The Pen is Mightier…

Well, here we are on Tacos and Tiaras Tuesday, and it’s time to come clean about another one of my favorite things and my not-so-secret lifelong addiction – pens. I know I’m not alone in this! I light up when I see those sale stickers in the pen section at Walgreens or a Deal of the Day on Amazon.

I can see y’all out there, nodding in agreement, throwing your hands up in praise, and getting all excited while thinking about your own pen collection. Simple pleasures. Am I right? Losing a favorite pen is a sure way to wreck your day, but finding that pen makes you want to do the Snoopy and Woodstock reunion happy dance! I would be dancing right along with you!

When I was in high school and college, I had a massive love affair with Crayola markers. I had the broad line markers, fine line markers, stampers… classic colors, bold colors, pastel colors, tropical colors… I was kind of obsessive with getting all the colors available and of course keeping them in ROY G BIV order!

In high school, I wrote hellacute multi-colored notes to my friends with the Crayola fine line markers! OMG and middle school was back in the day when we had a notebook with a best friend and took turns writing notes to each other. A shitload of LYLAS in those notebooks. LOL Kids today miss out on this kind of stuff with smartphones. Sad.

When I was a sophomore in college, I was initiated into Sigma Sigma Sigma sorority. During the mid-1990s, joining a sorority meant not only socializing and volunteering, raising funds for a philanthropy, playing intramural sports, or competing in Homecoming and Greek Week events, but also drawing “door decs”! Even if you weren’t in a National Panhellenic Conference organization (in other words, you didn’t “go Greek”), you knew when sororities on campus were having rush/recruitment and when Bid Day arrived. Sorority sisters made door decorations (door decs) to welcome the new members to their sisterhood. I still have mine in a scrapbook, which includes the early art a la door dec from Heather Ann Stillufsen! I seriously LOVED drawing door decs, especially when my pledge sister, Shana, introduced me to coloring posterboard as a background, then writing the message in paint pen.

All of my school years of note writing and journaling were limited to either Crayola, Paper Mate Flair, or Sharpie if I wanted colorful writing in anything beyond black, blue, red, or green ball-point writing from a Bic four-color pen. You know the one with the blue or orange barrel, and getting your parents to buy one for you was the equivalent of buying an iPhone for a kid these days! Oh, we were simple children. Ooh! I almost forgot about my Sheaffer calligraphy set with colored refills and various nibs! So faaaaaaancy!

I started writing in journals/diaries when I was eleven years old, but the rise/resurgence of journaling/planning is way beyond what I was doing with Crayola markers and Lisa Frank stickers! (More to come on planner stickers and washi tape!) The popularity of journaling as well as hand lettering has also ushered in EVEN MORE PENS and markers!

So here we go. In alphabetical order, all of the pens/markers I have with me today (as opposed to the rest of my pens at home, which will be a part deux of this post) are:

• Bic Intensity – fine – capped
• Bic Mark it – fine -capped
• Paper Mate Flair felt tip – medium – capped
• Paper Mate Ink Joy gel – 0.7 – retractable
• Pilot G-2 gel – 0.7 – retractable
• Sharpie pen – fine – capped
• William Mitchell calligraphy italic markers
• Zebra SARASA felt tip – fine 0.8 – capped
• Zebra Mildliner double ended creative marker
• ZIG Memory System Millennium – 5 sizes – capped

So yeah, I do refer to a Mark It as a Sharpie. It’s that whole permanent marker thing. Great on pretty much everything, except notebook paper or writing paper because it bleeds.

Bic intensity fine line works perfectly in my Passion Planner. I like to color code what I write in my daily tasks, and these babies git ‘er done!

Paper Mate Ink Joy gel pens… soooooo smooth and vibrant colors! These are my favorite for writing letters and in greeting cards. Yep! I still write letters, and I had pen-pals when I was in elementary and middle school. These would have been totally awesome back then! If these come in a purple multipack, PLEASE let me know!

Paper Mate Flair pens have been around a long time, but I don’t remember the rainbow array of colors availability when I was a child. I kind of remember black, red, and green… and how much I loved the feel of the felt tip while writing. Just a little bit of friction between the tip and the page, and if you pressed too hard, the tip would get broader… LOL This is starting to sound a little sexy.

Pilot G2 is my go-to pen for everyday writing, so I go through these pretty quickly because I actually prefer the medium point, but Walgreens had a sale on these! Purple is my favorite color AND purple and white are the official colors of Sigma Sigma Sigma. Therefore, purple ink is the official color of the sorority’s written correspondence. I think I had Pilot and Paper Mate ballpoint pens in college, and whenever my mom ran across them while shopping, she would pick up a pack or two and send them to me. I repeated that with my son when he was at MCRD Parris Island, and I put some Pilot G2 medium black ink in his first care package. He wrote and asked me to send more ink sticks, specifically the Pilot G2s that I sent. Yay!

Sharpie pen. I was buying these before the Bic intensity, and these may be slightly less fine. I was completely sold on writing like an original Sharpie but without it bleeding. This was my favorite crossword puzzle pen when I was still doing crosswords. If I could find these in purple multipacks like the Pilot G2, I’d be buying these all the time.

William Mitchell italics markers joined my collection of writing instruments when I was trying to learn to write in other languages that used their own characters. Right. These haven’t gotten much use, hahahahaha. I still recommend them if you’re writing calligraphy or anything that needs a reliable chisel tip. They haven’t worn down or lost shape as some tips do.

Truth be told, I haven’t used these much. The SARASA markers feel a lot like the Bic intensity markers. The Mildliners I picked up on sale at Walgreens, and today was the first day I opened them to do the sample scribbles. I suspect these would be good for students highlighting in a book and writing corresponding notes in the same color. I dunno. LOLz I suppose I’ll figure it out at some point, but I haven’t fallen in love with them.

I stumbled upon Zentangle by way of Pinterest, and I LOVE THESE for zentangling! The 005 is beyond ultrafine, so they’re very revealing of my unsteady hands. I’ve started using them for inking my Crayola marker drawings, but I dream of being able to do my own illustrations…which led to finding the Kuretake’s ZIG Cartoonist. Oh yeah, that will be a real treat if I ever feel ready to share. 😉

And that’s it for this part of my collection. I welcome your comments about your favorite pens/markers to try! Anyone who wants to send me pens in exchange for reviews/comparisons, please feel free to leave a comment with your email address.

And yes, “The Pen is Mightier…” was reference to “The Penis Mightier” from Saturday Night Live Celebrity Jeopardy skits with “Sean Connery”. It never gets old.

Luceat lux vestra.