2023: M205 Rose Quartz

[inkstainedruth]

14 hours ago, Bo Bo Olson said:

Back in the day before UPS/FedEx the US mail was efficient....as unbelievable as it seams, back when postal workers could read.

Yeah, and I remember when stamps went from 4¢ to 5¢ for a first class letter.  Now?  I think they've jacked up the price of a roll of stamps to $60!  I've paid less than that -- apiece(!) -- for most of my Parker 51s.

And the USPS claims to be a private entity -- but claims all sorts of perks like not having to obey parking regulations or even have LICENSE PLATES on mail trucks....  So, it's a case of "some animals are more equal than others...." (Yeah, I've read Animal Farm... back for some class in high school).

My brother-in-law was postmaster for a small town in Massachusetts.  He worked his way up from being a utility route worker (doing everyone else's day off) all the way up.  He's now taking early retirement because he's so tired of the BS.  He's been pleading for years to be able to hire more staff, but kept being told "No".  So he has to fill in at the counter when he's short-staffed or someone else is on lunch break -- AND do his job as well.  He even asked if he could go back to doing utility route work -- because the carriers and clerks got paid more with overtime than he did!  When he first became postmaster, my husband when up to visit their mom one time and went down to that post office to have lunch with him, and his boss showed up, going, "Oh, I guess I should check in on you and see how you're doing -- but your office hasn't been a "problem child" like in some of the surrounding towns...."  (His supervisor was north of Boston someplace, and his location was down near the Cape and the Rhode Island state line), and probably didn't want to deal with the greater Boston area traffic -- even on the ring roads....).  But that guy quit or retired, and his replacement is apparently a complete jerk.  And awhile back someone got laid off and filed a complaint, and my brother-in-law had to go to the hearing -- which took away time from his regular duties AND he didn't get recompensed for the time taken EITHER....  

So at this point, the *only* surviving members of my husband's immediate family who HAVEN'T retired are my husband and his sister (who's the oldest of 7, and runs her own company -- teaching computer stuff to small businesses).  My husband's next oldest brother got his real estate license, and works part time at his wife's agency, showing houses.  But both he and their oldest brother keep looking askance at my sister-in-law, going, "Is where you live THAT expensive that you have to keep working?" (Well, since she and her husband are in a co-op in midtown Manhattan, yeah, expensive...; but I think she also likes what's she's doing...).  And even my husband is thinking about looking at retiring at this point....

Ruth Morrisson aka inkstainedruth

[Tom Kellie]

9 hours ago, dascott said:

Lovely nib and grind Tom, is it a vintage nib?  I have a FS Italic Fine grind coming on mine but it has yet to negotiate UK customs 😞

 

~ @dascott: The nib came with the pen.

 

When the pen was ordered, an IB was one of the available options.

 

In fact, that encouraged the deal, having an IB nib available.

 

As I've had a series of highly satisfactory Italic Grinds from Fritz Schimpf, that was ordered.

 

Writing with the pen is pure pleasure, as it is highly responsive to fingertip variation.

 

As to hue, here in West Texas no one has commented anything other than admiration for the pen.

 

Sitting on the writing desk, it doesn't come across as being overly pink, but is attractive due to the nib.

 

      Tom K.

[debraji]

Well, my pen finally arrived today. The outer package was dirty and ripped from its three weeks' sightseeing tour of Germany, but the pen was safe inside its cocoon of bubble wrap. 

 

To be honest, I don't like it as much as I'd expected. I love the color, but why did Pelikan top it with a white finial? It looks like a pill got stuck up there. And I don't get the point of frosting the interior of a demonstrator. If I want things to look blurry, I can take off my glasses.

 

(Perhaps I should have looked more closely at the promotional pictures.)

 

That said, it's a Pelikan and a pleasure to write with. I inked it up with Yama Budo, and I'm sure I will grow to love it.

[Bo Bo Olson]

Translucent .... and not a demonstrator?

My Amethyst is translucent where I can see the guts, but not like it was clear, my Ruby Star is look hard to see the guts.

[debraji]

11 hours ago, Bo Bo Olson said:

Translucent .... and not a demonstrator?

My Amethyst is translucent where I can see the guts, but not like it was clear, my Ruby Star is look hard to see the guts.

