Friday, October 07, 2011

Friday-1:15am

Karma looks a bit annoyed.
This is why neither of us can sleep.
Note: It was so windy on the porch you can't hear a word I said--LOL!

And it hasn't let up yet. Bang...bang...bang...bang. So, as long as I was forced to stay awake, I thought I'd share my GouletPens haul with you that arrived yesterday!!
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They always package everything in many layers! Excellent!
Here's the unwrapped goodies!
They had Sheaffer cartridges on sale. I use them for my old calligraphy pens so I got blue, blue-black, and turquoise. Below those boxes is the J. Herbin small glass pen in violet.
J. Herbin package of 10 small sheets of blotter paper. I was kind of surprised that each sheet has this design on the one side. Because you can usually use both sides of blotter paper and you'd think the ink print and designs would interfere with the blotting? Maybe not?
G. Lalo Verge de France A5 writing tablet in Champagne.
Rhodia Webnotebook (5 1/2 X 8 1/4) and No. 16 Premium Notepad--both blank and orange.
Quo Vadis Habana Notebook--blank, red--6 X 9.
I believe G. Lalo, Quo Vadis, and Rhodia are all subdivisions of Clairefontaine. (www.exaclair.com) So, naturally, I have been planning to try them all out. ;) I fully expect them all to be marvelous with fountain pens!
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I do like the Exacompta refillable journal I bought with the silver edged paper and the forest green cover...for no bleed through and little shadowing...but it takes so long for the ink to dry that I had to order the blotting paper sheets. This is why I am still trying different journals and plan to see if I can sew my own journal covers this winter after the holidays. Don't ask me why I love having a journal cover so much...I just do. LOL!
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Oh, and the Ink Drop arrived for October!
"Autumn Leaves II"
I plan to test these new fun sample inks with my brand new glass dip pen. :):)
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Also got a big bottle of Blue Ghost invisible ink with a free pen and tiny blacklight. The pen can be used either as a fountain pen or a roller ball pen. I am going to try setting it up as a roller ball for something different.
As usual, Nathan has the most elaborate, interesting labels. Here he shows the bottles and writing under a black light...
...guys fishing? (I really need to read the fine print.) And more writing examples--with and without black light.
He loves his catfish...and here the fishing guys are surprised by a giant "Blue Ghost" catfish. Below that pic it looks like the catfish is fishing underwater and the guys are gone (eaten? invisible?). Oh, Nathan! He has such a strange sense of humor--LOL! I have got to read all the small print on this bottle. ;)
The glass dip pens have been around since the 1700s. The glass flutes that spin around the nib hold the ink after the pen is dipped. As you write, the ink slides down the flutes to the tip. Oh, and that textured paper under the glass pen in this shot is the G. Lalo.
And here's a shot against the red cover of the Quo Vadis Habana.
I already have a set of glass pens--a large and a small--that I bought maybe 20 years ago or more. Pretty, but they have never, ever worked. Brian and Rachel Goulet had that problem with the pens not working when they started selling them. If the flutes don't come all the way down to the tip, I suppose. That's what I figure is wrong with mine. Anyways, the Goulets complained and rejected the pens until they started getting better ones from J. Herbin. Plus Brian tests each one of them now. I haven't tried my new one yet but, thanks to Brian, I am expecting it to work. I'll let you know. :)
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I have had some strange things happening. First of all, I went to use my sample Blue Ghost ink after about a month or so. I had cleaned out a pen and had put most of the sample bottle (via syringe) into the empty cleaned out cartridge. The pen had lain on my table in the meantime. When I went to use it--it had lost all it's properties. Was like water. Black light showed nothing. But the teeny bit I had left in the sample bottle still worked? So, I emailed Brian Goulet...and somehow my email got bumped into spam!
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Well, I was determined to buy the Blue Ghost ink regardless. I would use a new dry pen or only use a dip pen if I had to. I get too much of a kick out of sending invisible notes. (Even if Dagan and Leah completely forgot what I showed them, thought I was going senile sending them a blank card, and tossed it into recycling...I shall persist!) I made a comment with my order about not hearing back about the Blue Ghost ink...and got an quick response. :):)
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Spam. I was spam. Boy! I seem to have some bad luck fluke fairies following me around the last few weeks, eh? Really bad fibro flare that doesn't want to quit and then I'm spam--ROFL!
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This too shall pass. ;)
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Anyways, Brian had no clue why the invisible ink lost its properties over time. He'll try to remember to ask Nathan. The notes I wrote at that time are still good and the ink retained its glow, as you can see from Iggy's blog here. I figure there was probably a tiny bit of water left in the pen and the cartridge? But would a drop or two of water change the invisible ink to water, too? Odd, eh? If I find out why, I'll let you know. In the meantime, I'll fill a brand new dry pen...and just wait and see.
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Well, I am obviously looking at a zombie day ahead. It is 3:15am (I have to take breaks) and the flap is still beating. Karma, though, is snoring in her chair. Cats don't sweat the small stuff. I am usually pretty good about that, myself...but sometimes...grrr! Sorry for the cranky video--ROFL! The wind is supposed to continue all day now on Friday with gusts up to 55mph and scattered thunderstorms. Looks like a good day to curl up in my chair and veg out with the TV or a good book. This blog will probably be my big accomplishment for the day--ROFL!
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Bang-bang-bang-bang...bye-bye!! ;)
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"If you cry because the sun has gone out of your life, your tears will prevent you from seeing the stars."
Rabindranath Tagore

