Jump to content

What's Your Worst Fountain Pen Shopping Experience


JordanLekawa

Recommended Posts

Hey there, I was inspired by similar posts on this forum to start this discussion. Note that I never intend to defame or insult the store, or any party involved it's just a rant. Hope you guys don't mind sharing your experiences as I found this to be therapeutic. Hopefully we can get it out of our system and perhaps get a good laugh out of it. Sorry for the long post and the writing is not my finest work.

 

I was deciding on a gold nib FP and hoped for a recommendation on which next level pen to get so I checked out a supposedly highly reputable FP store in my area which shall not be named. I was looking to try out a Pilot Custom 74 and Platinum 3776 B nib to get a feel of the pens, how they write and purchase it if I'm very satisfied.

 

I looked around the store before stopping at the Pilot display and asked the staff for help which he obliged. I could tell he was eyeing me with suspicion and was convinced I'm merely window shopping. I asked to have a look at a transparent Custom 74 with B nib and when I asked to try writing with it, he refused unless I paid for the pen first and proceeded to give a lecture on "preserving the new-ness of fountain pens" and it would be like buying a car where test driving would devalue it. I was dumbfounded by this man's logic thinking who in their right mind buys a car without testing it out first.

 

Instead I asked if 14k nibs is indeed thicker than steel nibs he rebuked and told me to find out online while insisting that the Custom 74 has a steel nib. I corrected him that it was rhodium-plated which gave it a silvery look but he wasn't having it and took out some Sailor 1911 with gold-plated nibs insisting that's what gold nibs look like. He then attempted to promote the 1911 and Pro Gear since I was interested in gold nibs. The last straw was when I took out a Lamy B nib writing sample to compare with the 1911 display plate which has EF to Music nib thickness, he commented "wow I never thought Lamy stubs are that thick". I left the store immediately and did the most sensible thing; left a two star rating out of kindness and a 'written' review on google.

 

It's a pity I'll miss out on what the store has to offer but I definitely won't miss that clueless man working there.

 

post-151069-0-70235800-1559502199_thumb.jpg
Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Replies 70
  • Created
  • Last Reply

Top Posters In This Topic

  • inkstainedruth

    9

  • Honeybadgers

    7

  • A Smug Dill

    3

  • sirgilbert357

    3

This sort of subject has a habit of being closed by mods (something I vehemently disagree with doing, as this kind of thing is genuinely valuable customer feedback that is really important to us, nobody wants to buy from a seller that doesn't do right by its customers when something goes wrong, and the argument that it's "slanderous/libelous" is silly when we're talking about businesses, and only keeping up glowing recommendations of businesses puts an unfairly positive spin on the image of some of these companies)

 

My two personal worst are (insert well known online company here who specializes in japanese stationary), who went so far as to blacklist me from ever being allowed to return a pilot product if I bought one from them, "because they couldn't recreate the problem" when I returned it and included two full-page writing samples showing the bad nib vs a known good pilot nib of the same size as well as digital microscope pictures of the baby's bottom showing it couldn't safely be repaired without grinding through the tipping and into the gold.

 

(this was my first ever purchase from them, as well. I had a problem with a visconti on my 3rd or so ever purchase from Goulet and they not only took care of it, but went so far above and beyond that I can't even imagine how generous Brian is as a person. I've repaid that good customer service in kind with thousands of dollars in business)

 

As a result, I don't think their business practices are even remotely worth supporting. One customer has a bad experience with a product once and you blacklist them from ever buying -anything- from that brand again, or only let them buy with the stipulation that they will NEVER be allowed to return it, even if it is defective?

 

Second is (Insert well known nibmeister and repair man who many people have had lots of really bad personal interactions with), who I honestly still think is worth buying from because the man is still unmatched in his ability to repair nibs nobody else will even touch, and his fair prices for pens. Just deal with him on the grounds of caveat emptor, because he accidentally made a mistake and shipped me a cardinal red ebonite waterman 52 1/2 V with ink in it. ink leaked out, ruined the ebonite, and he was absolutely not willing to even pay for return shipping on his mistake, and "threatened me with his lawyer."

 

He needs a lesson in customer service, but even after that annoying dialogue, I would still purchase from him and use his services again because he's just so good at what he does (the mistake with my 52 was a fluke mistake that we all make, he just handled it badly) so I guess (insert well known online japanese stationary focused retailer) takes the cake for appalling customer service.

