Apologies that the blog's a bit light on content--I just finished a long, work-related travel weekend that saw me make a run from Nashville to New York City on Thursday, from New York to Chicago on Friday, and return home from Chicago on Sunday. Multiple cities on a short itinerary exhausts me; hence this brief recap. An inveterate tinkerer and gear nut, one thing I aways do after a trip is evaluate my "travel kit" that I carry. My kit from this trip:
From left: Kum-Palomino long point two-hole sharpener; Tombow Sand Eraser; Uni Kuru-Toga Mechanical Pencil (0.5mm); Tombow 2558 (B); Palomino Forest Choice Pencil; Pilot Hi-Tec-C in orange (.4mm); Baron Fig Confidant; and Baron Fig Apprentice. Not Pictured: Lamy 2000 Ballpoint, review on the way. In the background: a couple Kum single-hole magnesium long-point sharpeners I picked up at Kinokuniya.
Trying to figure out how to work pencils back into my life, I didn't travel with any fountain pens this time. Pencils are great for travel: no need to worry about leaking, spilling, blobbing, etc. I've never had many problems traveling with fountain pens, but sometimes it's just nice to not have that nagging thought in the back of your mind. My travel gear may be pencil-heavy for the foreseeable future. Oh, and if you're in the market for a ballpoint pen, I will be reviewing the Lamy 2000 ballpoint soon. For those situations where you find yourself in an overcrowded hotel conference room having to write in a pocket notebook balanced on your knee, the ballpoint pen is perfect, and the Lamy 2000 is among the best I've used.
But all work trips have some downtime, and during the Thursday afternoon lull in my itinerary I walked down to the Lower East Side to grab 20 minutes or so in C.W. Pencil Enterprise, where I picked up a few things:
From the top: Viarco Desenho B (No. 1); Tombow 2B triangular pencil (mini jumbo); Viarco Eco HB (No. 2); Tombow Mono 4B; and Triangular Mitsubishi Penmanship Pencil (4B). Yes, I exercised some self-restraint.
The Mitsubishi 4B Penmanship pencil could become a new favorite. Time will tell whether it sticks in the rotation, but for a 4B pencil, smearing is minimal and it's quite possibly the smoothest writing pencil I have ever used. I also have a thing for thick cores in a normal-sized pencil, especially with quality graphite that can sharpen to a long point. This one fits the bill. Thanks to Caitlin and everyone else in the shop who makes stopping there such an enjoyable experience!
DISCLAIMER: All products reviewed in this post were purchased with my own funds, for my own use.