EFNIR: Yunjingtang Garden Stroll

[yazeh]

@A Smug Dill lovely penmanship and presentation. 👏

Funny how a different nib size and image changes the vibe of the ink. 👍

[Sailor Kenshin]

1 hour ago, LizEF said:

Beautiful!  Thanks, Dill.  Great addition to the thread.

 

Happy New Year!

Ditto that.

[LizEF]

1 hour ago, yazeh said:

That's one of my defaults. Cat & Muse tell me to take it easy and draw them more.

 Definitely can't get enough cat & m(o)use drawings!

 

1 hour ago, yazeh said:

It has a lot of potential for being a fun adventure for kids who have not been desensitized by video games. Or they might need it to connect with their imagination.

 Thanks!

 

1 hour ago, yazeh said:

I know. But the fun part of these reviews is to go beyond inks and travel through different colours of life

 

[inkstainedruth]

4 hours ago, LizEF said:

What!? The internet lied to me!? Say it isn't so!  

I can't fathom where Google AI gets its "facts" from  But then, after spending two hours out of my life I'll never get back dealing with a bunch of delusional morons on FB.... 

Ruth Morrisson aka inkstainedruth

[LizEF]

41 minutes ago, inkstainedruth said:

I can't fathom where Google AI gets its "facts" from  But then, after spending two hours out of my life I'll never get back dealing with a bunch of delusional morons on FB.... 

  I gave up on FB a long time ago - huge potential that is 100% wasted (or was by everyone I knew).

[inkstainedruth]

Unfortunately, I have friends and some family members on it.  But I think I've blocked as many (or more) people over the years than I have on my "friends" list.  And, annoyingly, there is stuff posted every now and then for the local chapter of the organization I belong to for the "other" hobby.  Why they can't just use the mailing list is beyond ALL comprehension -- other than that they don't seem to understand how FB's algorithms work -- and the scary part is that I *DO* because a number of years ago my husband went to a talk on how FB works for businesses... which is, if your customers don't go "like like like" to everything you post?  They don't necessarily SEE everything you post). And they apparently treat organizations the same way....   

And of course then there was the time I got hit on by some creepazoid who swiped the avatar image of some guy in Florida -- and changed ONE letter of that person's last name -- on a business's page and I reported the troll (this being back when you COULD still contact someone at FB) and got told, "Oh, the guy didn't actually say anything _offensive_...." and basically did NOTHING about the creep.  Even after I said, "So, what you're saying is that IDENTITY THEFT is perfectly okay with you people?"  Because make no mistake -- if you knew the guy in Florida and didn't look carefully at how the name was spelled?  You could VERY easily have been scammed....  And yes, I PM'd the guy in Florida to give HIM a heads up about what had happened.  Dunno if he got anywhere with FB support any more than I did....  

Ruth Morrisson aka inkstainedruth

[LizEF]

1 hour ago, inkstainedruth said:

Unfortunately, I have friends and some family members on it.

So did I. They wasted the potential and did nothing but post meaningless, impersonal comments and pictures without any thought or depth beyond a thumbs up. I left them there to enjoy their thumbs. Anyone who expects me to remain aware via FB is out of luck. Thankfully, I'm quite happy to be mostly oblivious.  

 

[USG]

On 12/30/2025 at 9:47 AM, LizEF said:

Extra Fine Nib Ink Review: Yunjingtang Garden Stroll

This is review #370 in my series. Here's the YouTube video:

Post-recording notes: This ink from China was gifted to me by a generous FPNer. My apologies for not including the Chinese name of this ink-my database language doesn't support double-byte characters, nor do I know how to write them properly. Please see my inks spreadsheet which now has a tab with both the Chinese and English ink names. This is a chroma-shading ink. Since this attribute can be less stable over time, I'm reviewing all of them out of sequence.

After one use (logic puzzle), I'm shocked by how much I like this ink's color. It reminds me of the corrosion we sometimes see on US pennies and also of some of the pale green lichen I've seen. It is ridiculously pale, but I like it! This doesn't really chromashade much, and not at all from this nib. The small inset on the swatch has a hint of pinkish color in it, but just barely.

