The Pen Addict Podcast: Episode 134 - It's A Gateway Edition

It's a Field Notes centric episode of the podcast as I mark the 25th COLORS release by ranking every Field Notes edition from 1 through 25. One of the great things about Field Notes is how each edition fits us all differently. Our tastes, our styles, and our use cases all differ, so my rankings could be extremely different from yours. What are your top 5 Field Notes COLORS editions?

Show Notes & Download Links

This episode of The Pen Addict is sponsored by:

Dash: Create beautiful dashboards with a few clicks. Sign up now to get one free private dashboard.

Pen Chalet: use the code PENADDICT to save 10% on your order or click the ‘podcast’ link at the top of the website and enter the password 'penaddict' for even more savings, as well as your 10% off.

Posted on December 23, 2014 by Brad Dowdy and filed under Podcast.

Uuni 2 - For Pizza Addicts Everywhere (Sponsor)

It seems a bit random for a small company making wood-fired pizza ovens to sponsor a pen blog but hear me out:

I believe that if you’re geeky enough to dive this deep into pens, there might be a few amongst you who thrive for perfection when it comes to pizza.

Here’s the Uuni story in a nutshell: I wanted to make great pizzas but couldn’t afford a traditional wood-fired brick oven. You know, the ones that are like $1000 or more and take up huge amounts of space. So I decided to invent and design a new type of wood burning oven that is small, incredibly fast and, most importantly, affordable.

Here are the specs:

Ready to use in 10 minutes
Cooks a pizza in 2 minutes or less
Reaches temperatures of up to 840°F (450°C)
Weights only about 20 lbs or 9 kg

To really get a picture of what delicious foods you can cook with it, check out more at Uuni.net.

How can you get one for yourself? There are two ways:

1) Order one on our website and get an instant $20 off by using the code PENADDICT at checkout. Easy right? We’ll send it out the next day.

2) Alternatively, you could try and win one. First to list, in the comments, all of the Field Notes editions shown in the photo above (starting from top left to bottom right) wins. Competitions closes on Boxing Day, Friday, December 26th at Midnight eastern. This contest is open only to residents of the US and UK. Good luck!

Update: Here is the answer key and some notes from Kristian:

Hey Brad,

How you doing? Ok, got this far now, here’s the official list:

Expedition

Fire Spotter

Cold Horizons

Night Sky

America is Beautiful

Drink Local Ales

Drink Local: Lagers

XOXO 2014 (Or standard)

National Crop

Pitch Black

Country Fair New York

Day Game

Northerly

Ambition

Shelterwood

Including the XOXO is what I feel a little bad about as it’s impossible to tell from a standard so let’s just count that as a standard.

Quite a few thought the Day Game is Balsam Fir. misstcnj got that right but then fell on thinking Night Sky is Raven’s Wing. S/he also got the Dot-graph wrong. Only two participants correctly spotted America is Beautiful.

So, I’m afraid there wasn’t any winners this time :)

Best,

Kristian

Posted on December 22, 2014 by Brad Dowdy and filed under Featured Sponsor.

Kaweco Liliput Fireblue Fountain Pen Review

Reviewing the Kaweco Liliput Fireblue was a huge challenge, more so than any other pen I can remember. There is so much to discuss with it that even finding a starting place is difficult, but let's give it a shot.

The Fireblue pen came about as a special project from Kaweco CEO Michael Gutberlet. Each steel body Liliput - the first in this material I am aware of - crosses Mr. Gutberlet's desk to be individually tempered with a 600 degree flame to give them their distinctive look. JetPens has a great video showing how these pens come to life:

The colors that result are amazing. I got this pen sight unseen and when I opened the package to see what was inside it was a definite "whoa" moment. The blues, purples, coppers, silvers and nearly every other color of the rainbow had me inspecting every millimeter of this pen. It is fascinating to look at each and every time it is put into use.

Using it is great too, as it is with all of my Liliputs. The size makes it the most portable fountain pen on the market, and the steel body gives it a weight that the standard aluminum doesn't have and is close to the brass model. The nib I use is the bold cursive italic I swap between all of my Kawecos. Its crisp, sharp line is one of my favorites.

Since each Fireblue is hand finished it causes the pens to be somewhat supply constrained. They aren't limited but are a JetPens exclusive and the first batch of 40 or so pens sold out in a matter of hours. That shocked me to be perfectly honest because at nearly $170 this pen is very expensive. This is where my original dilemma comes in. Do you know what kind of awesome pens you can get for that price? It's a long list, and you could even grab multiple pens, and throw in some ink to boot.

So it boils down to this: The Kaweco Liliput Fireblue is pure luxury. Yes, many of the products I talk about that fit that description, but this one especially so. If you want a nice, portable fountain pen, you can grab the aluminum Liliput for $55, or upgrade to the amazing Brass Wave for $83. Is the Fireblue worth more than twice that? More people than I thought believe so. The market doesn't lie.

(JetPens provided this product at no charge to The Pen Addict for review purposes.)