Edited by Honeybadgers

Selling a boatload of restored, fairly rare, vintage Japanese gold nib pens, click here to see (more added as I finish restoring them)

Link to comment
Share on other sites

There is a well known pen shop in a well known Sydney shopping arcade that is also well known for sizing their customers on how they appear. My poor wife decided to check in one day - after a long day at a dental surgical upskilling course, and of course - she wasn't dressed to the nines for such days. Long story short, she enquired about a particular product their store carried - the old lady manning the counter gave her the classical top to toe head sweep and walked away ! An absolutely appalling human being !

Link to comment
Share on other sites

My worst experiences were on eBay (and I say that as having had *mostly* good experiences in buying pens that way).

One pen was a cheap Arnold that was originally listed at $100 US (!) and then marked down to $30. Turned out the description of the nib being "Veri [sic] Smooth" was the nib brand (so not even an Arnold nib) and the pen is really worth about $10 IMO. Then the seller turned around right after I had paid for the pen and RELISTED IT (well, it turned out that there were 2 OTHER Arnold pens with "Veri Smooth" nibs on them :huh:; the second pen I saw the seller drop the price to $40 and wanted SOOO much to tell the buyer "RUN AWAY!"

Another pen I overpaid for because the seller told another potential bidder that there was not a crack in the cap. There was -- a considerable one, and I didn't file a dispute because I didn't realize just how much it was going to cost to get that sort of repair work done on vintage celluloid.... :yikes: (that pen is just sort of languishing, along with the replacement cap I was able to get for not a lot of money -- but the replacement cap has a chip under the cap band -- because I can't afford the repairs at the present...).

Then there was the adventures an Emerald Pearl Parker Vacumatic which had to be returned; I didn't realize that the return sticker wasn't put over the original mailing label, and the package bounced back and forth between Pittsburgh and IIRC Louisville, KY for about a month.... The seller probably thought I was crazy, because I was sending frantic messages going "The POSTAL INSPECTOR I talked to on the phone can't get the package snagged!" Eventually I got the tracking notification that it had been delivered.... Yeah. Back to me.... :wallbash: I ended up just re-wrapping the entire parcel in brown paper to hide the old shipping labels (both of them) and starting over....

But the absolute WORST experience was a seller with literally thousands of transactions, and feedback ratings in the high 90s level . But who decided to be a complete (bleep) when I was trying to get a pen set for my husband's niece as a high school graduation present (she was valedictorian of her class). The pens came sans the listed cartridges and the seller's attitude was "Well, you can send them back...." Well, no I couldn't. I didn't have time to order another one from a different vender before leaving for the graduation party -- a 10 hours' drive away in MASSACHUSETTS. So I filed a dispute and got my money back in a matter of hours (and got to keep the pens) -- but was then not permitted to provide feedback by eBay.... (Oh, and the "set"? Not so much, because *I* can read Parker date codes -- or at least know where to look online.... FP and BP had different codes (the only thing that made them a "set" was that they were the same color...). Needless to say, I was unpleased. And that seller is now on the top of my list of "DO NOT PURCHASE ANYTHING FROM THOSE PEOPLE EVERY AGAIN!"

But, like I said before -- the vast number of pen purchases on eBay have been hassle free, often inexpensive, and the sellers have been an absolute pleasure to deal with. Oh there was one case where the problem was with eBay (and their rather dreadful IT) -- NOT the seller. I lost an auction where the seller had five pens and you were bidding on your choice of color. Well, I wanted several but got outbid. Then, a couple of days later got a "2nd Chance" notice from eBay (apparently the winning bidder thought he/she was getting all FIVE pens for that price, not just one -- even though the listing clearly stated that...). But eBay doesn't have a mechanism to handle that situation for a 2nd Chance offer. And I spent most of the day messaging the seller (who was in the Netherlands) back and forth; the seller eventually PULLED the listing and relisted as a "Buy it Now" (at my price) so I could actually order the 3 pens I wanted at the 2nd Chance price times three.... (I have gotten pens from that seller before and after, and those experiences were trouble-free; in fact, the most recent time, the seller had in the listing that he was going to be unavailable for a few days -- but the pen (I was the only bidder) came much sooner than that notice suggested, and I like to think that it's because I'd gotten pens from him before... :rolleyes:).

