I am a technical writer and I manage scholarships for students of a local trade school I helped my father set up. As the daughter of an engineer I developed an office supplies fetish really early. (It makes sense to love writing instruments, ink AND paper together.) I have done wedding calligraphy for a friend. I also enjoy making my own greeting cards and have lately attempted making my own hand-sewn and bound journals. Yes, I have been a longtime fan of artist and writer Nick Bantock (of "Griffin & Sabine" fame).
In college I gladly rescued other people's unwanted pens, as long as they still worked and wrote well. My earliest was a black plastic Pilot fine point with a badly scratched cap, which has since disappeared. Since then I have acquired -- as gifts, through adoption, or as retail therapy -- a variety of cute plastic refillable fountain pens, school-type Chinese workhorses, as well as a few reasonably priced reliables (Parker Vectors and metal Inoxcroms), a couple of calligraphy sets, and my graduation MB Meisterstuck. My bottled inks are so far limited to what's available locally (Quink, Waterman). I usually write with a fine nib, and am attracted to nicely balanced, wet-writing, cigar-shaped pens as opposed to more decorative ones.
At this point I think of myself as more of an accumulator than a serious collector, because I prefer to use my pens in regular rotation instead of invest in them as collectibles.
Knitting paraphernalia have made a serious dent in my hobbies budget such that I haven't acquired a serious pen in a while, but now that I discovered Pentrace and similar forums/sites, all of a sudden I'm inclined to learn more about pens again.
I think snail mail is a very good use of one's fountain pens. I'm happy to correspond with different people who enjoy both the pens AND the writing.
Blog or Homepage:
http://personalgeographic.blogspot.com
Links:
http://knittipina.blogspot.com
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