The Obsession Grows...
Sep. 25th, 2005 04:23 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
klsiegel320So that was all when I was young and charming and in grade school in the 70's. I had not yet ventured very far out into the wide world, and most of what I could tell you about my taste in pens boiled down to a decided preference for Bics over Papermates.
And then I started exploring the dim corners of obscure book and stationery stores, and discovering ballpoints in all sorts of amazing colors! The best source, as I recall, was Lauriat's Books in the Salmon Run Mall, in Watertown, NY. Although it purports to be simply a bookstore, it was also a stationery shop, and they had a display of these pens - short, round caps; medium point ballpoints; and the colors!
This was when Bics came in a maximum of four standard colors, before they made the bright aqua and pink and purple and neon green that are now so popular. (Oh, and believe me, I pounced on those, when they started making them.)
I can't really say exactly when I started hoarding pens. It happened gradually, over time - I'd see something new or different, and pounce. I'd be a in a "writer" mood in Office Depot, and pounce. So I didn't have a few pens in a drawer, or even a few pens in a mug, or even a lot of pens in three mugs. I had a tin (you know, one of those old-style tins like Oreos come in at Christmas) full of pens...until they didn't all fit and I needed a second tin.
I've weeded them a few times. I go through a box, when I come across them in the closet, and anything that's long since dried up gets tossed. But I also still buy them in boxes, sometimes, when I'm feeling writer-ish.
Edit: And of course it occurred to me later that I completely forgot to mention my love affair with Gelly Roll pens. I have one entire (very large) mug full of these, in every color I could lay my hands on. Perhaps my favorite, in the gel pen family, is the Zebra multi-colors. The barrel shows three colors of ink mixed, and they write in a sort of iridescent, opalescent mix of the colors in the barrel. I especially like the "happier" colors for journal entries on feast days, like Easter or Christmas.
And then I started exploring the dim corners of obscure book and stationery stores, and discovering ballpoints in all sorts of amazing colors! The best source, as I recall, was Lauriat's Books in the Salmon Run Mall, in Watertown, NY. Although it purports to be simply a bookstore, it was also a stationery shop, and they had a display of these pens - short, round caps; medium point ballpoints; and the colors!
This was when Bics came in a maximum of four standard colors, before they made the bright aqua and pink and purple and neon green that are now so popular. (Oh, and believe me, I pounced on those, when they started making them.)
I can't really say exactly when I started hoarding pens. It happened gradually, over time - I'd see something new or different, and pounce. I'd be a in a "writer" mood in Office Depot, and pounce. So I didn't have a few pens in a drawer, or even a few pens in a mug, or even a lot of pens in three mugs. I had a tin (you know, one of those old-style tins like Oreos come in at Christmas) full of pens...until they didn't all fit and I needed a second tin.
I've weeded them a few times. I go through a box, when I come across them in the closet, and anything that's long since dried up gets tossed. But I also still buy them in boxes, sometimes, when I'm feeling writer-ish.
Edit: And of course it occurred to me later that I completely forgot to mention my love affair with Gelly Roll pens. I have one entire (very large) mug full of these, in every color I could lay my hands on. Perhaps my favorite, in the gel pen family, is the Zebra multi-colors. The barrel shows three colors of ink mixed, and they write in a sort of iridescent, opalescent mix of the colors in the barrel. I especially like the "happier" colors for journal entries on feast days, like Easter or Christmas.
