damselfish

Yesterday I was asked independently by two friends to recommend fountain pens to newbies, and this morning a third mentioned it and nudged me into making a post after I showed her The Atlantic's "How the Ballpoint Killed Cursive."*

The article does a good job answering the question of "why fountain pens?" I initially got into fountain pens for the colors and the temptation of yet more stationery, but that only got me in the door. What turned me into an exclusive fountain pen user was how much less pressure I needed to write, and how much easier it makes writing in cursive, or writing for long periods of time. I never liked ballpoints to begin with, finding the ink waxy, chunky, the points scratchy, and I was always hunting for a better pen. If you're not a fountain pen person and want to know what I do recommend, I like rollerballs and gel pens, notably the Uni-ball Vision Needle and the Uni-ball Signo. If you are curious about fountain pens, this post is for you.

As a lefthanded overwriter, I thought hand pain was par for the course, but in the course of using a fountain pen I learned two things. 1) It's all the pressure I used to make my chicken scratch, and 2) apparently everyone taught to write after the 1950s has been taught to finger write, which strains the hand. Yes, while researching left-handed writing solutions I learned that we're all writing wrong, and it's largely thanks to the mechanics of ballpoint pens.

Which isn't to say that fountain pens will cure all your ills; it's just why I like 'em and why I recommend 'em.

On to the bit everybody wants to know. What do I buy?

There are many "best fountain pens for beginners" posts floating around out there, and they all look a little something like this:

Pilot Varsity: $3
Platinum Preppy: $3
Pilot Kakuno: $13
Pilot Metropolitan: $15
Pelikan Junior: $16
Platinum Plaisir: $20
Pelikan Pelikano: $20
Kaweco Sport: $24
Lamy Safari: $28

Almost any "top five beginner fountain pen" list will be mostly made up of these pens. There are other pens in the same price range - various Jinhaos, some Sailors - which will occasionally make an appearance, but for the most part, these are it. Partly it's because these make up the bulk of "less expensive" pens.

To me, a nearly $30 pen is not a beginner's pen, but I'm a Millennial and many of my peers don't have that kind of money to spend on a lark. So if you're looking for the quick and dirty, here are my actual recommendations for a beginner:

Pilot Varsity: $3
Platinum Preppy: $3
Pilot Kakuno: $13
Pilot Metropolitan: $15
Pelikan Junior: $16
Platinum Plaisir: $20
Pelikan Pelikano: $20
Kaweco Sport: $24
Lamy Safari: $28

My usual spiel goes a little like this: how much are you looking to spend? Because you should really try the Platinum Preppy. It has a fantastic nib, is one of the most non-fiddly pens I have, and the seal on the cap means I'm not even sure it's capable of drying out. I once had a cartridge in there for 6 months.

If you're able to spend the $20, go for the Plaisir. The Platinum Plaisir has the exact same innards as the Preppy, but an aluminum body rather than a plastic one, making up for what appears to be the Preppy's only flaw: the plastic cap is prone to cracking. If you want to get a converter, you may as well get the Plaisir and a converter because anything over $25 gets you free shipping from JetPens.

BTW: a converter is a refillable ink reservoir that goes in your pen. A cartridge is not refillable (without tinkering) and nearly all pens come with one so you can start writing right away.

But mostly: get a Preppy. And tape the cap.

I will add some love for the Pilot Kakuno. I've just started playing with it, and it writes like silk. It is a children's pen, so it has a molded grip which may be a turn off for some, but it doesn't stop me as an hook-writing southpaw. I can't say much else about it, so I won't recommend it as enthusiastically as I do the Platinums, but so far, it is nice.

The Pilot Varsity shows up on the beginner lists because it's the easiest of easy. It's basically a regular disposable pen with a nib on top. There's no cartridges, no nothing, to mess around with. It writes exactly like those colorful pens we all used back in middle school. Personally, I find the grip rather uncomfortable compared to the Preppy and I don't think popping on a cartridge is all that taxing for a beginner. Honestly, you're going to have to learn some pen maintenance anyway so may as well start with the Preppy because who cares if you ruin it.

I love the Safari (I have two, I am a sucker for limited edition colors) but at $28 I think it's out of most first timers' price range. It is, however, worth every penny.

The reason I don't recommend the Jinhaos is because they're knock-offs. Not bad knock-offs, mind you, they are excellent pens for the price, but they're not as good as some other pens and most people recommend swapping the nib for something like the Goulet #6, which sounds like gibberish to most people.