Ruth Morrisson aka inkstainedruth

"It's very nice, but frankly, when I signed that list for a P-51, what I had in mind was a fountain pen."

Link to comment
Share on other sites

There is a well known pen shop in a well known Sydney shopping arcade that is also well known for sizing their customers on how they appear. My poor wife decided to check in one day - after a long day at a dental surgical upskilling course, and of course - she wasn't dressed to the nines for such days. Long story short, she enquired about a particular product their store carried - the old lady manning the counter gave her the classical top to toe head sweep and walked away ! An absolutely appalling human being !

I used to work in a framing shop and my boss was like that (the fact that she could have been the textbook case for Narcissistic Personality Disorder didn't help, and I eventually quit without having a job to go to because of all the BS and lies she told).

A friend of mine got dissed because she had gone the store in wearing jeans and told me about it afterwords. She said "I like to be comfortable. But because of how I was dressed I was basically ignored! For all your boss knew, I could have had a Gauguin hanging on my wall...."

I couldn't have said anything to my boss (and the incident with my friend was from before I started working in the place). But you and your wife should have complained to the store manager.... Because there's no excuse for that (reminds me of the scene from Pretty Woman).

Ruth Morrisson aka inkstainedruth

"It's very nice, but frankly, when I signed that list for a P-51, what I had in mind was a fountain pen."

Link to comment
Share on other sites

This sort of subject has a habit of being closed by mods (something I vehemently disagree with doing, as this kind of thing is genuinely valuable customer feedback that is really important to us, nobody wants to buy from a seller that doesn't do right by its customers when something goes wrong, and the argument that it's "slanderous/libelous" is silly when we're talking about businesses, and only keeping up glowing recommendations of businesses puts an unfairly positive spin on the image of some of these companies)

 

As long as there is no ill intent of defamation towards the seller / service provide, then I totally agree with you.

These kinds of feedback are very important in my opinion.

 

For me, thankfully I have not had a really bad pen buying experience here.

There are some sales person of B&M store that seems to be clueless about fountain pens but they kept professional and I appreciate that.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

This was a FTF transaction that took place a couple years ago when we were visiting family in New Orleans. A vendor with an alliterated, distinctly French name who has gained some notoriety for selling inks with clever, New Orleans-themed names sold my wife an overpriced piece of decorative pewter with a tin nib at one end and a dull, floppy "letter opener" at the other from their booth in the open market. My wife is wonderfully thoughtful, and brilliant in so many ways, but her knowledge of fountain pens would be hard-pressed to fill a toy thimble. The next day, we went to the actual shop to return it. The proprietor first claimed that since we hadn’t bought it in the actual store that they could not help us at all (even after showing the receipt with the store name on it). When I argued, she allowed that we could do an exchange, but not a refund. Her argument was that since they were a small shop, they couldn’t afford refunds. I asked how long she thought they could afford to stay in business by creating dissatisfied customers. I know the French Quarter is terribly touristy and alarmingly overpriced, but the prices in this establishment strained all limits of credulity. When she remained intractable, I settled on a glass dip pen (the only actual, useable item that hadn’t been marked up several hundred percent over normal MSRP) that I will eventually sell or give away as a gift.

Edited by Maccabeus

Lux in Obscuro Sumus

Link to comment
Share on other sites

It would be nice if we had some fountain pen stores around here for me to have a bad shopping experience at. Although I don't need to buy any more pens at this point, and probably would just be window shopping.

 

The closest I've come is at our local flea market, with a couple of sellers badly overestimating the value of some unexceptional vintage pens. But I don't expect someone with a box of miscellaneous "stuff" to be an expert, and don't waste much effort on trying to haggle with them. And who knows, maybe they will get someone to pay $20 for that no name third tier pen that I might have taken a chance on at $5.

 

My worst Ebay experiences haven't really been that bad, things like taking a chance on a low price for a group of vintage pens and finding that none of them were really worth having. The one time that I got a pen with an unmentioned (and serious) flaw, the seller made it up by sending a second pen.

"So convenient a thing it is to be a reasonable creature, since it enables one to find or make a reason for everything one has a mind to do."

