Eyeballs
Ear Holes
Eyeballs
Earholes
There is no legal reason to not use any color of ink, but it’s a well worn bit of professional etiquette that blue and black inks are considered professional. A former boss at my DayJob insisted on us using black ink for everything. She attempted to tell us that it was for legal reasons, then it was because it’s professional. Finally, she insisted on black ink because blue does not photocopy well. Some blue inks do not photocopy well and if I’m going to use blue ink then I need to know which inks copy well.
I’m going to start this little experiment with the following caveat- I know some of the blue inks I’ve been using at work do not copy well on the small Canon copier we use for fast small batches of copies. We’ve nicknamed this copier “Big Bertha.” Why? I’m less likely to kick uit if it has a name. Well that’s not WHY but it’s a good reason. I’ve included these blues in this experiment for many reasons. Thus far I’ve written with 16 different inks and with one refill style twice, when it is new and once when it starts to skip. Most of these inks are gel, ballpoint, or rollerball. I have one fountain pen inked with blue, and that is included. I do not use a lot of blue inks in my fountain pens, but find myself adding more as I need to have a rotation of “professional” inks.
Experiment- test these pages in my pocket notebook on Bertha as well as the high volume machine on the other side of the building. Bertha tends to make worse prints while the high volume machine does much better. I’d also like to test it on the fax, but then I’d have to write everything out again on a flat sheet of paper. Oh well, next time. Each pen and ink will have the following phrase, “Blue inks for photocopies” followed by the name of the pen, color and size if known.
Results:
The copier used makes a huge difference in the quality of how blue inks photocopy. Big Bertha (Small canon copier) doesn’t do a good job at picking up the blue inks, many of the lighter shades barely show up. With the larger Xerox WorkStation most of the blue inks copied perfectly well. Only the lightest of the blue shades were pale in the copies made on the large Xerox machine.
The pens I would use for guaranteed copy success no matter the copier would be:
Medium tips seem to copy better than fine or extra fine even with the better copier. The line form the EF and F tips were fair with the better copier but not exceptional. Sadly for photocopy clarity, a medium point is needed.
Eyeballs
Digging into my silly obsession with productivity information. This is an interesting take on logging your ideas and ideas. All it takes is a pen and a notebook.
I was wondering what Big Dick Energy meant, so I looked it up. This is probably the least… explicit article I could find about BDE.
I never really thought about where bullet journaling originated. It seems to be the love child of the GTD, 43 Folders, and Patrick Rhone’s dash/plus system. Either way, they are all just complicated lists with added symbols.
Ever feel like the art world is full of it right up to their ears? Read this woman’s takes on her toddler’s paintings and laugh… or cry.
Ear holes
Writing weighty topics on Writing Excuses is a lovely discussion on writing people who are different from you.
There are a lot, and I do mean a lot of projects that people sign up to do online, from 30 Days of something to NaNoWriMo to 100 Days Projects. I have trouble completing any month-long projects that I sign up for let alone 100 Days projects. Yet here I am at 33 days into a 100 days project. I’ll surely have more pointers at the end of the project but let me share what I’ve learned so far.
Break the rules– The rules of 100 Day project state that you work on something every day for 100 days. I can’t do that and know I can’t. It’s not possible for me to work my DayJob and then come home and do something every night. I work late on Wednesdays and I know that I cannot work on my project on that day. So I double up on a day when I work late.
Don’t beat myself up. Because I know that I’m not going to be able to work on the 100 Days stuff on Wednesday night, I also allow myself to not work on 100 Days stuff when I’m stressed out or very tired. Because I’ve built in some flexibility I don’t beat myself up for taking off a needed night.
Accountability– Despite building flexibility in, I need to hold myself accountable for catching up on days when I can. This means that often times I’m doing double duty on Saturday and Sunday. I do 2 items on those days. Or try to. Go back to not beating myself up.
