I think I've heard that as well. I don't know if you can keep up with that. Cause I know a day after mentors seems to.

Come out with a lot of new bottles that are the same previous colors, but just, you know, you can get your standard colors, but in the great writers line or your standard colors in the room line, Katie to stock all that, I don't know what she's decided. Well, 

John: [00:06:39] and I know that they had a pretty massive explosion of the variety.

When all of a sudden I started putting in different sheens where you can get silver sheen or gold sheen or Brown Shane for some of the inks. And I love some of those inks, but man, that is a lot of inventory. Yeah. 

Becky: [00:06:56] That's a serious 

John: [00:06:57] commitment. Yep. So do you think the ink [00:07:00] market is getting too full? 

Becky: [00:07:01] I don't think so, honestly, because obviously the demand is still there.

People are buying. I was, we had a conversation either last week or a couple of weeks ago on the pen addict, Slack about people were worried about whether it was going to be a market saturation situation. Like in the 1990s, American comics market, where, you know, everything was driven up into the sky and then it collapsed completely and almost killed the entire industry.

And I don't think those are analogous because there are simply so many different companies in different markets in the inquiry. You know, you got your Japanese Ang, she got your American ex, you got the European union inks. It's not the same situation at all. 

John: [00:07:47] I think there's something to be said for the fact that I think it makes it harder for some of the new, smaller, incoming Inc brands.

Because all of a sudden you have to have something new and different because everybody [00:08:00] does. Blue green, black bread inks. So you've got to come up with something new. 

Becky: [00:08:06] That's true. You got to have, like, I mean, your packaging has to be particularly acute or your label names have to be something that catches the eye.

Like, yeah. I'm not just going to a bottle of like 

John: [00:08:16] simply black or. Yeah. And especially when you have companies like diamine and their infant calendar, and now they've come out with those same inks in those special ink vent bottles with the feet on them. And I mean, there's just so much stuff going on with bottles and shimmering links.

And I love the shimmer ranks. Don't get me wrong. I, I I'm all for him coming out. I think a lot of the fountain pen users are starting to. Except the fact that you can put the shim rinks into the modern pens and not have them destroy the pins the way some of the older pigmented inks would. Yeah, 

Becky: [00:08:50] I totally agree.

And I just decided, no, I totally loved those of those that diamine winter bottles. They make me very happy. I've got two of [00:09:00] them so far, but I can see them sitting there over there on my shelf and they got their little feet just fills me with delight. 

John: [00:09:07] That's awesome. I, I do need to go get, I believe it's Jack Frost.

That one's the one I made. I 

Becky: [00:09:12] have a little, little sample bottle of that one. That one is nice. 

John: [00:09:18] Yeah, that one was right up there with color verse cat. When they decided to come out with a 30 emo bottles. Yes. 

Becky: [00:09:25] I had to jump on that. Yeah. That is such 

John: [00:09:27] a good blue. Yeah, it is. It's just a beautiful blue and I love the shimmer on that one.

Yeah, no, 

Becky: [00:09:33] no, I absolutely had to get that one because. I didn't feel the need to get the full size bottle of the Schrodinger's cat because it's shredding Jerry Green. It's nice. But I didn't think I needed a full bottle of it, but Kat heck yeah, I'll jump 

John: [00:09:47] on cat. I picked up the shrone juror cat when it was originally put out just because I wanted the cat so much.

I was willing to put the, the Schrodinger into a, an office pen and, and let it go. [00:10:00] Very nice. 

Becky: [00:10:00] Yeah. It's like that, but that was relatively similar to the, uh, it's a nice, mid-tone green, isn't it? It's kind of like a mall, the mall Blanca Irish grade, right? 

John: [00:10:09] It's actually a little darker than that. Mark. It's more of a forest screen.

Becky: [00:10:13] Greens are not my forte. I like crazy. I got quite a few greens, but they're not my, a special area of expertise. I 

John: [00:10:21] like the green inks, just because I have to sign quite a few documents at work. And it's nice to have that color vague because it comes across as professional yet. Not common. It's definitely, uh, my own personal touch on things.

And it also helps me when I'm looking at documents. And I can tell if it's a copy or not. Yeah, 

Becky: [00:10:42] that's totally makes 

John: [00:10:43] sense. Yep. This is going to be tough because this is like asking everyone their, their favorite child or their favorite pet. What's your favorite? 

