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Yes, the Internet is wonderful and there are definitely some great vintage & new pen dealers out there - BTW, no affiliation to anyone... Sometimes you get lucky in a way that is only possible in a brick & mortar situation. That's what happened for me yesterday. I will share the highlight: Backstory: About 18 months ago, just before Christmas I went to a special sale at the local second hand store that takes donations from the community and sells the stuff to raise money for the local food pantry and shelter. Just before the Holiday they sell some of their "saved up ", probably more valuable vintage goodies". I bought a ball point and fountain pen set. It was (and still is) a Waterman C/F - the first cartridge fill pen Waterman made (18k French fine(?) nib. Paid $18.00. What I later found out was that regular Waterman cartridges no longer fit, are hard to find and the converter for the pen, if you can find it in working order can cost a lot. I had two old, dried out cartridges but I'm not a big fan of refilling them. Fast forward to yesterday:I am going into Boston for a meeting. (When I do that and have the time I always visit Bromfield Pen Shop.) I decided that I'm going to bring the Waterman set with me on kind of "fishing expedition". I go into the store and say "hello" to the owner, Fred. Well, my opening remark, after the greeting to him and the woman, Mary, working with him is, "Fred, by any chance, do you have a converter for a Waterman C/F?" Fred's response, there is a pause and... "Yeah, I think I do. I found it in an old box of stuff that I recently bought." :yikes: Well duh.... Okay, it looks pristine and it fits. "Fred, how much do you want for it? Pause... "$x.xx" Yes, DONE!!!! The moral of this story is, Sometimes you just have to ask! And it's much more fun at a B&M. Ahhh, the sweet mysteries of life!!!! P.S. Thank you Fred, you made my day and my visit to Boston 10x happier! P.P.S. Of course I was so happy I also bought some other goodies. P.P.P.S. Now all I need is to find a replacement for the ball point refill for the other pen in the set. Heck, I'll even accept a medium point :lol:

I'm just curious to know how often other people manage to see others using fountain pens in day-to-day life? And when you do see one, do you say anything to them? A little background on what happened to me yesterday.... Until yesterday, I only knew of one other person in my workplace (a major multinational company) who uses fountain pens regularly. But he was the guy who introduced me to fountain pens so he doesn't count. But yesterday, I was in a meeting with a bunch of people that I had never met before. I was listening and taking notes, when I noticed that a person in the meeting was using a Pilot V-pen! What I wanted to do was to squeal with joy and immediately ask her why she decided to use fountain pens, why she chose the V-pen, and whether she wanted to go back to my desk and try out my pens What I actually did was start taking slightly more copious notes with my LAMY 2000, with a fair few more flourishes, in the hope that she would notice and we could have a fountain pen chat after the meeting. In my defence, it was a fairly important meeting Next time I see this woman, I will wander up to her and have a chat about fountain pens, but in the meantime I was wondering if anyone else has ever had the experience of spotting another fountain pen user in the wild?