The Sailor Clear Candy was actually my first non-Preppy fountain pen and I had a bit of trouble with it because of the barrel grip and the way I hold pens. I like them now, but I probably wouldn't recommend them to a beginner. Also, at $18, you're probably better served by grabbing something else. Also also: I hate screw-caps.

And finally: how do you write with a fountain pen?

Pretty much like any other pen. Fiddle around with it in your hand until you find the angle at which it puts ink on paper. Continue as normal. Same for choosing nibs. I recommend getting a fine or medium depending on how thick you like your pen to write (medium is closer to the standard 0.7 mm pen).

Congrats on buying a pen virtually no one in the office will steal because they all find it too intimidating!

Next up: Pen Maintenance, or in the alternative, When Did I Touch the Nib and How Did That Ink Get There.

*How the Ballpoint Killed Cursive.

I can’t believe it’s taken me this long to post some pictures, but here’s my green cheek conure, Coquí!



Even before I got the bird, people asked me what I intended to name it, but I’m one of those people who believe that names reveal themselves. I was originally thinking “Uffizi” or “Chickadee” because I am of the firm opinion that a bird’s name should be fun to say.

Then the bird came home and began… croaking. Soft little frog sounds. I couldn’t call her Froggie, but then I remembered that my grandmother loves the little coquís. Even though my bird is much quieter than a coquí frog, Coquí she is!

I went through a whole host of name possibilities with my sister, and she said “those all sound like nicknames.” “I can’t name the bird Sir Birdington of Avianhamshire!” “Why not?”

I admit, she made a compelling point. My bird should be landed and properly titled.

Coquí still makes those little frog sounds, but she’s been adding more to her repertoire: a buzzing fart noise, a wide assortment of grumbles, and tiny “skree!” cries, especially when she’s getting rough. I haven’t heard a lot of the sounds I hear from green cheeks on youtube, but that may come with time. Or not, she lives in a relatively quiet house and gets the most response to her croaks (because they’re so cute). She’s still a baby, so every day is some new behavior.

Which… often causes me to wig out. I did a lot–possibly too much–research on parrots before I decided to get one, so I’m often on the lookout for behavior that needs to be nipped in the bud. “Is this aggressive, or is she playing?” is something I ask myself at least daily, because green cheeks have three settings:

1) Cuddly
2) Hungry
3) FIGHT ME

All these settings may exist simultaneously. I have learned that FIGHT ME means “play with me!” because she’s a bit of a rough and tumble bird. I learned that none of her behaviors are aggressive but she is occasionally giving me a bit of sass. I have seen advice that says never ever ever let a bird engage in any sort of aggressive behavior because it will grow up thinking it’s dominant,* but this is just the bird trying to entice me to play (according to the vet). This lesson was driven home because after a little too much strutting around the keyboard, she’d start regurgitating.

“No way, bird, you’re 3 months old, you are not trying to mate with me.” So I called the vet to find out what could possibly be happening. That could be head bobbing, maybe she’s hungry, bring her in to get weighed! I spent the day fretting that I was starving my bird, and when I went to the vet the diagnosis was in: birds are weird, and she likes me lots. Diagnosis proven because a few days later, the head bobbing resulted in successfully bringing food up from her crop.

Remember this post with the adorable baby green cheeks?

“Does my bird like me that much?” I wondered.
Coquí: *barf * I saved u dis cheerio. I earned it for being good at step ups.

Thank you, Baron Coquí. For being cute, less so for the chewed up cheerios.

*There’s a lot out there about parrots and dominance theory, which seems to be mostly bullshit.

**For those interested in a few more pictures, I have them on the tumblr post here.

I really should update more, but I get trapped in that place of thinking that I have nothing worthwhile to say and that there's little in my real life that I should talk about (because either I try to keep real life separate or because I worry it's boring). Or, mostly, I write blog posts and work and then forget to post them when I get home. OOPS. Unless you really want The Pen Story.

But I have news.

I GOT A NEW JOB! I got a damn good job, from what it looks like, in a rather unexpected (but unsurprising) field. My experience in medicine has garnered more interest from employers than anything else I've done--regardless of what those employers actually do. Nearly everyone's asked if I can read medical records. "I do that all day." "Oh good, so you're not squeamish?" "...Hmmm, I want to tell you the turkey-tumor story but instead I'll tell you that I've done a lot of eye cases, that's pretty squidgy, if not as hilarious as the turkey-tumor." Growing up with doctors will warp your sense of what makes other people squeamish.