 

- Benjamin Franklin

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I don't see why this type of feedback is not allowed either. I think the fountain pen community is small enough that we need to know who is good to deal with and who is not. I also don't understand why everyone is afraid to name names. If your feedback is honest and accurate then I can't see why we would be afraid of slander accusations. The truth is always a defense to slander right?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Now that I think about it, I've had good luck with all my (25) pens bought online, save for a Platinum Cool which would always have starting problems; my other problem pens were a Waterman Laureat I bought in person, which eventualy leaked all its ink onto the cap, and a Kaweco Sport which I was given as a gift, whose converter I hate so much I put the pen away. So not bad for buying online, sight unseen, even with a couple of used pens.

"The trouble with the world is that the stupid are cocksure and the intelligent are full of doubt."

 

B. Russell

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I don't see why this type of feedback is not allowed either. I think the fountain pen community is small enough that we need to know who is good to deal with and who is not. I also don't understand why everyone is afraid to name names. If your feedback is honest and accurate then I can't see why we would be afraid of slander accusations. The truth is always a defense to slander right?

I agree completly :thumbup:

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I used to work in a framing shop and my boss was like that (the fact that she could have been the textbook case for Narcissistic Personality Disorder didn't help, and I eventually quit without having a job to go to because of all the BS and lies she told).

A friend of mine got dissed because she had gone the store in wearing jeans and told me about it afterwords. She said "I like to be comfortable. But because of how I was dressed I was basically ignored! For all your boss knew, I could have had a Gauguin hanging on my wall...."

I couldn't have said anything to my boss (and the incident with my friend was from before I started working in the place). But you and your wife should have complained to the store manager.... Because there's no excuse for that (reminds me of the scene from Pretty Woman).

Ruth Morrisson aka inkstainedruth

 

Dear Ruth,

 

As no money changed hands on that day, I didn't contact the store manager - but I thought of leaving a Google feedback for that shop - and unsurprisingly, it wasn't just her that bore the brunt of that lady's attitude. There were many disgruntled potential customers with a similar experience.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

 

Dear Ruth,

 

As no money changed hands on that day, I didn't contact the store manager - but I thought of leaving a Google feedback for that shop - and unsurprisingly, it wasn't just her that bore the brunt of that lady's attitude. There were many disgruntled potential customers with a similar experience.

I still think the manager or owner should have to be told what happened (even if your wife DIDN'T make a purchase). Because clearly that employee has cost the store business. It sounds as if you and your wife will not be patronizing them in future. And the manager needs to know why -- and needs to know that EVERY time a customer has a bad experience. And should understand that ONE bad review is more important to their bottom line than TEN good ones....

I used to work retail. We often didn't have enough employees on the floor (especially in the evenings, when it was often just me and one assistant manager. People would complain and we'd tell them the same thing every time: contact Corporate (it was a chain). Because there is nothing that we can do and nothing the store manager can do. Corporate would have completely unreasonable projections about how much foot traffic we'd have per week (NOT how much in sales, mind... :(). And when we'd fail to meet those unreasonable projections, the first thing the chain would do would be to cut payroll.

Years later, long after I stopped working for the company, I was in another location. This guy was being completely annoying when I said I was just looking. Later, I overheard him bawling out an employee ON THE FLOOR.... A couple of other employees were standing there just cringing. I said "Who is that jerk? The assistant manager?" And was told "No -- he's the MANAGER...." I said "Not for long he's not...." and went home and took my own advice and contacted Corporate (who actually gave me an 800 # to call in future so it would be on their dime, not mine...). Well the next time I was in that location (the one where I worked years before had closed down) I saw a girl I used to work with, who was telling a customer that she was the NEW manager.... B)

Ruth Morrisson aka inkstainedruth

 

edited for formatting issues

Edited by inkstainedruth

"It's very nice, but frankly, when I signed that list for a P-51, what I had in mind was a fountain pen."

Link to comment
Share on other sites

My wife doesn't understand why I'll track down a manager to tell them if I've had a bad experience, or good - whether or not I buy anything. She'll complain about a problem, and I'll say "Did you TELL them?" - I almost always get a "No.."

 

It happens with food a lot. I'll let the manager know what the problem was, but as long as it's edible, I'll eat it - I just won't let them play games with the price. (One chain gave me the wrong entree. I told them I'll just eat it, rather than waiting. Then they wanted to charge me the extra $5 for the more 'premium' entree. I went to the manager over that one.)

Link to comment
Share on other sites

It would be nice if we had some fountain pen stores around here for me to have a bad shopping experience at. Although I don't need to buy any more pens at this point, and probably would just be window shopping.