Thus far I’m very much enjoying the 100 Days Project. I’m learning a lot about watercolors- how the various colors respond in use and with one another on a variety of papers. I’m learning which of the colors granulates, how they merge with one another on the page as well as when mixed in a pan. Anyway, the 100 Days projects are a great way to learn about a material in depth, and it’s worth the effort. Just remember to be flexible and not to beat yourself up when you need to skip days, then catch up when you have time.
Eyeballs
Warren Ellis does the author mailing list right. Sort of like getting an accumulation of interesting things in my email once a week. Perfect.
Man the 70s and 80s were a rough time for paternity. Also, Jobs was a shit heel.
Ear holes
Truth in advertising. People are hungry for truth.
Starting around minute 19 own your own content. For real people, own it.
Zig Zag is a lovely podcast. I don’t get half of what they talk about but listening to the hosts explore what it is like to create a fresh business as women is amazing. David writes in and says some typical grousing about women laughing and being themselves and Manoush shuts that BS down. Sick burn, get David some ice for that buuuuuuuuuuuurn.
Some people are just evil and the world is a trash fire.
Reading:
CockyGate hits the courts. If you haven’t been following me on Twitter or listened to RSVP, then you don’t know that I’m obsessed with CockyGate and all that it could potentially mean for authors of all stripes. I love me a fight with a trademark troll.
Reviews are often gatekeepers of content. We’re sent things to review. Often times we buy stuff to review. So often our review follow our whims and interests. It is no different in the land of books. Romance book reviews lean toward cishet f/m and overall what sells. That said, perhaps the romance publishing houses should look more closely at the sales of the indie and self-pubbed authors who are writing f/f and m/m or other romance novels. Just sayin’.
Want diversity in your reading choices? I know I do. I’d love to read more books with characters like myself, but those are few a far between. Penguin hopes to remedy that, somewhat with their new diversity initiative. Some authors are taking a myopic view of diversity. Good lord folks, level up or get out of the game.
Ear holes:
8-year old kid crushes some Zep and giggles about killing it at the end. I’ve got dust in my eye.
For Eyeballs:
Free online courses. I’m a big fan of teaching myself things. There are hundreds of great online course offered for free all over the place. This is a collection of hundreds.
This art piece fills me with joy. I wish I could participate in something like it near me. Helium and charcoal ball.
I roast my own coffee. Sweet Maria’s has a good starter how to and loads of archived resources. There’s a forum somewhere.
For the Ear Holes:
Call Your Girlfriend, a super smart podcast with 2 lady co-hosts talking about all sorts of women’s issues, smartly. I’ve listened to almost all the episodes from ep 1, but the most recent years worth are the best.
Get to Work Hurley is a great podcast by the author Cameron Hurley. It’s smart, funny, and a pointed reminder that even published authors have a rough time. It’s decidedly NSFW as Hurley and I have a similar trucker like vocabulary.
This post and images was graciously created by the wonderful Tiffany Babb. She is a New York based poet, comic creator, and academic. You can find more of her work at www.tiffanybabb.com
Taipei is a stationery lover’s paradise. No matter where you are, you won’t have to go far to get some shopping done in the city. Even in the most residential areas, you’ll find yourself walking by some form of school supply shop or stepping into a convenience store with a decent assortment of mechanical pencils, erasers, rulers, and pencil pouches.
During my time in Taiwan, I was able to visit most of the stores recommended to me. My first stop was Kuangnan, a brightly lit two-floor store (the upper floor is where you can find stationery). The stationery section of the store focused on pens, notebooks, and binders, but I did find a pencil section which featured a selection of labelled and unlabeled dime pencils. I also grabbed a cool pencil pouch for about 3 US dollars.
ESLITE
The second store I visited was the large Eslite location near City Hall. Visiting Eslite was quite an experience. It felt like a glossy shopping mall with a strong literary bent. I found everything from a Powerpuff Girls café to an organic olive oil shop. 
In my mad rush to find some pencils, I first stumbled across the “Writing Center” (pictured below) which mostly carried fountain pens and fountain pen related ephemera. They had these gorgeous Caran D’ache pencils—a set of four for $30 USD, which I had to pass on, but a quick trip upstairs landed me with some well-priced single Caran D’ache pencils, a cool store brand notebook, and an Agatha Christie novel I hadn’t read yet.
