I'm A Sad, Pathetic Stationery Junkie.

[A Smug Dill]

46 minutes ago, dragondazd said:

I decided to roll the dice on the bieffe . No good! Too much bleeding for my use.

 

Sorry to hear that. When I came across those on an earlier visit to TK Maxx, I ran my fingertips on the Bieffe's paper, and immediately thought it would exhibit feathering and bleed-through as least as badly as Moleskine's. With the asking price for the three-pack being more than that of a Leuchtturm1917 A5 hardcover journal in Australian TK Maxx chain stores, I wasn't going to give the Italian product the opportunity to disappoint me.

 

By the way, this was what was in TK Maxx Chatswood late Saturday afternoon: https://www.reddit.com/r/fountainpens/comments/150kj0r/for_those_still_on_the_hunt_for_leuchtturm1917/

[A Smug Dill]

On 7/11/2023 at 8:31 PM, A Smug Dill said:

I picked up one of these Blueline Executive Journal (model A7.BLK) in black, in a Prime Day Deal …‹snip›… if the number of pages is indeed 144 and not 150, then Amazon isn't going to want me to send the unsaleable item back, but will simply issue a refund for the trivial amount I paid.

 

It arrived, and I was surprised by the item in more ways than one.

 

 

It's made in Canada, not somewhere in Asia.

 

It has not just 144, not even just 150, but 152 pages. I cannot tell how many signatures there are; the glue along the spine has them packed very tightly.

 

By the way, the book doesn't lay flat when opened, due the 凵-shaped part of the “amazing and durable hard lizard-like cover” over the book's spine, in spite of the manufacturer's product page claiming, “Its perfect binding allows book to lie flat when open.”

 

The item, which was a standalone order, was packed naked (as photographed below) with three other orders — a network router (in a large box), a 12-pack of Sharpie markers (in a flat blister pack), and a two-pack of not-exactly-A5-sized hardcover journals (in shrink wrap and with cardboard corners under that to protect the books) — in a shipping carton. The only void fill was some rough bunched up paper, with nothing physically separating the items or protecting them from each other. Nevertheless, it is not plausible for the other items to have caused all the scuffing, scratches, and not-that-shallow pockmarks on both the front and rear covers of the Blueline journal:

  

 

I can see from the worn-out laser-printed text and barcode on the product label that at least three quadrants of the front cover has been subjected to rubbing against a wide and rough surface, most likely in some warehouse prior to shipment. So much for the “amazing and durable hard lizard-like cover”!

 

The printed ruled lines are (as can be seen from the product images) quite dark, bold, and unrefined. They're also lacking in uniformity across the pages. On some pages, the last ruled line is 5mm above the page's bottom edge; on others, 6mm or 7mm. (The discrepancy is somewhat random from one sheet to the next, as opposed to progressive.) Furthermore, they're not always parallel to the top and bottom edges of the sheet (as bound and cut for the book); I've seen some examples where the line is 6mm above the bottom edge near the book spine, but only 5mm above the bottom edge at the right-hand edge of the sheet, and the slant is visually noticeable.

 

So, what I got is akin to a factory seconds unit (or even a reject) of an inherently poor product.

 

I complained and sent the photos to Amazon, asked for a full refund (of the measly $4.67), and told them I'd gladly return the patently unsaleable item if they so request and send me a prepaid mailing label. To my surprise, they sent me a QR code for a prepaid label to be generated at the post office. No problem; I don't think I could be bothered testing just how well the paper would perform with a multitude of fountain pen inks anyhow, given how little confidence I have in the product quality from what I've seen.

[Lithium466]

14 minutes ago, A Smug Dill said:

So, what I got is akin to a factory seconds unit (or even a reject) of an inherently poor product.

 

 I don't think I could be bothered testing just how well the paper would perform with a multitude of fountain pen inks anyhow, given how little confidence I have in the product quality from what I've seen.

I'm afraid what you got is just a regular sample of the product, at least from what I can see in stores.

I never bothered going past the appearance to test the paper, but I don't think Canada is still producing fp friendly industrially, so you'd likely have been disappointed too.

[ParramattaPaul]

[USG]

5 minutes ago, ParramattaPaul said:

 

Ha ha, Great !!!!  😀👍

[Misfit]

49 minutes ago, ParramattaPaul said:

🤣 and true

[Gloucesterman]

14 hours ago, Misfit said:

🤣 and true

Whatever you do, STAY AWAY FROM THE INK...

It's a TRAP!!!