It also means I have to move. I've applied to jobs all over, got really excited for some of the ones out west. I'd love to move to Utah and be able to go hiking through the mountains every weekend. Well, turned out the job is a couple counties north of where I am now--still in Florida, so all the trouble of moving but none of the new, exciting possibilities of somewhere different. Except the town looks very cute and beachy, and very "Florida" in a way that Miami isn't, so I am super excited about moving. Sad to be leaving my condo of perfect perfection, but happy about a new place that looks like it may be a little more my speed.

I CAN HAS JOB.

I am not into New Years Resolutions--I frequently resolve or challenge myself to do something all throughout the year, with limited success, and New Years is the time when resolutions fail. But I've got a big one I wanted to share:

I'm on Goodreads again! Are you on Goodreads? Come on down and friend me! Also recommend some books to me, because I decided to try the "read X many books" challenge. I picked 36, so three books a month, which seems do-able. I have no clue how many books I read in a year. Sometimes I'll read a book in two days, other times I'm slogging through them for weeks. I used to be voracious and stopped reading in law school, and I've been trying to rebuild the habit ever since.

I'm also trying to read in more genres for that whole... be a better well-rounded human being. Thing.

( other resolutions, sort of )

Consider Phlebas and Player of Games are a couple of the books recommended to get into Iain M. Banks’s Culture books, and what luck, they’re the only ones my library has!

I read a comment saying that Consider Phlebas is hard to get into until the very end when you see all the threads start coming together, but I was having a rollicking good time, happy to go wherever the story was taking me. Until about 100 pages out and started worrying if the questions I wanted answered, would get answered.

30 pages from the end I realized, nope. I was not going to get that story. I was not going to find out the whys and wherefores I was really itching to unravel.

I know, don’t critique the story you wish you’d read, and the story told definitely told me enough to get Banks’s point across. The problem is: the story told was FUCKING SOUL-DESTROYING.

Knowing my interest in sentient vehicles and the relationships people have with them, and also my love of the ocean, someone recommended I read Katya's World.

Aside from going in expecting more sentient submarines than what I got (I was promised "it has the spaceship human merge thing" which it definitely did have), I'd say it wasn't a bad book, but not so massively good that it left me a husk of despair over my own failings. And it certainly was chock full of submarines which delighted me endlessly because submarine battles are far more interesting than space battles. I feel like they're a very well-kept secret, out of reach of the SFF crowd. The rules are strange, the atmosphere is tense, and nobody ever writes it despite the hard SF crowd bleating on and on about realism and science, which will boring up almost any space battle. Meanwhile, real submarine battles are all kinds of fantastic and even more alien than most space battles I've read.

But I went in expecting more about the human-spaceship merge thing, even though I wasn't promised a book about people and their living submarine buddies. I wanted it and to be fair, those moments shone. Those few pages of body horror were perfect.

Even before I'd finished the book I sat curling my toes, singing with tension. I want more! I need more about the horrors of merging with a machine! Except not in an instance where you're subsumed by the machine because that's not merging, dammit, the living machine can't just pick you up, suck you dry, and continue on its merry way!

This was an itch Space Noir will not scratch, for all its non-consensual mental hijinks, because it's still ultimately about two people who have alien sensibilities thrust upon them. Also, more spaceship romance than I think works for the concept. So the niggling need to do something passed.

I woke up intending to write some arctic fantasy, inspired by the waterworld thing, but before I knew it, I was 3,000 words deep in a world full of living submarines and the strange people mentally linked to them. A world where humans don't bond with these machine-beasts, until (obviously) one easily exasperated teenager does in the midst of it trying to kill her. It's okay, xe got better after that.

Xe calls xirself Trinket.

Trinket must be kept a secret from the government.

So of course Trinket goes around on gaming forums calling xirself Shiny_Trinket.

"You can't be on the internet!"
"Obviously I can."
"You're a living submarine YOU CANNOT BE ON THE INTERNET."
"Then why did God give me a wireless connection."
"Not to play Guardians of Eterna! That is *my* game!"
"It's my favorite game too."
"Find another game!"
"You're just mad I'm better at it than you are."
~Later, looking up scores~
"Slap me thrice, xe's right. D:"

I think I wrote less "horrible mind-meld with a biological artificial intelligence" and more "Socorro 2: set on a water world and starring teenagers."