Becky: [00:10:51] Nope. Nope. Not going to do it. Okay. Actually it's bug bucks ink of 

John: [00:10:57] which.

Excellent. Is that [00:11:00] even still available? 

Becky: [00:11:01] There's been some questions about it now. Cause like, I don't know if they've been cycling through what they make and it's just because it's, it's almost impossible to find in the United States right now. I've seen a lot of questions about it, but I've got two bottles.

So I'm 

John: [00:11:15] set. There you go. Yeah. I think a certain point I referred to earlier on that you can, it doesn't take too much to get to Sable, which is stash acquisition beyond life expectancy. Definitely past that mentioning the size of the ink collection. I was scrolling through the FPC dot Inc profile for you and taking a look at all of the different inks.

And one of them really jumped out at me, just such an unusual name for the manufacturer. Who is site's crush. 

Becky: [00:11:47] So site's crush. Neck is a German brand. They release a variety of colors in the little, I don't know if it a 20 mil bottles that. You can see some other companies also use, like Colayco [00:12:00] also use it's the little, little, uh, kind of dome top bottle, dark orchid in particular.

I think a lot of people really like it. That's the one I have. I got a sample for him and it's, it's difficult to find in shops here. You can order it online either from Amazon or from their own site over there in Germany. If you like hit the Google translate button, then you figure it out. 

John: [00:12:23] Actually there, if you go onto their website, they actually do have a immediate English translation.

Cause I had just had to go look and it looks to me like a sys Krishna is actually a department store. Sweet, definitely. One of those, a very German things where you don't go to a department store here, you can't go to a Kohl's and go buy fountain pen ink, but you sure can. In Germany, 

Becky: [00:12:47] the market's just a little 

John: [00:12:48] different.

Yep. So what is your most unique ink? 

Becky: [00:12:52] Well, if it's just ink period, it doesn't have to be fountain pen ink. I like Fox and quills beetle juice. [00:13:00] It's a depend on my ink. It's an iron gall and it's got a coconut oil in it from the Beatles to add a slight red cast to it. So it dries a deep Dar black with a hint of red to it.

I, I, it's just very interesting in that or is, is very much not a vegan ink. Oh, 

John: [00:13:19] yeah, the bugs have been smashed in the making of this egg. 

Becky: [00:13:24] If that's a concern, this is not the inky. Want 

John: [00:13:28] any weird 

Becky: [00:13:28] inks. When I think of weird ink, I think of like, like some of the scented inks, like the detriments is like the one that smells like horse.

John: [00:13:37] Oh, no, I have not 

Becky: [00:13:38] seen that. Or the one that they have a cannabis one. I don't have either of those. 

John: [00:13:43] Uh, please tell me the cannabis smelling one is called the green, green grass of home. 

Becky: [00:13:48] I don't, I think it's just cannabis. 

John: [00:13:52] Yeah, they really missed an opportunity there. 

Becky: [00:13:55] Yeah. Like I should tell petty down a manager, maybe she'd stuck that [00:14:00] get some of the Colorado people into it.

John: [00:14:03] Do you have a favorite ink manufacturer? 

Becky: [00:14:05] I am going to say sailor just because they make a lot. I mean, Damien is also 

John: [00:14:12] pretty darn good sailor really expanded their stuff out with that studio Inc series. That was one of those so far. Which one of those 

Becky: [00:14:20] did you get? I got a nine 35. It's a deep purple. Oh, wow.

John: [00:14:25] Surprise. Surprise. Yeah. Well, it's not surprised that it's a purple. I'm a little surprised that it wasn't the I, what was it? One, two, three. I was like the dark. 

Becky: [00:14:35] Yeah. I, I mean, I've tried as what the sailor manual ha that is along the same lines. It's it's not a dupe of that, but it's the similar. Very light, multi shader, ink.

That's been really incredibly popular right now. It's definitely having a moment, but it's a little, it's just too light for me. It's more of an art ink as opposed to a writing Inc. In my 

John: [00:14:57] eyes. Yeah. I don't disagree with that one. [00:15:00] You end up with greens and blues and purples all coming out of the same ink.