18 comments:

laurak/ForestWalkArt :) said...

at 55 mph...i would say that's MORE than GUSTS!! wOw!! it's hard to relax...with winds like that...ESPECIALLY at night!! hopefully as the sun comes up, the wind will die down and you can have a little peaceful...sleeeeep.

i have NEVER seen a glass tipped pen like that!!!!! it's beautiful!! and i guess it works just like a nib pen...dip in ink...write...????? i love it!! what size is the tip? maybe you can show what you do with it...how it writes?? draws??
...the invisible ink...that's a new one for me too. when i used to do screen printing....i used some 'glow in the dark' ink...but i haven't seen this invisible ink...even the ones that glow under the black light...are white...not invisible. interesting...
and your journals!! you gift yourself such wonderful things!! you deserve it!!
have a good day...feel good!

carol l mckenna said...

Wow! What a post! Great info and Tagore's quote is great ~ I do hope you get some rest today ~ try and copy Karma and 'let it all go by' like a video ~ I know it is not easy ~ us humans! Good to hear from you and enjoy the weekend ~ Hope you find a good book and/or something good on TV ~ I rarely watch TV ~ love a good movie so tend to rent movies and will explore more what's on TV when it is cooler ~ Hope the wind has subsided! Take good care of you! And thanks for your great comments on Share the Creative Journey ~ hugs to you ~ namaste, Carol ^_^

DJan said...

I love that glass pen, too. And yes, it would be impossible for ME to sleep with that racket. At least you have accomplished this post, Rita. I hope you can nap on and off during the day.

Dee Ready said...

Like DJan and laurak I find those glass-fluted pens intriguing. I'd never even heard about them before.

I went to Iggy's blog and saw the letter you sent with the design you'd made and your invisible ink. That answers part of all those questions I asked yesterday.

Please do consider doing a series of postings about what you do with your pens and paper--your passion and your art form.

Thank you, Rita, for sharing your own problems with perfection in the comment you left on my Thursday story about the convent polishing. I always look forward to your comments because you always tell me how they elicited memories from your own life.

Peace.

Queenie Jeannie said...

Oh no! How annoying!! Isn't there anything the maintenance people can do?? Maybe put some rubber bumpers on it so when it "bangs" it's not making such a racket??? I've been using a loud fan, pointed away from me, to drown out our partying neighbors. It totally worked too!! No matter what stupidity they've been up to, the fan blocks it all out. Perhaps you can try that too?? I hope you get some rest soon - I know you need it!

Queenie Jeannie said...

Oh! And enjoy all your lovely new goodies! If your glass pens works, you should make a video for us while you use it! It's so pretty!!!

Rita said...

Laura--LOL! Up here they are gusts. We are used to 20-30 mph wind...well, a lot of the time. A day where the wind is 10mph or less is considered still. And they call Chicago the windy city--hehe! ;)
I think I'll have to try to make some videos. Be patient with me since I'm still ranking just a notch above crummy.
These last few years here in Fargo I've been gifting myself something almost every month. ;) I started being nicer to myself in 1989...kind of tangled up with self-esteem...being worth special things. Gifting yourself can be a joyous, celebratory, little-kid-at-Christmas kind of feeling. I've been making up for all the previous years of feeling guilty about my small treasures. No guilt here anymore! ROFL!! And being home 24/7, all the goodies I have collected over the years has come in very handy (books, art supplies, pens & inks, craft supplies...ahhh! Ain't life grand! :)

Carol--Dagan and Leah have me set up with a computer system for TV, so I can watch Netflix Instant movies on TV, too. I am one spoiled puppy! ;)
Have a great weekend!

Djan--Not easy. The pounding speeds up and slows down and stops and starts. When I open a window then my apartment door rattles from the wind like somebody is trying to get in--and the wind shakes the building so that the floor wobbles. I'm glad it doesn't happen very often--the pounding against the building, I mean. The door rattling, floor shaking wind happens a lot. But I can shut the windows and porch door and door will be quiet--and I found I can sleep on a wobbling, bouncing bed--LOL! ;)

Dee--I only wrote the invisible note--didn't make the notecard. I ordered those many years ago--personalized and it says "Soul Comfort" on the front. I promise I will do a post about my love affair with pens, inks, and paper. May take me a little while, but I promise.
You write from your heart and soul. That's where I live. So your posts sometimes trigger memories for me. I'm glad you don't mind if I mention them. Thanks!
Peace to you, too--and to the world! :)

Intense Guy said...

