My name is foxy, and I love office supplies.

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
41

I bet that opinion will change before long. I used Sanford Uni-ball Gel-RTs (retractable) for a semester, and they bugged me. For one thing, they seemed to use ink unusually fast, even for a gel-ink pen. For another, the ink would frequently just stop flowing, requiring me to draw some circles on scratch paper until it decided to start working again. The few I have left will stop producing ink several times in the time it takes to fill out a single check. That’s just unacceptable.

The next semester, I got a box of PaperMate Gel Rollers. Not as pretty, but their operation was much more satisfactory.

And I swear to God that while I was typing this, FedEx knocked on my door and dropped off my Graphiti Grip drylighter (a graphite-based highlighter) and my Levenger Gotham pens, freshly ordered from Levenger. Look 'em up on the Levenger page. Heaven, I’m in heaven…

42

Back in the day (about 6 years ago, that is) my debate coach (Mrs. Alves) was known for sniffing office supplies. Not correction fluid, mind you, or Sharpies, but paper and envelopes…

My obsession is limited but severe: real wood pencils. I love the look, smell and texture of Ticonderogas and especially Mirado Naturals. Oh, and pens with very tiny nibs or balls, since I write small.

43

Torque - I am with you on the Uni-Ball RT. I tried one for a while and it had to be one of the worst pens I have ever used. When it did write it skipped and quite often the damn thing would just quit outright. Again, the Parker gel refills I put in my pens are working splendidly if you are looking for something new.

Caveman- I have a Hero fountain pen headed my way, you might like this if you have a thing for tiny balls… er… nibs… sorry… could… not… resist. They write exceptionally fine and one refill will last a long long time. They use bottled ink so you can also pick your favourite colour of ink. I know of a dealer that can get you one for $15.00 U.S.

44

Pentel RSVP ballpoints. Fine tip purples only. I must have about fifty. Notetaking is only done with these pens and canary legal pads.

Also, every Post It product available, Sharpies, 0.7mm mechanical pencils for recording data in the field. Swingline stapler, disk holders, DIY business card and label packages, gel pens, Page Up! paper holders, white-out pens, view binders, I love all these things.

45

Does anyone remember how good mimeographed paper used to smell? Does anyone care?

46

i love gel pens and now i really want some fountain pens! nothing brightens a day like new notebooks and fresh art supplies.

47

i love gel pens and now i really want some fountain pens! nothing brightens a day like new notebooks and fresh art supplies.

48

i love gel pens and now i really want some fountain pens! nothing brightens a day like new notebooks and fresh art supplies.

49

I love gel pens and now i really want some fountain pens! nothing brightens a day like new notebooks and fresh art supplies.

50

oh, bloody hell.

Sorry about that.

51

[Next stop, Memory Lane and Nostalgia Avenue]

Ohhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh yeah…
Loved that smell. Takes me back to third grade - the teachers would ask one of us to take the ‘ditto sheets’ to the ofice where the secretary would run them off – this was in the dark ages when the copy machine (expensive to run) was used for administrative business and student worksheets were run off on the mimeograph machine (cheaper to run).

Fer those of you young’uns out there, the ‘ditto paper’ was a sheet of thick white paper with a very plasticky feel to it. It was attached (perforated at the top for ‘easy’ (HA!) tearing) to a sheet coated with trasfer ink - usually blue, but sometimes red or green. All this was protected by a thin sheet of brown onion skin paper between the two to avoid premature transfer.

Remove the inner protective sheet, write what you needed to**, replace the protective sheet, and then bring the whole thing to the office for the secretary to run off.

(** - whoops! Did you make a mistake? Grab the razor blade and scritch out the offending error, leaving behind a large blue smudge, no matter how careful you were. If you were lucky you had a bottle of white-out or a piece of scotch tape, but the paper just wouldn’t copy correctly with it. If you made lots of mistakes, grab a new one, but remember, you have a very small supply of sheets per teacher.)

