{"id":15416,"date":"2012-02-10T07:58:00","date_gmt":"2012-02-10T12:58:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/hame.ink\/hameblog\/2012\/02\/10\/frankenpen-or-the-art-of-knowing-when-to-say-enough\/"},"modified":"2025-09-12T07:50:15","modified_gmt":"2025-09-12T10:50:15","slug":"frankenpen-or-the-art-of-knowing-when-to-say-enough","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/hame.ink\/blether\/2012\/02\/10\/frankenpen-or-the-art-of-knowing-when-to-say-enough\/","title":{"rendered":"Frankenpen, or the art of knowing when to say \u201cEnough!\u201d"},"content":{"rendered":"

I recently got a new fountain pen. (Yeah, I know: new typewriter, new fountain pen”¦ We’ll get to that in a moment.) I always carry my pen in my pocket, and while I liked the nib of the one I had, a Tombow Object, I found it heavy, and its innards clattered around while I was writing. Plus I love small things — ultimate portability seems to be an ideal of mine — so when I saw the Kaweco Lilliput, I really<\/em> wanted it.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

(I’m ashamed of wanting things. When they’re named “Object” it’s even worse.)<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

The Lilliput had good reviews online and sounded like the perfect pen for my tiny handwriting and need for precision when I write shorthand. When it arrived and I started using it, though, I found it scratchy, and it dried out if I paused for even a short time. Uh-oh.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

So yesterday after work, I plucked out the nibs from both pens and”¦ whaddyaknow? <\/em>They were exactly the same size, so I swapped them.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

The nib that came with the Kaweco is much nicer-looking, with etched scrollwork that adds to the feeling that this pen dropped out of time in the Forties and somehow reappeared here, but”¦ scratchy and dry is just bad<\/em>.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

I used this new Frankenpen to write today’s morning pages<\/a>, and it was just a perfect writing experience. Once again, DIY has allowed me to customise some small piece of the world to work exactly the way I want it to.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

“¦Which brings me around to something that came up in the morning pages:<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

I am very good at setting up the perfect conditions for doing creative work. But I have become more accustomed to doing this than to actually doing creative work. I like my systems, and they are rewarding but it’s a trap to hide them them and not do the work. I have created the very best in security blankets. My systems are excellent: I have the best pen, typewriter, notebooks, programs, schedule, packages, delivery channels”¦ Now it’s time to put them to use. I’m not knocking what I’ve created — I’m proud of these achievements and I know my attention to them will help me become a better teacher to others. But, you know”¦ Again, I’m not making myself wrong here. But I’m all packed, and now there’s another adventure ahead.<\/em><\/p><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I recently got a new fountain pen. (Yeah, I know: new typewriter, new fountain pen”¦ We’ll get to that in a moment.) I always carry my pen in my pocket, and while I liked the nib of the one I had, a Tombow Object, I found it heavy, and its innards clattered around while I […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-15416","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/hame.ink\/blether\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15416","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/hame.ink\/blether\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/hame.ink\/blether\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hame.ink\/blether\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hame.ink\/blether\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=15416"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/hame.ink\/blether\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15416\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/hame.ink\/blether\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=15416"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hame.ink\/blether\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=15416"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hame.ink\/blether\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=15416"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}