Welcome! I feel your pain! I have the opposite problem with pencils. Once they’re sharpened and looking so perfect propped up in a glass on my desk, I don’t want to touch them and ruin them. I like the aesthetic too much.

I’ve gathered up about 20 or so now, and I figure if I get enough crammed in the glass I won’t feel bad if I just take one out and “ruin” it. :)

I love pencils, but I am lazy, so I go the mechanical pencil route. Otherwise, with my OCD tendencies, I’d be sharpening and sharpening pencils all day and never get anything done. (I can’t have paperclips in my house, because they must be made into chains; same with rubber bands and rubber band balls).

Those notebooks truly are addicting. And they go nicely with pencils.

Argh! “Deliverables”.

That’s the Anti-Christ of words. It’s what the Chip-Implantees like to say all the time at the Widget Factory.

Please tell me you haven’t been “assimilated” :-)

When I was about 12, my Grandma bought me a huge box of expensive PrismaColor artist pencils…60 different colors. To me, that was totally unheard of. I thought I had died and gone to heaven!

That was in 1976. Grandma has long since gone, but still have those pencils! Of course, a lot of them are much shorter now…and some are missing. But most of them are still there. I still keep them in an old cigar box and I still use them.

I can’t count how many cartoons and pictures and sketches those pencils have produced. They’ve been old friends, they were there in the early days of my passion for art, and they’ll stay with me forever.

@Ellen – I know what you mean! That’s why I also bought two white erasers to go with my new pencils.

@Janice – LOL! I must say if pencils and Moleskines turn you on then I’m in great company. I’ve definitely found a new obsession (or more rediscovered an old one).

@ Brett-Faber Castell anything…yum.

Sign me up. We can talk pencils and Moleskines anytime. Makes me drool. Stops me in my tracks. Seriously, when I saw what your post was about, it was like waving chocolate under my nose, only better. :)

I am gathering content as well in the background. Going over miles of notebook entries and sketchbooks, blogging, creating ” deliverables” ( don’t you love that word?), painting, sketching, working in the notebooks,working on a project to hand over to the MwP, and trying to add value wherever I make the social rounds. I think I probably need some more Moleskines.. yes, definitely. And Brett has reminded me that I may just go in and spend some quality time sharpening my pencils, one by one, by hand.

Are you writing a novel?

Good luck on your novel. Mines done and I’m trying to get the attention of Oprah.

I remember those from drafting class. They are kind of nice too, but they don’t have the nice smell the wooden pencils have :) and they are $40 too…

@Brett I’ve been thinking about buying a lead holder, leads and I think I still have a lead sharpener around here somewhere. We used to use them in art school, and I’d forgotten about them until I was pencil shopping. There’s also something Faber Castell makes called a Perfect Pencil that I’ve been debating over, but do I really need a $40 pencil? :) Sorta defeats the simplicity factor.

Pencils are awesome. I like pens too, but a pencil just transfers the knowledge in such a smooth way.

I like to sharpen them myself, with a knife, and then form the point on a sanding block. Just perfect…