In Dutch we have an expression that links the warrior with his arms. Good warrior, good arms. In my opinion it’s the same thing with writing material: if you think it’s important, you’ll use quality stuff. If taking notes is just taking notes, you’ll settle with anything.

Here’s just a short overview of the writing gear I use daily, please don’t accuse me of using only one brand *smiley*:

• Parker I.M. – I bought this pen a while back in remplacement of an old plastic bodied Parker pen. When going through the different possibilities in the shop, I really wanted a heavy pen and this one suited just fine: rather heavy compared to others, smoot thick lines and it looks fancy. A pen I use on a daily basis and always carry around.
• Parker 180 – This is a pen with a story. A collegue of mine found it when cleaning up the house of her aunt that went to a retirement home. It came with a fancy box and the story that her aunt or uncle probably got it at work. The pen was offered to the complete family but no one was interested, so she decided to give it to me. Of course I couldn’t refuse this. The pen has a really particular nib and writes in very thin smooth lines.  Some research led me to think it’s a Parker 180 with a ‘grain d’orge’ pattern. Due to the lightness of the pen, another pen addicted collegue made me believe it’s gold plated, however I’m not sure. The pen works with regular Parker refillings but also with a pot of ink. I use it when I fancy something different than my IM.
• Parker International Classic Ballpoint – Of course you need something to scribble around with: a regular Parker ballpoint, which I found when cleaning up my desk. Not that much used, but when I need a ballpoint, I refuse to write with a plastic, used by everyone, promotional gadget type of ballpoint.
• Faber Castell Blue Grip Pencil – I don’t use a pencil that often, most of all to write things down in my agenda when they aren’t certain yet or to scribble around in my different notebooks. I like a refillable pencil, so the thickness of your writing is always the same. Faber Castell is a high quality pencil that I have been using for a few years now. It sticks around, I like it.

I got the idea for this blogpost via Davy Buntinx who published a video last week on the notebooks & pens he uses. I thought: “Hey, I use pens too! Why not write a blogpost on this?!” The rest is history.