In the main office, the mimeograph machine was a small monster - a paper tray connected to a rotating drum, with a huge rotary dial on the side, set from 1 - 100 (finger hole for every five copies. with teeny (and I do mean teeny) hatch marks. Looked like a huge snail, ran faster and louder than one.

Remove the thick paper, clamp it to the drum, wrong side out (otherwise you do not get the imprinting and end up looking like a dork in front of the office staff), dial up the number of copies (hoping like hell you dialed the intermediary button correctly, and don’t EVEN think of using the ‘continuous’ mode when the secretary was in the ofice), press the rocker switch and stand back.

*** KAH-CHUNK***
*** KAH-CHUNK***
*** KAH-CHUNK***
*** KAH-CHUNK***
*** KAH-CHUNK***
*** KAH-CHUNK***
*** KAH-CHUNK***
*** KAH-CHUNK***
*** KAH-CHUNK***
*** KAH-CHUNK***
*** KAH-CHUNK***
*** KAH-CHUNK***
*** KAH-CHUNK***

This thing was LOUD and sounded like it was about to break. In our office, you had to shut down the machine if the secretary was on the phone so she could hear.

Also on this contraption was a small clear bubble with a colored bead bouncing about in a clear liquid, much like the bubble on a level. No idea what this was for, but the bead burbled happily, making a very soft buh-buh-dub-buh-dub-bub-duh-buh-bub- as it jostled about.

But back to the point, the transfer paper and the final product both ended up with a weird formaldahydey odor, very permeating, almost like brand new carpeting. Oh, the rapture of being the child who was sent to the office to pick up the armload of worksheets for class, especially when the papers weren’t quite done when you got there and had to wait. The main paper was on top, ink side up, so as to not smudge the top worksheet, ad the whole stack was a mimeograph junkie’s dream. I achieved Nirvana many times in the halls of Lakeland Elementary, and had nice chats with Gawd on my slow trek back to class. Damn, those were the days. Mimeograph paper smell.

And rubber cement smell. But that’s another thread.

52

I admit my supply of choice is coloured pens. I don’t care who makes them or who sells them. We go to Meijer’s, the kid goes off to video games, the old man off to tools, and I off to the office and school supply aisle where I will stilll be found half an hour latter, trying to decide if I should get the colourted pencils or the neon higlighters. My lot in death is to be shown in the PaperMate display. Ball points, Rolling balls, Jell Tips, Felt tips, even pencils, just so they’re in colour!
I will buy them at the dollor store. I will buy them at the grocery store. I will buy them at the drug store. I will buy them.

BTW< Why can’t I find the coloured pens with the traditional PaperMate barrel? I used to be able to get them packaged with a set 1 green, 1 purple, 1 pink, 1 black and 1 blue. I can find sets similar but they are the horrid erasable ink that gets smeared everywhere. I can also find sets similar, using the same inks, but the barrlels are thicker and rubbery. The Bic’s of this type are very easy to find, but thier writing is blotchy, and the inks rather pale. (Compare thier greens)

Alright. Who of you also pick up every pen they find on the street? Everyone in my house knows where to find a pen. They yell at me. And of course they never get returned. Street pens let you give without loosing!

I too remember mimeographing. The blotchy purple ink…the wetness…I havn’t had one since my daughter started school.

Yarg! Off to Ben Franklins’ for the lot of you!

53

Ooohhhhhh. Ohhhhhhhhhhhhhh… Offfiiiccccccce suuppllliiiiiiiiies.

God, I love office supplies, bless their little perforations.

When I got the job at the STM, I just about fainted to learn we have unlimited access to office supplies. And photocopies. I adore photocopying.