Uh, Yeah, that's going to be something where it's going to look pretty, uh, in a piece of artwork. But I don't know about it using it as a day to day or a daily driver ink as 

Becky: [00:15:14] like, I would love to get a sample of it, but I don't need to. That's not something I see. I need a full bottle of some of the deeper versions that do do the multi shading.

Was it sailor?  I believe it's the purple blue one that I have a full bottle of like it's steep enough that I can write with a regular. Broader media nib and it's split level completely legible. And I feel okay using that. 

John: [00:15:39] Alright. Today's daily double thing. Ding, ding, ding, ding, can you name all 77 brands of ink that you have listed on FPC dot Inc.

Becky: [00:15:48] Maybe. How long do I have? 

John: [00:15:51] Don't worry about it. That was just 

Becky: [00:15:54] sailor. Kobe Funbox diamine. K Debbie Z. [00:16:00] Black stone book, binder standard standard bindery, pilot. 

John: [00:16:05] That's. Okay. I'll let you off the hook. 

Becky: [00:16:08] Like I, I could get into the thirties probably. And then now we're slowing down. 

John: [00:16:13] It was definitely interesting to me to see 77 different brands.

Becky: [00:16:19] Well, and you've got to think some of them are like, you know, like sailors, like three or four of them, I own just because they do the different lines. If it gets in the sailor, the Kobe and the bunk box, that's three off the top of my head. They're all 

John: [00:16:30] sailor. Yep. I wanted to go through, so since urban Hafner had been so nice in putting together the most popular anx, I thought we would go through the.

Top 10, most popular inks per the phone pen, companion website. And number one, is she her Yvonne 16, 70 Emerald of Shavasana, which is 389 entries. And probably the, at least in my opinion, probably the thing that kicked off the shimmer ranks [00:17:00] for a, in a big way. I 

Becky: [00:17:02] totally agree. Yeah. 

John: [00:17:06] Yeah. Oh yeah. I've got two bottles of it.

I was stocking up. I was worried about it being limited edition now, thankfully 

Becky: [00:17:12] that is not the case. Everyone can get in. Enjoy some EOC. 

John: [00:17:18] Number two is diamine oxblood yes. I have a bottle 

Becky: [00:17:23] of that. A 30 mil bottle. I don't use it often. It's a little bit browner than I think I would like. Okay. It's a good day.

I just. It doesn't thrill me at the moment. 

John: [00:17:36] I was actually a little surprised that a red ink got that high up. Yeah. I 

Becky: [00:17:41] think people are kind of uncertain when they branch out, but between beyond blue and black and they're like, what red ink should we get? And I think a lot of people, particularly I read it will recommend oxblood and they're like, okay.

And it's cheap. So let's do it. 

John: [00:17:56] Oh, that's a good, that's a good explanation. So number three, [00:18:00] pilot, Russia. Zuku com pecky. That is a bottle I have. I'm pretty sure you have a bottle of it. No, 

Becky: [00:18:05] I do not own even a sample of 

John: [00:18:08] a compact. That's a great color. 

Becky: [00:18:12] No, it's just, it's about my favorite shade of blue and I F and that's always that's, I'm like, I know it's always going to be there, so I'm like, Oh, one day I'll pick it up.

And I just haven't yet. 

John: [00:18:22] Yeah, I kind of follow along in with Brad Dowdy. That Compex is a nice color, but I actually prefer shin kine or shouldn't Chi to it because it's got that darker little bit of a green tinge to it. I really love that. See blue 

Becky: [00:18:39] and that serious skipping ahead to number eight there.

And that's another one I don't have. Wow. And that is actually on my list because I know uh Shinkai and number four there, the Yamato, those, there is a recipe up there on FBN about how to make a LaMi, dark lilac with those [00:19:00] two inks. So, and that is. One of the great disappointments that I do not have a bottle of that I do have a sample of lemme dark lilac, but I should get Shinkai in order.

So I could try out this 

John: [00:19:13] recipe and that does bring up a good point that, uh, for anyone out there that has decided that they really want to get into experimenting and sloshing some anchor around. It's generally a best practice to keep it in the same brand as you're mixing stuff up, just because different manufacturers use different additives and you never know what's going to react and potentially muddle a color for you.