Someone needs to do something with that dryer vent. Is it attached to "your" dryer? Next door's? All of them?

AliceKay said...

If I were you, I'd show that video (or one similiar of just the banging sound) to your building's maintenance office. Seems as tho they could put some kind of extension on the dryer vent so it's not banging on the outside of the building. That noise would totally drive me bonkers if I had to listen to it for more than a few minutes in the day time, let alone at night when I'm trying to sleep. I've sent Terri out in the dark of night sometimes to quiet a banging shutter. :\

You have a lot of interesting ink and a lot of interesting pens. :) I hope you find out why the Blue Ghost ink lost it's properties. Wouldn't want something like that to happen often.

I hope you were able to get some rest today. We had a beautiful fall day in northeastern Pennsylvania. It was 72 with a little wind, but the sun more than made up for it. We need the sun to dry up some of this water and mud.

P.S. Thank you for my birthday card. That was really special. *hugs*

Anonymous said...

Wind scares me to death- it's one of my biggest fears!

Rita said...

Jeannie--The office knows all about it. Talked to them years ago when I moved in. Nothing they can do about it they said. If they took the flap off, the swallows nest in there. (Which has happened once even with the flap on because I think it got stuck open--talk about stinky in my apartment when I ran the dryer and I may have killed baby birds--and it was dangerous for the maintenance man to try to reach the third floor vent to clean the nest out because they don't have a ladder quite high enough--not my fault.)
I had a couple fans going and my sound machine. :(
I'll try to make a video of the glass dip pen, yes. :)

Iggy--I guess I'm not sure if it is only my dryer vent or not, but it is up here by me on third floor on the side of the building somewhere. I only hear the one. The maintenance man called it my dryer vent flap. They know about it. If they had a tall enough ladder I suggested they could put a screen over it...but then they said they are afraid in the winter it would get plugged with snow and ice. True. Just one of those things. Glad it doesn't happen too often.

AliceKay--They know. I have had them here when it was banging away. If you had an extension it would bang against the extension. The sucker is just going to bang with this wind when it is at the right angle and strong enough.
That was the weirdest thing about the invisible ink truly becoming invisible--like water--LOL! You can still read your note, right? If they find out from Nathan (the owner, maker, and inventor of all the Noodler's inks) they'll let me know.
You're most welcome! ;)

Angela--You wouldn't like living up here...at all! It can howl at night and the building shakes. I suppose kind of like in scary movies--LOL! :):)

Toriz said...

Really windy here too, and I'm guessing from the roughness of it that there's a storm out at sea.

Sounds like you got some great stuff there.

Hey, maybe you could experiment with a little of the ink with some water; that will tell you.

Rita said...

Tori--I might have to do that--experiment with some water and the invisible ink. I'm curious as to what Nathan might have to say. He is so meticulous, this might be something that hasn't happened before.

You may get more wind now being near the ocean, I suppose. Have a great day!!

Toriz said...

Yeah, but - in theory - less rain, so it's all good. ;)

Serena Lewis said...

OH my goodness, that banging noise would certainly keep me awake too, Rita...it would drive me nuts! I can't stand hearing dripping taps at night time either. lol

How nice that GouletPens pack their goods so well. Less worry over damage in transit.

I'm drooling over your pen and journal supplies yet again. Giggling at the fishy illustration. ol

How interesting about the glass tipped pen! Does it not cause big blobs of ink on the paper? I'm trying to imagine who the ink flow is controlled with so many flutes holding ink?? I need to get over to YouTube and check out some of your videos. Do you have one where you're using dip pens?? I don't know if I work mine right. I seem to have trouble with too much ink flow or not enough.

I check my spam folder constantly as, sometimes, there has been an email from a safe contact that has somehow managed to find its way there.

OH no...your fibro flare still has a firm grip on you? Feel better real soon. xo

I hope the racket cleared off so you could get some sleep.

Love,
Serena xo

Rita said...

Serena--That banging does drive me nuts--LOL!
Goulet's pack so well they could ship to the moon, I think--ha! So, you have a glass pen, too? My old set didn't work at all--nothing would come off the pen n matter how I turned and turned it. I think the flutes didn't go all the way to the end of something. This one has been good. No blobbing. If anything it dries and you have to turn it to find another spot where it flows. But it might have been the paper I was using, too. That makes a difference. I should try something smoother.
No, I don't have any videos on the glass pens. I need to make one. I will when I feel better. And, don't worry, I'll post it on the blog, too. :)
I never even think of my spam folder. I suppose I should check it once in a while.
Yes, I finally crashed for almost 12 hours! :):)

Serena Lewis said...

No, I don't own a glass pen but was curious how they write with so many flutes guiding the ink to the point. thanks for answering. I was more talking about the regular dip pens as I don't know if I work mine right. xo

Rita said...

Serena--email me a picture. Not sure if I can help, but maybe. ;)