 

Exactly. I prefer the old, clear style of demonstrator. The Olivine, Blue, Clear, Transparent Red, and Cognac demonstrators that I have don't have frosted barrels. I guess the Apatite model does--I have to check--but I think I didn't notice it because it's dark. However, the frosting is very noticeable on the Rose Quartz. 

 

Just my preference. It's still a demonstrator. I have no trouble seeing the ink level.

[Bo Bo Olson]

6 hours ago, debraji said:

The Olivine, Blue, Clear, Transparent Red, and Cognac & Apatite

Are pens I don't have....in I have the Amethyst, is as close as I need to go to transparent.

Marbled brown and Petrol were the last couple 200's I picked up.

[DnzUlc]

I've received mine a while ago and tried to warm up to it. My expectations were already low but I bought it since I collect all M200s-205s-215s. But boy Pelikan made a surprise here. It is worse than my expectations. I know it is a personal taste thing but when I see that white piston mechanism, it's like I accidentally caught someones oversize undies with the corner of my eye.

[amk]

I do know what you mean DnzUlc! I can live with it, but your comment made me laugh.

[carola]

🤣 Me too!

[SLinkster]

On 11/24/2023 at 6:48 PM, Bo Bo Olson said:

back when postal workers could read.

 

We can read. A miscalibrated bar code scanner, on the other hand... 

[SLinkster]

On 11/19/2023 at 3:28 AM, amk said:

 

 

Is that a... white piston mechanism? In a pink demonstrator? Whatever was the designer thinking?? 🤦‍♀️

[Bo Bo Olson]

Got to be able to see the guts....and pink on pink don't go far.

[SLinkster]

1 hour ago, Bo Bo Olson said:

Got to be able to see the guts....and pink on pink don't go far.

Black would be excellent. 

[inkstainedruth]

6 hours ago, SLinkster said:

 

We can read. A miscalibrated bar code scanner, on the other hand... 

Oh and I learned that it's worse than that -- are we talking about a regular bar code scanner, or an *optical* bar code scanner?  I found that out the hard way a number of years ago.  

Hadn't noticed that we weren't getting the monthly newsletters for the organization my husband and I belong to.  Until one of the regional officers told me that she was giving the list of people who work under her to the regional president and got told I wasn't a paid member (!) -- being a paid member is important because on occasion I have to be handling money (and at one point was the secondary to sign off on checks made out to one of the CORPORATE officers as well).  So I called the corporate headquarters in California.  Then started paying more attention (I think I ended up calling them three or four times -- long distance...).  And then said, "I know how this works!" and talked to a postal inspector (!) after we got tipped off when we lived in MA by my brother-in-law who was a letter carrier at the time when we kept getting mail for some guy who lived several blocks away (the only thing the same about the names and addresses were the first letter of the guy's first name -- which also started with "R" -- and the house number, and the zip code....

So I talked to a postal inspector (and was SUPER happy that I had opted for first class postage on the newsletters early on) and SHOWED her what I was supposed to be getting.  And then a week or two later our carrier came to the door and showed me the optical bar code (the newsletters are labeled and packed up as either 1st class or 3rd class -- a friend of ours used to do the newsletters for our region, and we'd help with the monthly labeling parties) and bundled up separately to take to the post office.  Now I don't know how the optical bar code ended being different from the printed one, but apparently they were....

Of course, every time where we live NOW we don't get our mail (including a couple of credit card bills which never arrived last month) I suspect the stuff went to the same street address in a DIFFERENT town east of Pittsburgh -- because it's happened both ways -- they've gotten our mail and we've gotten theirs.  And the only real difference (besides the names) is the last two digits of the zip code are different.  Same street name, same street number.  And technically BOTH Pittsburgh zip codes -- even though NEITHER address is actually inside the city limits....  (Ironically, "Forest Hills" is considered "Pittsburgh" even though I live about a quarter of a mile from the city line -- and WAY closer to the main Pittsburgh post office; USPS closed OUR post office a few years ago).  And (also ironically) the next town down river from us has the SAME zip code that our town does....   

Ruth Morrisson aka inkstainedruth

 

[SLinkster]

15 hours ago, inkstainedruth said:

are we talking about a regular bar code scanner, or an *optical* bar code scanner?

Technology is great, isn't it? </sarcasm>

[Tom Kellie]

 

[Bo Bo Olson]

I like that Fritz IB nib.