Tuesday Toolset, Fixpencil Edition

If I set the Over/Under at 1.5 Tuesday Toolset posts before I included my beloved Caran d’Ache Fixpencil, how many of you would have taken the under? Yeah, me too. And we would all be poorer for it. I made it all the way to the second post!

This setup is one I keep handy at the house for grab and go situations. It will always contain two things: Note cards and the Fixpencil. The rest rotates, but what I have here is a normal setup.

1. Nock Co. Lined + Blank Note Cards. I like to carry loose or perforated paper on the go for situations when you need to hand something off. These are also some of my favorite sketch/idea cards.
2. Superior Labor Pen & Wallet Case. I wasn’t sure this layout would work for me, but it does. When full, it is a little too big and heavy for a jeans back pocket or shorts front pocket, but goes great in a bag.
3. Caran d’Ache Fixpencil. A personal favorite. If I don’t have this pencil with me when I travel I get anxious. I should give it a proper blog review one day.
4. CW&T Pen Type-B. This pen and my Fixpencil usually run in tandem. I keep mine loaded with the Pilot Hi-Tec-C 0.3 mm black gel ink refill, and it is glorious.
5. Sailor Pro Gear Imperial Black Fountain Pen, F nib, inked with Sailor Sei-boku blue black ink cartridge. A carry-over from last week, which is something you will see frequently in my Tuesday Toolset posts. I didn’t get to use it enough last week.

Feedback on last week’s Tuesday Toolset post was fantastic, and if you have more, please let me know. I’ll be working on a submission form for readers to submit their own Tuesday Toolsets so there is a wider variety of posts. Look for that soon!

Tactile Turn White Delrin Gist Fountain Pen Giveaway

I’ve been a fan of everything Tactile Turn makes since Will Hodges launched his company on Kickstarter many years ago. With his new shop up and running as of last fall, Will has been making improvements in his products across the board, including an update to the Gist Fountain Pen.

The Gist now accepts full-length international converters in its slightly longer body style. It is now also available in white Delrin, which Will has sent over for me to give away today. It is a fantastic looking pen that I want to keep for myself! But no, I am giving it away to one of you awesome readers. Read the rules below and enter away.

Tactile Turn White Delrin Gist Fountain Pen Giveaway

Robert Oster Honey Bee Ink Review

2018 was an ink desert for me. The inky landscape exploded, and I was overwhelmed. That feeling made me slow way, way down on ink acquisitions, but in 2019 I am getting back into the ink game. I am interested in testing out new colors and types of inks, and, primarily, things outside of my wheelhouse. It’s time for me to mix it up!

While Robert Oster Honey Bee wouldn’t be considered a stretch for many people, this is not a color normally found on my ink shelf. I’ve had similar shades pass through some of my pens for a single fill here and there, but nothing I’ve been committed to using on the regular. I think Honey Bee might change that.

If you look closely at the online samples you will see a lot of the orange that drew me in to choosing it, but in actual use, you see more of the brown and yellow that you would expect from an ink called Honey Bee.

With my new focus on inks, I will also need to use wider nibs to really see what the inks are all about. My blue black, orange, and turquoise inks work well in my favorite extra fine nibs, but to see what an ink like Honey Bee is all about, I need to break out the stubs. Plus, I jumped at the chance to go matchy-matchy with my beautiful Stylo-Art Kinpaku and Pilot SU nib. Swoon indeed.

On the page, Honey Bee reminds me of the color of raw honeycomb. It has light browns and deep yellows and golds. It’s almost more of a light caramel, blonde roast coffee color. And I like it. I’m getting a good amount of shading too, which is what I want from my inks more than anything. The shading characteristic is not something a gel or rollerball ink pen can output on to the page.

Like some of my other favorite inks (Sailor, Pilot, Diamine, etc.) Robert Oster inks always perform well, and Honey Bee is no exception. It is the perfect combination of flow, wetness, lubrication, and saturation. It’s right in the middle across the board, and that is what I want in an every day writing ink.

Choosing an ink is always a challenge. Over the years, I’ve learned what I liked, and resisted branching out to try new things. That could mean a new brand, a new category, or even, like Honey Bee, something as simple as a new color. I’m going to keep experimenting, and when I find something interesting, you can bet I will be sharing it with you.

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

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