Becky: [00:19:40] Keep them in the family and then maybe let it sit for 24 hours before you try it 

John: [00:19:45] before you make sure it doesn't eat your bottle. So it doesn't eat your pen. 

Becky: [00:19:49] Don't go putting it immediately into something. In digital, he did something like a good old gin hell. That's what they're there for 

John: [00:19:58] Jen Hauser farm.

Gotcha. [00:20:00] So we've got number four, which we had already related to Yamamoto. I'm sure you have that one. Yeah. 

Becky: [00:20:05] That's a lot of people call it a purple. I can kind of think of it more as a magenta, pink, whatever, but I do have a bottle of it is a very good day. 

John: [00:20:16] Yeah. Diamine ancient copper, number five. 

Becky: [00:20:19] Yes, I definitely have that.

It does crest a bit on occasion, but it's worth it. And it's not an egregious amount of pressing, so shimmering. No, it's just, it's just a really nice rich, warm, reddish Brown. 

John: [00:20:36] Robert Oster, fire and ice. Number six. 

Becky: [00:20:38] Yes. I have a, I have a slight teal problem. Not on one of my purple problem, but yeah, so I had to get by her and ice that, so that's one of the, it's not a super, super Sheena, but it does have some nice sheen.

John: [00:20:50] Yeah. I don't have that one. I've got a few other Robert Auster in the fire series, but not the fire and ice. The number seven noodlers [00:21:00] Apache sunset. 

Becky: [00:21:01] I do have a sample of bed. I do not have a full bottle. Uh, I 

John: [00:21:05] bought a full bottle of it and ended up giving it away. As we had been talking a little bit before we started recording that, uh, apparently noodlers had a little bit of a QA issue with that particular ink.

And when it initially came out, it had some really neat shading characteristics to it where it would go from yellow to. Orange to red and the bottle I got would do that a little bit, but it just, I ended up falling in love with, uh, some of the other oranges, like sailors apricots and the Fu gawky. Oh yeah, that's a good one.

So, yeah, that one, that one got displaced. And then, uh, we had mentioned the shin, Kai from pilot number eight, number nine is diamine Earl gray. I 

Becky: [00:21:53] do have a bottle of that. I have one of the big, what is it? The 80 mil bottle. The bigger one. I mean, I don't remember. [00:22:00] It'd be 50, but it's, it's a nice, uh, medium purple leaning, gray soft it's shade slightly.

No real. It doesn't it doesn't sheen at all. It's a nice, solid little gray. 

John: [00:22:16] What do you use your gray ink for just general writing? 

Becky: [00:22:19] Just general writing. Like what do you use anything else for? I don't. 

John: [00:22:23] Okay. I was just curious. I, I ended up actually buying a bottle of Cara's Cara's pins, Wolf gray, and 

Becky: [00:22:32] I want to get that one too.

John: [00:22:34] Yeah. And I picked it up specifically because I don't typically write with black ink. So I typically don't write with gray inks either and I bought it up, bought it because of the Japanese tradition that you write condolence letters in gray ink, because it is supposed to symbolize black ink. That's been cried on.

Becky: [00:22:55] Oh, that's fascinating. I never knew that. 

John: [00:22:57] And I love the symbology of that so [00:23:00] much that I bought an entire bottle of graying to make sure I had it in case, uh, the, the very unfortunate circumstance came up that I would need to write a condolence letter that it has been used. Yeah. 

Becky: [00:23:14] Yeah. I do like the almost vintage look of like some of the CPA yanks or some of the gray aches.

And we'll use that in some of my. Slightly flex here, nib pens to just to look old timey. I like it. 

John: [00:23:31] Very good. And then Browning, everything out. Number 10, sailor genteel Yama. Dory, 

Becky: [00:23:37] definitely have to happy you on Dory. That is a great deal. I love it. 

John: [00:23:43] There you go. That, that was going to be that most of my shopping list is right here.

Becky: [00:23:48] I mean, it's a solid, I mean, no blacks, but there's I want to say, yeah, you got your blues one darker, one liner. You got your [00:24:00] green, you got enough teel. You got a little turquoise. Yeah. I mean, it's got Yama Buddha, but there's no real good purple on it. 

John: [00:24:09] There you go. Well, we'll have to list that complaint with urban, 

Becky: [00:24:13] like make people buy the right.

