Pelikan M200 - Grey

Paper! Paper! Paper!

It does take planning, buying, organising, and some motivation to figure out how to get those thoughts in your head on paper.

With the Gulliver down, I had high hopes for Apica, and I believe it just may do the trick.

The Apica's are not my usual fare.

Anyone interested in inexpensive journals, with excellent paper for fountain pen use should try these out.











In terms of appearance, they are just one notch above a Mead, but the paper is fabulous!

Right now Molly Taylor has them listed on ebay. And it also appears for a few more cents, the Daily Planner also has some stock of these journals.

So, with hope in my heart, the World as my daily card,

I am off to Liz's house to see if I can retrieve 20 years of writing from an old Mac and transfer those words in red.

And then just as I think it will be an afternoon of poetry, MG calls to say they'd like me to do another feature for the newspaper!

The Art of Convivium is dancing in my head!!!

Gulliver Didn't Travel Well

I bought a refillable 5x7 Exacompta Gulliver journal/diary recently. It is smart looking and the right size.

Unfortunately, although the paper weight is good (80g/m) and the texture smooth, it bleeds through badly with all the fountain pens I tested on it.

Diamine not Diamonds

I am a sucker for colours.

Even with the adventure with the J. Herbin tins, I was craving a few colours from the Diamine Ink line.

Then K put up some calligraphic representations of these fine English inks, and I nearly hit send on their website. I resisted. I so resisted.

But I did get Vermillion here in the States, and will probably fall prey to my own addiction sometime soon.

Thank you, K, for letting me use your calligraphic hand to show these inks.

A break in the whether!

One month ago, more or less I started thinking about fountain pens, and discovered that after five decades of collecting them, I knew virtually nothing about these except that I loved writing with them. Now I know better, and have succeeded in figuring out something about most, not all of these lovelys.

But I need a break in determining the remaining identifications because several have small imprints I need to copy; some need to be photographed to be sent out for identification and third and most importantly, reading the FPn is making me an obsessed pen collector--and a collector adding to rather than decreasing the number of pens I own.

Since participating in FPn, I've coveted another dozen or more pens; bought my very first desk set, and accumulated another half dozen ink colours.

The Giving Tree

What about paper?

First comes the pen, then the ink, and then the paper. As much as I have collected pens, fountain pens, calligraphy pens, gell pens, ballpoint pens and pencils, I have also collected paper.

I remember stroking paper the way some people stroke silk or satin. Some papers have the nicest feel, the sweetest smell and are amazingly beautiful in their sheen, touch and surface.

Now with the continued dimuition of natural resources, trees among them, some are coming up with alternatve sources like polypaper.

Eureka has some very interesting journals and laboratory books on their website.

I haven't tried them, but perhaps my outdoors woman daughter would like one of these!

Pelikans in Pennsylvania

How many Pelikans in Pennsylvania?

Sometime in either 1990 or 1991, I was on Thayer Street and strolled into the local stationery store across the street from the University. If memory serves me nearly 20 years later, I admired their small but fine selection of fountain pens.

One in particular must have caught my eye: a blue marbled fountain pen. However, given my penchant for duplicates I seem to have two Pelikans, a blue and another in a
lovely shade of grey.

Are they both M200?

There are several good articles on the net about the Pelikan's and their history.

Pelikan also has some wonderful history here.

And, lastly, after doing some additional searches, I found a pen in Germany that matches mine exactly, and is indeed an M200! Voila!

Who is my Waterman?

I am still not certain what the pedigree is of either of these Waterman pens!

Word has it on FPn that the blue pen which I've had for ages is a Gentlemen's Waterman, while the small red fountain pen is a Lady Charlotte. I know I bought the Lady Charlotte at the Fountain Pen Hospital--it was on sale in one of the cases in the back of the store near the inks. It was the day I also bought my first Noodler's.

The Moleskine Dilemma

I've never thought anything but good about the Moleskines I've owned, but for the most part I've only used the sketchbooks. The sketchbooks have heavier weight paper than the others, and although they are not watercolour friendly, I think they do fine with fountain pens.

Then after joining the FPn, I realized that many Moleskines were not as user friendly as others, and not all have the same quality paper.

So when I was sorting through my journals, I came upon an older, little used Moleskine diary (2004) that I bought in Sicily. Since finding it, I've been using it to test ink, write notes, and just doodle.

Today I tested the following pens, with these inks on the pages with negative and positive bleed through results, and little feathering:

Lamy Safari (Lime), 1.3 nib; Lamy blue cartridge - N/N
Lamy CP1, F nib; J. Herbin Verte Empire cartridge - N/N
Pilot Knight, M nib, Noodler's Baystate Cranberry ink - Y/N
Morriset Dip Pen, F/M nib, Diamine Register's ink - N/N

Dip Pen, F nib, with the following Noodler's inks: - Y/N
Baystate Blue
Cranberry
Concord Grape

Dip Pen, F nib, with the following Private Reserve inks: Y/N
Copper Burst
Spearmint
Sherwood Green

Reform 1745, M nib, with Private Reserve Arabian Rose - N/N

Pelican M200, M nib, with Noodler's Apache ink = N/N


Dip Pen, F nib, with Diamine Vermillion - Y/N


N/N = no bleed through, no feathering
Y/N = bleed through, no feathering