 

The closest I've come is at our local flea market, with a couple of sellers badly overestimating the value of some unexceptional vintage pens. But I don't expect someone with a box of miscellaneous "stuff" to be an expert, and don't waste much effort on trying to haggle with them. And who knows, maybe they will get someone to pay $20 for that no name third tier pen that I might have taken a chance on at $5.

 

My worst Ebay experiences haven't really been that bad, things like taking a chance on a low price for a group of vintage pens and finding that none of them were really worth having. The one time that I got a pen with an unmentioned (and serious) flaw, the seller made it up by sending a second pen.

 

There's an amazing antique mall in Seattle that has incredible deals on a lot of little things, but they must tell anyone selling a FP to charge a hundred dollars minimum no matter what it is.

 

So many ratty old no name steel nibs with a tine snapped off for $190 in there.

Selling a boatload of restored, fairly rare, vintage Japanese gold nib pens, click here to see (more added as I finish restoring them)

Link to comment
Share on other sites

My wife doesn't understand why I'll track down a manager to tell them if I've had a bad experience, or good - whether or not I buy anything. She'll complain about a problem, and I'll say "Did you TELL them?" - I almost always get a "No.."

 

It happens with food a lot. I'll let the manager know what the problem was, but as long as it's edible, I'll eat it - I just won't let them play games with the price. (One chain gave me the wrong entree. I told them I'll just eat it, rather than waiting. Then they wanted to charge me the extra $5 for the more 'premium' entree. I went to the manager over that one.)

 

This. I believe in feedback, good and bad. I had absolutely phenomenal customer service on a Shark motorcycle helmet from their US representative and I left a message with their headquarters in France praising him. He sent me an email a few weeks later thanking me for that, he had gotten recognition from headquarters because of it.

 

What amazes me most is that teachers and general professional people just get left alone. My wife will NEVER actually raise an issue and just gripe to me, and nothing ever gets done as a result. We had a lot of problems with our foster kid's Treehouse rep, and she was just a piece of trash. But my wife would NOT go over her head and talk to her boss. But the rep was getting nothing done and being rude and indignant. So I spoke to her boss and suddenly, we got a new rep and our problems went away.

 

My wife will also never call or talk to people's faces. She'll struggle and struggle for days or weeks with automated systems and lazy a**holes who can't answer an email (which is like 90% of people these days) and I'll just take charge and one five minute phone call later, the issue is solved.

 

The only time I actually threw a bit of a fit about food was at an expensive steakhouse. I ordered a $60 NY strip and asked for it to be mid rare, leaning closer to rare. It wasn't even rare, it was texas style BLUE. Completely raw in the middle. I asked her to take it back, and she brought me back that same steak, it had now been cooked to medium. That sh*t ain't kosher. If a customer's cut into a steak and it's clearly improperly cooked, you can't just "heat it up more." I apologized for being such a hardass, but I insisted they cook me a new steak.

 

One of the very worst customer service incidents I had was with a mountain climbing gear supplier at Mt. Rainier. Due to my wife getting sick right before we were going to leave, I wound up returning our gear, unused, clean, and still folded, the day we were supposed to leave on a 5 day rental. I asked if we could get a small refund because the gear was unused and they could turn around and rent it off again immediately, and the rental manager was just an absolute d*ck. He also refused to fully honor some store credit we had and when we picked up the gear itself, there were at least 5 different mistakes (mistmatched gloves, incorrect temp sleeping bags, wrong size pants, mismatched boots, and a broken Go-pro mount) and he was just rude and indignant. I complained to the owners and heard nothing back for like a year, but they said they had fired him a few months later. It was not appropriate to wait that long to even acknowledge a customer, so they lost out on thousands in future rentals from me.

 

 

Treat people with respect but if something is wrong, let them know. If they don't respond appropriately, that's what their boss is for. And if someone really goes above and beyond to help you, don't just tell them, because that only makes them feel good. Tell their boss, because that might actually get them rewarded for their excellent work.

Edited by Honeybadgers

Selling a boatload of restored, fairly rare, vintage Japanese gold nib pens, click here to see (more added as I finish restoring them)

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Ignorance is programed in at minimum wage and no training. That pen expert' will be gone soon, to become an expert on refrigerators....or back to flipping burgers.

