I just caught Chris Pirillo's new design. Very creative thinking, and it left me thinking...why didn't I come up with that idea. I've been meaning to blog something about handwriting for ages, you know, an entire blog post in my own handwriting that speaks of how little we actually write these days. Shortly before I did it someone else, I forget who, beat me to it and posted something up in their own handwriting. Soon after I lost the desire to do the same and promptly forgot all about it. Until I saw Chris' new weblog design which I think is the coolest weblog design I've ever seen. Period.
So here's roughly the post I intended to write months ago. When do you ever actually use a pen these days? Signing for credit card payments? Expense claims? Receiving parcels in the post? That's pretty much it for me. The problem manifests itself in more than one form. Firstly, I can never find a pen when I need one, principally because I hardly ever need one and therefore pay scant regard for where I leave them. Also, I mostly use other people's pens when ever I need to sign my signature in shops, restaurants etc.
But this devil may care attitude to pen ownership leads to other problems, for instance I've found myself calligraphically embarrassed in traditional business meeting settings, the formal kind you wear suits to, (suits, remember those? well apart from those of us who are of a criminal disposition, most of us don't wear suits any more) the kind of meeting where you have to behave yourself, speak only when spoken to and, above all, you must take written notes whenever you're given an action, because we all know that if we are seen to be writing something down in a meeting then of course you're gonna do it, aren't you? Well in those meetings, I usually turn up with either no pen at all forcing me to beg, borrow or steal one from someone else who always greets my less than professional predicament with abject horror and disgust, or I use a half chewed, probably broken and barely held together with sellotape, bic biro, minus it's cap. If I'm really unlucky it still has it's cap, badly chewed, usually by its previous owner which, more often than not, creates an internal feeling of 'eugh' for a few seconds before you manage to mentally block it out and get on with the meeting. Until, of course, you catch yourself chewing it during the meeting which usually results in you regurgitating a small portion of your lunch or worse still, a small splash of projectile vomit at the thought of chewing someone else's chewed biro.
So what I'm basically saying here boils down to one or two basic facts. (1) That you should either sell your shares, if you have any, in biro manufacturers before people just stop using pens altogether, (2) That you should buy shares in Mont Blanc as quality pens are bound to increase in value the less frequently we use them, (btw why would you ever need a pen that you can punch straight through a can but which then you can still write with? what design meeting did that requirement come up in? are they looking to hire anyone?) and that, basically, we're forgetting how to write which must hold dire implications for the future of the world at large. Once we've done away with the need to sign credit card payment slips in about 10 years will our hands just wither and evolve into strange shaped keyboard compatible claws?
Anyone got a pen they can lend me? Preferably not chewed.
PS. Chris also has a post about Blog Apathy Disorder (BAD), a subject dear to my own heart of late.
So here's roughly the post I intended to write months ago. When do you ever actually use a pen these days? Signing for credit card payments? Expense claims? Receiving parcels in the post? That's pretty much it for me. The problem manifests itself in more than one form. Firstly, I can never find a pen when I need one, principally because I hardly ever need one and therefore pay scant regard for where I leave them. Also, I mostly use other people's pens when ever I need to sign my signature in shops, restaurants etc.
But this devil may care attitude to pen ownership leads to other problems, for instance I've found myself calligraphically embarrassed in traditional business meeting settings, the formal kind you wear suits to, (suits, remember those? well apart from those of us who are of a criminal disposition, most of us don't wear suits any more) the kind of meeting where you have to behave yourself, speak only when spoken to and, above all, you must take written notes whenever you're given an action, because we all know that if we are seen to be writing something down in a meeting then of course you're gonna do it, aren't you? Well in those meetings, I usually turn up with either no pen at all forcing me to beg, borrow or steal one from someone else who always greets my less than professional predicament with abject horror and disgust, or I use a half chewed, probably broken and barely held together with sellotape, bic biro, minus it's cap. If I'm really unlucky it still has it's cap, badly chewed, usually by its previous owner which, more often than not, creates an internal feeling of 'eugh' for a few seconds before you manage to mentally block it out and get on with the meeting. Until, of course, you catch yourself chewing it during the meeting which usually results in you regurgitating a small portion of your lunch or worse still, a small splash of projectile vomit at the thought of chewing someone else's chewed biro.
So what I'm basically saying here boils down to one or two basic facts. (1) That you should either sell your shares, if you have any, in biro manufacturers before people just stop using pens altogether, (2) That you should buy shares in Mont Blanc as quality pens are bound to increase in value the less frequently we use them, (btw why would you ever need a pen that you can punch straight through a can but which then you can still write with? what design meeting did that requirement come up in? are they looking to hire anyone?) and that, basically, we're forgetting how to write which must hold dire implications for the future of the world at large. Once we've done away with the need to sign credit card payment slips in about 10 years will our hands just wither and evolve into strange shaped keyboard compatible claws?
Anyone got a pen they can lend me? Preferably not chewed.
PS. Chris also has a post about Blog Apathy Disorder (BAD), a subject dear to my own heart of late.