...So if you wanted more Socorro, uhm... yeah? Watch this space.

Anybody have the words they can't spell?

Maybe you know how it's spelled, you just can't type it out.

I'm finally getting around to writing up a retelling of "Prince Lindworm" I mentioned back in December, where I wondered how you get two sons from eating a red rose that'll give you a son and a white rose that'll give you a daughter. Sure, I can see getting a monster out of the mix, but this magical math is not adding up for me.

Turns out, I cannot for the life of me type "shepherdess." It's always sehpherdness.

This is a problem in a story where I decided nobody should have a name and the main character is "the shepherdess."

I recently reblogged "My Fav Porn Site" which was a link to jetpens.

I wasn't joking.

I've lost a bunch of my good pens, and was finally spurred to action when trying to take notes at my desk and the pens here are all skipping--including my 7 Year Pen. Ha! I know pens have no concept of time but it hasn't even been two years, pen! Half the time I can't get any ink on the page anymore with it. I am generally displeased with ballpoints because they seem to be 40% ink and 60% weird waxy stuff that means you can't write over the blank patches.

I either need a cat to blame for the loss of pens, or adopt a black hole. It's always the good pens, too. I'm drowning in a sea of freebies from law school emblazoned with brands that mean nothing anymore, but rarely do I find my trusty gel pens and rollerballs. I've resorted to using a felt tipped creature for my note taking. It offers a strange, feathery resistance. Writing with it is what petting an alien must be like.

I needed more pens, but no local store stocks my beloved 0.5 mm rollerballs. Sure, I can find the 0.7 mm versions, but I could drown small cities in that much ink and certainly swallow up the defining loops that differentiate an "ing" from an "ly."

I resorted to jetpens, who last put into my hands an awesome power: 0.38 mm point Signos. Dare I use it? I was Icarus, flying too close to the sun, wielding the might of my minuscule scrawl. I'm still not sure if I love them or fear them.

I've used all sorts of pens, and I've found that quality has relatively little to do with cost--if anything, good, more expensive pens tend to thwart me. I think if you charge $20 or more for a pen, you should have it tested by lefties with a funny grip. If you want to know what pen works, ask a left-handed person, especially if they hold their pen oddly.* I've noticed that most pen bloggers are also left-handed, many of whom also have strange coping techniques. I'm working on a better grip which occasionally feels pointless, because honestly, I don't use pens that much, for all that I'm stationary obsessed. I don't write for other people's benefit because I worry my cursive is too small and my printed text feels childish. I know other writers write first drafts long-form and I used to primarily write this way when I was in school, but I prefer to type. Transcribing what I've written often does lead to a round of editing (which is a bonus other writers rely on) but I can write so much more when I'm typing. Last time I wrote by hand it took me several hours to get out 1,000 words, which I can do in an hour at the computer.

Sometimes this is good, sometimes bad: there's few feelings quite like having a scene in your head and trying to follow the chain of events to the conclusion before it leaves you ("okay, you're having an argument and six lines in, character X has a witty rejoinder. ...Uhm, how did that line go that led to that rejoinder, again?") But I also think I write too much and meander around and would really like to become a more concise writer again. Did writing long form help?

If I want to write long form shouldn't I actually put the time in to learn to write properly?

Maybe!

So thanks, jetpens, for stocking cheapo fountain pens for me to try and make a terrible mistake with.

*If you're interested, the overall consensus is the Uni-ball Jetstream. Which, coincidentally, is one of my favorites, but I prefer the Signo Micro. It's also the overall best pen for everybody, apparently.

Yesterday, I bought my paddleboard.

Today, on the 6 month, 6 day anniversary of the crash, I have finally gotten my car back!* I've forgotten what it's like to drive. I've forgotten all the places I dreamed about driving to after becoming inured to the home-bound monotony of being a pedestrian in a driving town.

This means I should celebrate by taking a road trip!

Got somewhere scenic you like in Florida? Lemme know!

*Yeah, the car shop had my car for 5 months. It was one excuse after another and miraculously, they started work when I started calling up other shops, one of whom called the shop to go "hey dude, wtf?" And now, of course, there's a leak in the A/C and it's blowing freon right in my face. If I don't develop cool ice powers after this road trip, I'll be really angry.