But it gets better - I work in Service à la Clientèle - Communications - Outils d’information. We design all the maps and posters and shit for the whole public transit system, and since we’re also customer service, we keep copies on hand to mail out. I therefore have access to all the maps, information tools, and everything that I ever wanted. Even the ones that aren’t for the public, like the big metro signs they install in the trains. swoon

And better yet, last week they cleaned out the storage room. Threw out four or five mobile dumpsters’ worth of god-knows-how-long-it’s-been-there crap, but I scored some of the most amazing items, like:

-two full boxes of obsolete sticky labels,
-swarms of poster paints and coloured pencils (they don’t paint posters anymore, they design them on computer and serigraph them),
-squares, protractors, and other drafting tools, obsolete for the same reason,
-huge old foamcore boards (I mean to use them to paint on),
-and my best treasure, a huge coroplast 25th anniversary festive metro sign from 1992. (scott evil and detop know what I’m talking about.)

54

I do remember mimeographs well, but not the machine; if I had to guess, I’d say the colored bead is so that the level of the fluid can be seen easily from a distance, so that whoever’s job it is to replace the fluid can notice before it goes completely dry.

I love office supply stores too. I’m horrible; my husband has to nag me to grab the last of what I need and get out. Computer labels are the latest in my long line of weaknesses, and for some reason now I want a laminating machine.

55

So my favorite pen now is my Pentel “Energel.” It’s kind of like a combination of liquid and gel and writes really really well. I love to be able to see the light shine off of my writting, and this does that without smearing like some other gel pens.

Give 'em a shot!

56

I want a laminating machine, too, but I’ve got a reason for it. I play D&D, and I frequently want to laminate things. So far, I’ve just been putting clear Con-Tac plastic over them. I spent most of this morning cutting out square bits of paper with monster images on them. I used my very own paper cutter, the sort that has a little razor on a slide. That thing set me back twenty bucks, but it’s FUN. And a lot quicker and more accurate than scissors.

I love the Sheaffer everyday fountain pens. I have several, and each has a different ink color cartridge in it. I like other kinds of pens as well, but there’s something special about Sheaffer cartridge pens.

Each time I see composition books displayed, I have an overwhelming desire to buy one or a dozen. I like steno pads, too, for some reason, though I’ve never been able to figure out WHY they have a line down the middle. Legal pads are great, especially the junior size in different colors. Right now, I have four junior pads on my desk, one with a list of things I want from the hardware store, one with the grocery list, one with the Wal-Mart list, and one with general things to do.

In the late 60s and early 70s, notebook paper used to come in different colors. One brand was Luvin’ Colors, or something like that. I miss that. Of course now I can get colored copy paper in a zillion shades AND a zillion designs. I guess that makes up for it.

I nearly have an orgasm when it comes to art and craft supplies. Kneaded erasers! Chalk and pastels and colored pencils and CRAYONS! Humongous pads of newsprint!!!

Clearly, I’ve been sniffing too much rubber cement.

57

I just got back today from buying several beautiful5-subject Five Star notebooks. I swear, you can never have enough notebooks of clean lined paper. I also found some very smooth pens, blue Pilot G-2 extra fine click ones. I can only write with pens that are super-fine tipped, and this one is very thin. It’s also gel-ink, so it flows very smoothly and hasn’t cut out on me yet. I’m stuffing my bag full of notebooks and pens and highlighters, and the great thing about it is everything is on sale now that it’s “back-to-school” time. I am going to have more supplies than I’ll ever need, but isn’t it great? :wink:

58

I was out on my regular Saturday flea market excursion and managed to come away with what I think is a Wing Sung fountain pen… it’s a cross between a Parker 51 and 75 in shape with an extra fine hooded nib. It writes amazingly well and cost me a whole $3.00. It’s gold with a soap company logo on it…

Even better than the pen was the un-opened box of Sheaffer peacock blue ink cartridges I found. It’s among my favourite colour and those bastards at Bic (who own Sheaffer) discontinued the colour in 2001.

So while I’m here… anyone who finds any bottles of Sheaffer Peacock Blue ink should contact me. I’d like to acquire a good stock of it as it is also Lola’s favourite colour as well.