Last month I reported that I got my hands on my old favorite pen, or the same model of pen anyhow. It wasn’t easy to find but I do now have a stainless steel-barreled Parker Vector fountain pen. I wondered how it would compare to some of the similar models of Parkers, and since they were pretty inexpensive, I ordered some. I had to (virtually) go to Great Britain to find a Parker I.M., which in the UK is marketed … Read the rest
Today is Armenian Remembrance Day, a day set aside in memory of the Armenian genocide by the Turks mostly during World War I.
President Bush made a statement today stating «there cannot be reconciliation until there is truth telling» but stopped short of using the word «genocide.» The government in Ankara still insists that there was no genocide, but historians generally agree that the Turkish slaughter of Armenians was the first genocide of the Twentieth Century.
Here in … Read the rest
My bottle of Aurora black is running dangerously low, so it was time to go ink shopping. I don’t know as much about inks as I’d like to, so I’ve been reading what I can find online. What I’ve been reading are raves from all corners about a brand I was formerly unaware of: Noodler’s.
Noodler’s is an American company that makes inks for pens. Most fountain pen ink brands are produced by pen companies. While I don’t deny the … Read the rest
Endgadget whines about Jobs distancing Apple from DRM
This is not a home run by any means, but getting rid of the DRM protections and upping the bitrate to 256K bring me a lot closer to buying albums that I’d like to keep… currently I buy individual songs or sometimes albums that I don’t really have a lot of attachment to.
I’m much more likely already to buy MP3s from labels that don’t attach copy protection. Six Degrees Records… Read the rest
After all the writing I did about the pens I do have, how about a little voyage into fantasy?
This is the Waterman Edson Black Diamond. It has an 18 karat gold nib, which means it’s the sort of pen you don’t lend to a friend. Not because your friends are untrustworthy, but because the gold is soft and over time will be shaped to match the way you hold your pen. Everyone holds their pen a little bit differently, … Read the rest
I have two major shopping weaknesses. Well, three if you count electronic junk, but I don’t feel a lot of connection to electronic junk. Sometimes useful toys, but for the most part still toys. No, my virtue and vice gets rolled into two categories: books and pens.
I’ve always bought books faster than I can read them. These days I’m not reading nearly as much as I used to; it’s the end of March and I’ve finished only seven books this … Read the rest
I remember being six or seven years old when television was explained to me. It was around that time that I asked my dad about lasers. I was astounded to learn that the zap guns that blew up aliens in the movies were just very powerful bursts of light, all going in exactly the same direction. It was then that I hatched my sinister plan to kill everyone in the United States. One would have only to infiltrate the TV … Read the rest
It was on this day in 1854 that the Republican Party was organized.
Historically the GOP has stood for some very laudable ideals and has fought effectively for them. Some of the ideals of the Republican Party may seem strange to modern readers who read the news of the Republicans of today, but the ideals are worth embracing even though today’s execution falls short of those ideals.
There is no vice in falling short of one’s ideals. The only vice … Read the rest
Somewhere along the way I got the crazy idea to do a self-portrait. Mostly I wanted to have something representative of my work on this page. I like the stark black and white template that I use, but it seems a little too dry. I wanted to include something that reflects my love for the contrast of black and white lines. That’s what I do, after all. I don’t like the black and white template because I like things that … Read the rest