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In case you've neglected to check your recent typewriter news feeds, these items are worth a read:
At least this dismantler of typewriters is getting creative: check out the Corona Matic Waffle Maker if you've always dreamed of eating keyboard-shaped breakfast items. And who hasn't?
I never tire of articles about old typewriter repair shops like Carolina Typewriters still holding up in these thumb-typing times.
Update: And another about Frykman Technologies in Illinois.
It was cool to discover a review of Strikethru on the Rhodia notebook site, Rhodia Drive. These really are excellent notebooks, so I recommend checking out the site, and/or giving a Rhodia notebook a try for yourself.
Personally I am intrigued by the Rhodia pencil, but I am trying not to get sucked into the world of pencils. There are too many fountain pens and typewriters to get through. Right? I don't need a pencil, do I?
I recently ordered a pink Pelikan Pelikano from Pear Tree Pens (that's a lot of p's...) and it just arrived today.
Naturally upon arrival it picked a fight with my current and only other fountain pen, the Lamy Safari, which was documented on Myndology notepaper as follows:
Update: Not long after purchase, the Pelikan Pelikano developed a crack in the barrel (I didn't drop it, so not sure how this happened) and the cap no longer stays on securely. As one might expect, this resulted in a pink ink disaster in my pen case. It goes without saying that I have since soured on the Pelikan.
Disclaimer: this is a really weird post. I know. Here is a picture of the notepad in question, and here is another of its more modest relative.
P.S.: Welcome, Inflatable Guy!
I am always amazed at the endless amount of blogs out there, and how oftentimes the only way to learn about them is to hopscotch through blogrolls on other sites you already know. Two I am enjoying lately are Retro Thing and Pencil Talk, although there are plenty of others too - whenever I find one I like, I slap it into my link list off to the left (below the list of Papercasters, but check those out too).
Any good paper, retrotech, pen, pencil, notebook sites I'm missing? Because it's really important that I find more reasons to spend time on the internet during the gorgeous, temperate Northwestern summertime.
Duc N. Ly's blog has some great content about notebooks and journaling, and he's offered me an opportunity to guest post today.
Thanks! Check out his blog.
A week or so ago I predicted that I wouldn't be able to resist trying out Myndology notebooks. Turns out that this was an accurate forecast. I have several that I've put through the papercasting paces, starting with the Bare Journal (which you can read about on the Myndology site). This product has been reviewed before, so there's no sense in my repeating some of the basics about the product (to wit, it has some earth-friendly specs, a bonus here in the hypergreen Northwest). What I want to cover here is, how does it work for papercasting?
My original interest in this product came from the thought that I could store all manner of papercasted screeds in the same notebook, no matter their writing instrument of origin. You can't say that about other kinds of notebooks (unless you're a fan of the bulky three-ring binder, which gives me flashbacks to undergraduate survey courses rife with mimeographed textbook handouts). As I mentioned in my original post, Myndology products are disc-bound, which allows you to remove and rearrange pages within a single notebook.
I'm told there are several other products out there that fit this description, but I'm going to pull this review over to the side of the road right here and admit it: I like cool-looking stuff. Myndology notebooks have a distinct design aesthetic. (Unfortunately for my wardrobe, my taste for cool stops at paper products.) Also, people, please jump in and correct me if I am entirely off in my assumption that some of the other disc bound products are a little on the "GTD" side of things, GTD being, if you are not already familiar, a curious cult of personal productivity that I, as a disorganized and spontaneous person, have a hard time relating to. I am possibly being completely unfair.
On to our review. But wait? Why not papercast it? (Oops, edited to add, I refer to ring-bound notebooks in the papercasts that follow, but the term s/b disc-bound.) 
In conclusion, this is a fun notebook with some environmental cache. I really like the look of a typewritten page in a regular notebook. Who'd have thunk? Paper quality does not suck and holds up well to liquid fountain pen ink without bleeding or skipping. I also definitely approve of the fact that refills are available.
Cons are, the tabs are delicate, and you've got to choose your typewriter well, or you're going to mangle the pages. Also, if you're thinking of fitting some off-brand pages into your notebook, better start saving now for the punch.
I believe I forgot to mention that, regarding the refills, you can get different types of paper (lined, plain, graph) which works nicely to mix and match pen and typewriter papercasts.
Scribble is an up-and-coming pencaster that I recommend. Mandarine is a pencaster who also offers a tutorial for those new to pencasting, in adddition to the pros and cons. Here are some other pencasts I've found online: The Girl in the Cafe, Telecommuter Talk, and probably the godfather of papercasters, Papercasting.net, which seems to have regrettably gone offline sometime late last year.
I'm sure there are others. Anyone know of any in particular?
PS: I got that stamp from Fishcakes, who even makes a typewriter magnet...
Oh, and papercast on Rhodia notepad paper...
It's true that I've self-imposed a typewriter collecting moratorium (recently and briefly suspended only because a holy grail-style typewriter came along); however, there remains a list of random typewriters I admire, and may some day acquire:
The Remington Quiet-Riter
I don't own any Remingtons. I am certain I have never even typed on one. I usually recognize any kind of Royal, Olympia, or Hermes on the spot, but Remingtons remain vague, that off-brand of car you've never driven or owned. The whole brand to me seems nondescript, I routinely click past Remingtons when rummaging eBay search results, save for the Quiet Riter, which sports a stubby, stylized, VW sort of look, and that delightfully misspelled brand name (a common quirk of typewriter nomenclature in general, this). Something tells me this might be my kind of typewriter, although I can't put my finger on exactly why. (Relatedly, is there really a pink Remington Noiseless? I want it.)
Smith-Corona Silent/Silent Super
I'm not real clear on the variations within this particular line, I just know I like the stripes, and everyone keeps saying they are so damned great. I can't sit around hearing how damned great a typewriter is from every typewriter guy on the interweb without eventually wanting to try it for myself, which is how I ended up with an SM9 (not a typewriter that would ordinarily have jumped off the shelf at me, because it's as ugly as sin).
Pink Royal Quiet De Luxe
I already have a RQDL, and it's handsome and everything, but my inner 12-year-old-girl really wants a pink one, which I know I'll never get, because the bidding is always too high on the darned things, and I've spent too much at this point already. But I want one! I want an Oompa Loompa now! Wait, did someone say that there are also pink Silent-Supers? Is a pink typewriter the next holy grail?
70's Smith Corona Super Sterling
I went and wrote this soppy post awhile ago about My First Typewriter, the Smith Corona Galaxie 12, and later realized I would be a terrible witness should I ever be called to the stand, because my memories of my inaugural typewriter were completely false. Any superficial perusal of the photograph in which my original machine appears would immediately clarify that it was a Smith Corona Super Sterling, and yes, I want another one in that exact shade of rhinoceros gray so I can re-live the glory of my tween writing years, when I sat about typing romance novellas about Huey Lewis.
Some day I'll go back and issue a retraction of that post and its many lies.
Underwood 5
You can only be told so many times that standard typewriters are vastly superior to every scrap of tin in your crappy portable collection before you begin to daydream of a luxurious personal office, complete with ocean view, full of unlimited, rolling vistas of desktop space not shared with your husband's virtual flight yoke thing, the centerpiece of which is a space-hogging, 40 lb standard typewriter, the Underwood 5, a looming pipe-organ of type. Then you realize that your actual office space is a $39 Ikea laptop table called Dave shoved into the corner at the top of the stairs, and there is not even one square inch of space in your house actually devoted exclusively and permanently to your writing pursuits, and so you grudgingly accept that every typewriter you are likely to own will come in a little suitcase with a handle.
That's my list. What's yours?