I have nothing like this. The comparisons are as close as I could come, but not at all close. Cleaning was ridiculously easy with plain water.

Zoomed in photo (Color is quite close, maybe a tiny bit too dark.)

Screenshot (Text is too dark and desaturated.)

Scan of Completed Review (Very close to what my eyes see. Probably the best reproduction.)

Absorbent Paper Close-up (top is puzzle paper like thick newsprint, bottom is old 20lb copy paper) (Text in both seems a little too dark, but the color's not too far off.)

Line width (Roughly 306µm. The "I" in "Ink:". Magnification is 100x. The grid is 100x100µm. The scale is 330µm, with eleven divisions of 30µm each. With 370 inks measured, the average line width is 299µm.)

Swatch card comparison (Darks are too dark. Everything's a little too blue. It could be worse, though. (Inset is CRENA swatch card paper.))

Microscope image (400x. Colors are fairly close.)

Additional Papers (Colors are fairly close.)

Previous Review: De Atramentis Document Blue Grey.

Images also available on Instagram: @zilxodarap.

Want to influence the inky sequence? Take the "next ink" poll.

View a list of my inks, complete with review results in a google sheet.

Need to catch up on The Adventures of Quin and Makhabesh? Find the whole story here. Or read Part 8: The Ice Fields Adventure.

Hope you enjoy. Comments appreciated!

 

 

😀👍   <--- Hitting the Like Button

 

HAPPY NEW YEAR

[A Smug Dill]

On 12/31/2025 at 2:51 AM, LizEF said:

At least the base color is similar, just paler.  I'd imagine they put down a lot of ink in that sample. And as your swatch card vs mine shows, paper makes a big difference.

 

[LizEF]

8 hours ago, USG said:

😀👍   <--- Hitting the Like Button

 Thanks!

 

8 hours ago, USG said:

HAPPY NEW YEAR

And to you, as well!

[LizEF]

6 hours ago, A Smug Dill said:

 

 Thanks!  Clearly putting down more ink changes things!  (But then, that's the whole reason I started doing these EFNIRs, so that shouldn't surprise us at all. )

 

Happy Day After New Year's Day!  

[knarflj]

On 12/31/2025 at 11:27 AM, A Smug Dill said:

That's beautiful, @A Smug Dill, thanks!

[knarflj]

On 12/31/2025 at 8:08 AM, yazeh said:

Well when I did a first check with my over-optimist, know it all AI, it was confident that it was from Game of Thrones, spoken by Melisandre. But not verbatim. 

😁

 

On 12/31/2025 at 8:08 AM, yazeh said:

Then it dug deeper, and said" "The quote is attributed to Guy Gavriel Kay because readers condensed and paraphrased a thematic passage from Tigana, where ice symbolizes cultural stasis and an ending without renewal—the wording is not verbatim, but a redacted aphorism extracted from that context." 

 

It's obviously time for me to re-read Tigana.  Been wondering what to read next, anyway...

[inkstainedruth]

I was just thinking the same thing -- to re-read Tigana (as well as other stuff he's written).

Ruth Morrisson aka inkstainedruth

[lamarax]

Apologies for the [OT]; we recently lost trace of @Bo Bo Olson, but where's @InesF? I hope she's doing well!

 

 Just saw her post from 30 December! Pheww 😮‍💨

[yazeh]

8 minutes ago, lamarax said:

 but where's @InesF? I hope she's doing well!

 

[PJohnP]

17 hours ago, inkstainedruth said:

I was just thinking the same thing -- to re-read Tigana (as well as other stuff he's written).

 

I first came across his works when another SF author recommended that I read The Summer Tree back in the mid-eighties (Thanks Tanya !).  Toronto in the 'eighties was a caldron of fascinating writers, and many of them knew one another in some degree.  Bakka Books on Queen Street was a resource for me through its (then) owner John Rose and his very able staff.

 

I haven't kept up on his recent stuff, so this was a nice prompt.  Thanks Ruth !

 

 

John P.