Purple. Yeah, you got to decide which one that would be a thing cross violent. Everyone should own cross violent. 

John: [00:24:24] There you go. I have a grail ink, something that it sounds like, honestly, it sounds like you might've already answered this with the one violet that you, which file was I talking about? Where you could mix the mommy, Derek lilac, mommy, dark wildlife.

Thank you. 

Becky: [00:24:39] I would, I would like a bottle of that, although I already have a sample. So that is not super pressing. I would really like a Waterman, Patricia purple. One of the vintage ones that is gone. That is super pretty. And I would like a little sample of that. [00:25:00] Patricia, Patricia and purple. It's a little dust year, then the tender purple and I saw in a Jesse's collection.

Testicles has the, uh, the actual biggest pinnacle in collection that I know of. Yeah. 

John: [00:25:15] And not by a little bit either. Yeah. 

Becky: [00:25:18] Like she makes me look like an amateur. She's got like literally four times the amount of ink I have. 

John: [00:25:23] Yup. Yeah. I think, I think at that point in time, you either have a strict organizational scheme for how you, how you organize that stuff.

Or you end up in a landslide of ink bottles. 

Becky: [00:25:37] She has an organizational scheme. That is excellent. She's like the library of Congress at banks. She's got everything notated and correlated and yeah. 

John: [00:25:47] Yeah, it doesn't surprise me at 

Becky: [00:25:48] all, but I didn't that I was very lucky that my previous grail Inc, was a papier plume Solen, which was the, uh, fountain pen day, Inc.

[00:26:00] From 2017. And it's a dusty purple that's right in my wheelhouse. That's awesome. John Knepper up in Wyoming, he had a bottle of it. Wasn't that thrilled 

John: [00:26:13] with it founded a new home. 

Becky: [00:26:16] It came to live 

John: [00:26:17] with me and it's so we have to do as, as stationary and pen addicts is we've got to, we've got to make sure that we get what we, I love and what we don't love.

We have to go find new homes for yep. 

Becky: [00:26:29] Yep. Most definitely. 

John: [00:26:31] And if you can enable somebody while you're doing. 

Becky: [00:26:35] Yeah. And then they'll get more stuff that they don't need. Hey, you want 

John: [00:26:40] this? Now? They can always return the favor. It's a happy circle. That's right. We've talked about your favorite ink and your grayling.

Uh, do you have a favorite pen? 

Becky: [00:26:50] Okay. Right now my current baby is my yard OLED. They just got recently. 

John: [00:26:57] How did you pick that up? 

Becky: [00:26:59] Atlas stationers [00:27:00] was having a sale. They did a, is it a brand takeover this, this summer? And like, those don't go on sale that often. And I've wanted one for like three years, so let's do it.

Well, I've always loved Stiller, Sterling silver. One of my very first jobs was polishing silver for an elderly lady, friend of ours. And like, I want a silver pen. So that's what I did. 

John: [00:27:26] Yeah. I remember that. Uh, definitely showing up on the zoom call. Yep. 

Becky: [00:27:31] I have to show that up. 

John: [00:27:34] Just a ticking down the list here.

Do you have a favorite paper? 

Becky: [00:27:38] Um, Madorie MD. I like myself, a little bit of a tooth and that's, that's just perfect. 

John: [00:27:44] Um, does it change based on what kind of anchor using? I'm 

Becky: [00:27:48] not a huge sheen person. It's very pretty, but it doesn't, I don't hunt it down, but every once in a while I will have to break out, break out the till my way, just 

John: [00:27:58] because.

[00:28:00] Okay. And I'm gonna start this with a question, which I already know the answer to. Do you practice your handwriting? I 

Becky: [00:28:08] do. I, uh, well, I mean, I don't, I write a lot. I don't write purposefully. I'm like, I'm not, I'm not a correspondent. I am not a pen pal. I am horrible at that, but I just sit down and I, what I'm listening to on TV, which sounds strange.

That's what I 

John: [00:28:23] do. And one thing that I think, uh, this is leading to, do you have a favorite handwriting? 

Becky: [00:28:30] I do like the, I don't know what you call it. The running ends, the spacing, the spacing drill that, uh, Michael soul teaches in his, uh, business writing class. That's condensed. It's just kind of meditative so they can they're spaced out ends or A's.