[Misfit]

Too late. I got a Cult Pens order in the mail today. Three notebooks, three bottles of ink, a Kaweco Sport in apple green, and an extra Kaweco 1.1mm stub nib unit to swap onto a Kaweco pen. 

[Gloucesterman]

17 minutes ago, Misfit said:

Too late. I got a Cult Pens order in the mail today. Three notebooks, three bottles of ink, a Kaweco Sport in apple green, and an extra Kaweco 1.1mm stub nib unit to swap onto a Kaweco pen. 

Actually I was thinking of an ink trap with names like Diamine, Noodlers, J. Herbin. You know, the brands with more than a hundred colors, all of which you would end up buying.

 

I wonder if anyone, other than Amber 😁, might have all of the (even the regular ones) colors produced by the above manufacturers?

[A Smug Dill]

 

At least another 15 Maruman Spiral Note A5 books will be arriving soon, so I decided to pull out the super-heavy box that holds (most of) my stash of new A5 sized notebooks to do some rearranging. Splitting that stash into ruled books and books of other page formats was one of the goals, because the box is so heavy my wife (who prefers ruled notebooks) can't safely pull it out of the linen closet.

 

This is the bulk, but certainly not all, of the A5(-ish) notebooks I have here today that are at least said (by someone else) to be fountain pen friendly.

 

And this would be, at a rough guesstimate, about a tenth of the unused ‘good’ paper I have.

[dragondazd]

On 7/16/2023 at 5:20 PM, dragondazd said:

I went to HomeGoods. No leuchtturm but some denik and a pretty 3pack of bieffe for $6. I decided to roll the dice on the bieffe . No good! Too much bleeding for my use.

 

 

I will donate these.

I successfully donated these to the library nonprofit. I hope someone finds a use for them. 

[Gloucesterman]

12 hours ago, dragondazd said:

I successfully donated these to the library nonprofit. I hope someone finds a use for them. 

BRAVO and Thank you for supporting your public library. Personally, I think that public libraries are among our most important resources. It is sad, imo, that they have become less recognized as a vital, and essential - again imo, assets in our civilization.

 

 

[inkypete]

On 7/20/2023 at 8:08 PM, A Smug Dill said:

 

At least another 15 Maruman Spiral Note A5 books will be arriving soon, so I decided to pull out the super-heavy box that holds (most of) my stash of new A5 sized notebooks to do some rearranging. Splitting that stash into ruled books and books of other page formats was one of the goals, because the box is so heavy my wife (who prefers ruled notebooks) can't safely pull it out of the linen closet.

 

This is the bulk, but certainly not all, of the A5(-ish) notebooks I have here today that are at least said (by someone else) to be fountain pen friendly.

 

And this would be, at a rough guesstimate, about a tenth of the unused ‘good’ paper I have.

You are like me - we will be kings when the paper famine hits.

[inkypete]

I'm a shattered man. Went to my nearest shopping centre with a Daiso and Daiso is gone. A Nobody could tell me if just moving space or closed permanently. Not a happy man.

[AmandaW]

I went to our Daiso to look for a sketchbook. There weren't any.

 

I don't know whether they were sold out, or never stocked here. I will visit again in a few weeks for another look. I haven’t given up.

[A Smug Dill]

2 hours ago, AmandaW said:

I went to our Daiso to look for a sketchbook. There weren't any.

 

Hmmm, I just came back in from shopping in town, including a quick visit to Daiso, but this time I didn't check which paper products it had in stock; and I didn't see your post before I went out, sorry.

 

In any case, the post bag is jammed so full right now, I can't possibly fit anything else into it. (I actually dropped into the post office on Friday to check with the staff whether it'll be OK.) But I'll keep an eye out for the Daiso sketchbooks. Maybe I'll drop in on the way home from a run later in the week.

[AmandaW]

Thankyou. My comment was more about rolling eyes that our store was so hopeless. I will get another visit to the store. I am just curious about what they consider to be sketch paper and at no risk of having nothing drawn on.

[Misfit]

18 hours ago, Gloucesterman said:

BRAVO and Thank you for supporting your public library. Personally, I think that public libraries are among our most important resources. It is sad, imo, that they have become less recognized as a vital, and essential - again imo, assets in our civilization.

 

 

I totally agree with you. 

[Gloucesterman]

15 hours ago, inkypete said:

You are like me - we will be kings when the paper famine hits.

God SAVE the King(s)!

[inkypete]

Daiso is an interesting shop. I often buy things, go back later to get more and they don't have them. Also, stock varies so much between stores. One manager explained to me that some Daisos are company owned and some are franchised. The company owned usually have the bigger range of products.