The store is a must for lovers of washi tape, as I felt like I couldn’t walk ten feet without bumping into another selection of (admittedly not cheap) beautifully designed tape. I also found this huge table of Rhodia products, half of which I hadn’t seen before. The store also carried Leuchturrm, Midori, and Moleskine products.
The day I set out to hit the rest of my stops, it was pouring rain (yikes!) I’m pretty sure I ruined by shoes, but my love for stationery won out, and I found some real gems!
DAISO
The Daiso I visited (in the Living Mall) carried Golden Swords, only the B cores, but they also carried a host of other Japanese pencils that I had never seen at Daiso before, including the Kitaboshi red/blue pencils, Kitaboshi HIT 4Bs and 6Bs, and even some pretty Mitsubishi pencils. They also had the newer triangular natural wood pencils. Apart from the much better pencil selection, I didn’t see much difference from the actual store in Taipei and those visited in Southern California.
PINMO PURE
I only stopped by the Pinmo Pure store for a few minutes, but it was a really cool little DIY notebook place. If I had more time, I could imagine spending hours there picking through the various grades of paper, stamps, covers, and binding options before coming out of the store with an awesome personalized notebook. Like a lot of boutique stationery stores in Taipei, the store’s aesthetic very trendy and the employees seemed friendly.
KINOKUNIYA
When I first got to the Kinokuniya, I was a little disappointed. Don’t get me wrong—the store is big and beautiful and carried a bunch of amazing stationery options, but I just didn’t see much that was different from what I could find in the branch in New York or LA—at least not in the single pencil category. There were a few more more Japanese pencil options, but most were in box sets and a little pricey for me. I did note that they had a few really cool displays of both ballpoint and fountain pens, but due to my lack of knowledge about pens, I couldn’t tell how special or rare they were.
I was about to leave when a jar of pencils caught my eye. In this magical jar I found some loose Palomino Blackwing 602s, a couple of Pearls, an older MMX with the gold stripe (which I snapped up), a vol. 1138 (!), and three vol. 24s (!!!) I rushed to pay for my purchase, constantly glancing around me making sure that no one was going to take my treasures away from me.
TOOLS TO LIVE BY
Tools to Live By was the kind of stationery store you wish you had down the street from your apartment. It’s meticulously kept and curated and carries a strong assortment of pretty much anything you’d ever want. It was also the store I visited which carried the most American made pencils and notebooks. They also had a nice selection of fountain pens and ink. 
They had a myriad of Japanese pencils as well as American pencils including loose Field Notes pencils (both the round ones and carpenter), Rhodia pencils, Palomino HBs, and a couple of loose Guy Clark editions too (which I happily picked up). They had some individually wrapped (!) Pitch Black Field Notes. They also had a really amazing selection of high quality (and priced) “Tools to Live By” branded items from delicate and surprisingly heavy scissors to beautifully thin metal rulers.
CONCLUSIONS!
Taipei is a really great place to check out if you’re a fan of stationery. The city is wonderful (lots of tree covered mountains in the distance), with a very clean and easy to use subway system. High quality stationery including Faber Castell and Staedtler as well as (surprisingly) Wopex pencils can be found pretty much in any stationery store as well as Taiwanese brands like Liberty and Rabbit. If you’re not picky about brands, you’ll be able to find plenty of pencils and cute notebooks of varying size and quality for fifty cents to a couple of dollars.
Motherland
The mountains here are a force of nature,
oceans of stone roiling beneath a vibrant forest
that shivers as warm winds pass through.
The boundaries between air and earth are indistinguishable
As the tallest peaks disappear into the sky
It seems as if they’ve been there forever
Waiting to split open the earth
And swallow the sky.
Hey folks, the podcast is out of the bag- my friends Dee and Lenore and I have teamed up to do a podcast about stationery and so much more. You can listen to our first episode over at RSVPstationerypodcast.com and head to our facebook group for discussion.