A trained German salesman has a three year course behind them...........and in department stores are not pen wise.....well for regular run of the mill folks, but not for us FPN types.....I'm always willing to give them 5 minutes more training. :rolleyes:

But once I didn't know much either.

 

And that store should have had some example pens...........at my B&M, if I want to test a 146/9 they have one or any other pen....or just let you test a new one....dip and write...............sure keep an eye on the buyer, in many are bend a nail in a second types....more so in the States than here in Germany.

 

Should have asked to speak to the manager..........if he/she hopefully knew better.

 

Always take your own paper to test a pen....my B&M had poorer paper than I use, so a MB in M which is wide, wrote there the B I wanted............at home it wrote only M. :headsmack:

In reference to P. T. Barnum; to advise for free is foolish, ........busybodies are ill liked by both factions.

 

 

The cheapest lessons are from those who learned expensive lessons. Ignorance is best for learning expensive lessons.

 

 

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

 

There's an amazing antique mall in Seattle that has incredible deals on a lot of little things, but they must tell anyone selling a FP to charge a hundred dollars minimum no matter what it is.

 

So many ratty old no name steel nibs with a tine snapped off for $190 in there.

 

Is it actually in Seattle? Or in that town east of Seattle (forget the name of the town) that has more antiques stores than you can swing a stick at? I want to go back to that town and go to the big antiques mall on the eastern end of town and just spend a few hours poking around -- instead of what happened when I was there several years ago and some guy just zoomed me around to the booths that he thought had pens in them.... I mean, I like looking for OTHER things too....

(On the way back down to the main drag to meet my husband and brother-in-law, I stopped at another place and picked up a Pastel Green Snorkel. I didn't get to ALL the places (the big place on the western end of town wasn't open the day we were there) but I did hit most of the antiques and collectibles places.

Snohomish. That's the town. The big place where I got zoomed around was listed on on the blue highway sign for that exit.... But I think I ended up going to 10 or 12 places. Plus coffee when we got there (because, Seattle), and a nice place for lunch, and then ice cream before we headed back to my in-laws' place in an easter suburb.

Ruth Morrisson aka inkstainedruth

"It's very nice, but frankly, when I signed that list for a P-51, what I had in mind was a fountain pen."

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now


  • Most Contributions

    1. amberleadavis
      amberleadavis
      43844
    2. PAKMAN
      PAKMAN
      33494
    3. Ghost Plane
      Ghost Plane
      28220
    4. inkstainedruth
      inkstainedruth
      26624
    5. jar
      jar
      26101
  • Upcoming Events

  • Blog Comments

    • Shanghai Knife Dude
      I have the Sailor Naginata and some fancy blade nibs coming after 2022 by a number of new workshop from China.  With all my respect, IMHO, they are all (bleep) in doing chinese characters.  Go use a bush, or at least a bush pen. 
    • A Smug Dill
      It is the reason why I'm so keen on the idea of a personal library — of pens, nibs, inks, paper products, etc. — and spent so much money, as well as time and effort, to “build” it for myself (because I can't simply remember everything, especially as I'm getting older fast) and my wife, so that we can “know”; and, instead of just disposing of what displeased us, or even just not good enough to be “given the time of day” against competition from >500 other pens and >500 other inks for our at
    • adamselene
      Agreed.  And I think it’s good to be aware of this early on and think about at the point of buying rather than rationalizing a purchase..
    • A Smug Dill
      Alas, one cannot know “good” without some idea of “bad” against which to contrast; and, as one of my former bosses (back when I was in my twenties) used to say, “on the scale of good to bad…”, it's a spectrum, not a dichotomy. Whereas subjectively acceptable (or tolerable) and unacceptable may well be a dichotomy to someone, and finding whether the threshold or cusp between them lies takes experiencing many degrees of less-than-ideal, especially if the decision is somehow influenced by factors o
    • adamselene
      I got my first real fountain pen on my 60th birthday and many hundreds of pens later I’ve often thought of what I should’ve known in the beginning. I have many pens, the majority of which have some objectionable feature. If they are too delicate, or can’t be posted, or they are too precious to face losing , still they are users, but only in very limited environments..  I have a big disliking for pens that have the cap jump into the air and fly off. I object to Pens that dry out, or leave blobs o
  • Chatbox

    You don't have permission to chat.
    Load More
  • Files






×
×
  • Create New...