It makes me happy. 

John: [00:28:47] There you go. And that's what this whole thing is about and you gotta make yourself happy. All right. What is one thing you wish people knew about ink 

Becky: [00:28:56] that you don't have to chase [00:29:00] all the new colors? If you're not interested in, like, I think a lot, sometimes as a community, we get caught up with the new hotness, you know?

And you're like, Oh, everyone has to own sailor. And one, two, three, I'm like, no, you don't know what you like, stick with your guns. If you're not, if you're perfectly happy with platinum, carbon black, and that does it stick with it, that's fine. Don't feel the need. Like you don't have to own emeralds up ship or just because it's number one on the list.

Oh. Also try samples before you buy a full bottle. So if you don't, if you're not 

John: [00:29:39] sure, um, that one, I completely agree with. I. I bought bottles early on that I really shouldn't have the, the one being the, uh, noodlers Apache sunset. I totally should have bought a sample before I bought a bottle of that.

We've 

Becky: [00:29:54] all done that definitely. 

John: [00:29:56] Yep. Right? Blank line grid or dot grid. 

[00:30:00] Becky: [00:30:00] I'm a dot grid 

John: [00:30:01] person. There you go. That's another one in that column. I'm I'm there with you. Like I 

Becky: [00:30:06] know a lot of people are blank or blank is best and yeah, it is the most. Suitable for all different types of uses that I like me, your dad grid.

John: [00:30:15] Yup. Artists out there doing amazing work in the stationary world. Stationary lovers need to know about 

Becky: [00:30:22] every one I can think of. I think most people are looking out. Check out Lee Reyes. Yeah. People know about library 

John: [00:30:27] as, Oh, there you go. I actually, I don't think. Has actually been mentioned on this podcast yet?

I do, man. I do ask that question of all of my guests and that one actually has not been mentioned yet. And yeah, Leah does some really interesting. Uh, stuff with thumb Penick and fountain pens and mixing, uh, lettering and watercolor, or just a think water smearing with 

Becky: [00:30:55] some beautiful layering of colors.

Yeah. It's just a great technique [00:31:00] that I've tried to copy a little bit to my own little, much less adept way. 

John: [00:31:05] Okay. What is your favorite purchase stationary or not in the last six months?

That's perfectly good. I liked that one a lot. 

Becky: [00:31:16] It's only two months now, so it's definitely still got the new shiny. Yup. 

John: [00:31:20] So I mentioned Brad Dowdy earlier and his work on the Pentech podcast. Well, he's also the owner of nock co. A specialty Casemaker for the Penn community and he has the NACO Kickstarter currently active, and they're going to be making wax canvas pen cases.

They've got 14 days to go and it ends on the morning of October 18th, which is just before I will publish my next episode of stationer orbit. So I wanted to make sure I told everybody about it. Now there have been a lot of changes to the stationary orbit world. I have a new website@wwwdotstationaryorbit.com that stationary with an E where you can find all things, stationary, orbit, including show notes and links to other goodies.

[00:32:00] One of those goodies is a new discord server for stationary orbit, which has a snail mail channel and a snail mail sign up list. I'm hoping that this community will grow around the discord and get all of you. Snail mail enthusiasts, a group of people to be pen pals with who will appreciate the effort you put in.

Mentioning effort doing something stationary. Orbit is now on Patrion and there is merchandise like tote bags and hoodies for higher membership tiers. So if you enjoy this podcast and have the means to help support it, please go to the website@stationerorbit.com and click on the Patrion link. All right, Rebecca, that does it for my announcements.

Where can they find you on, on the internet? 

Becky: [00:32:38] I am, I don't have a website. I just have Instagram I'm on as a re will R E w I L. 

John: [00:32:48] Very good. So Rebecca, thank you so much for being on the show. It was a lot of fun to be able to talk to you about all the different inks and all of the different characteristics and everything.

It was just as [00:33:00] much fun as I was hoping for. Thank you for the interview. Oh, 

Becky: [00:33:04] I am so glad that you asked me to be on this. This was great. I, I love color. I love talking about the different colors and the fountain pen community is just. So great. And they've helped me through some very hard times recently, and I am just glad to be able to talk and maybe give something back.

John: [00:33:22] Thank you very much, and that's going to do it for this episode.