There’s a story of tight-knit community under threat. There’s a love story of a kind rarely portrayed in fiction these days – one deeply mundane, pragmatic, pedestrian, and also deeply tragic, transformative and profound. There’s a Bildungsroman element, a gangster story element, a mystery, a religious element, and even time devoted to plants. There are many stories of friendships, many of them unlikely, and a few stories of rivalries, some of them rivalries to death. There’s a particular story of friendship, through hardship, alcohol, cheese and furnaces, that is alone worth the read. There’s a budding romance between two star-crossed and not young lovers. There are heart breaking moments, and there are laugh out loud funny ones (the funny ones outnumber the heartaches, I promise). There’s a cop story, a feisty grandma story, a story of racial struggle, and a story of medieval religious art.
Read this book. It’s a delight, it’s full of heart and surprises, and it’s one of the most original works of fiction that you’ll get to read. Wonderfully well written, jumping with life, and a joy to experience.
I’m a week away from getting back to a 10k long run, and the running weather has been pretty perfect so far. I ran a 30 minute hilly recovery run today and for the first time ever I ran it without headphones. I normally run with earbuds and listen to podcasts or music, except during races where I leave my earbuds at home for safety reasons (and to get the full race experience). It was relatively early and the trail I was running through was deserted, so it was quite the experience listening just to birds and the sound of my feet and my breath. This is definitely something that I plan on adding to my running routine.
Reading
I’m two thirds into “The New York Trilogy” by Paul Auster and I’m dreading starting the 3rd and final story. The writing is excellent, but it’s like reading through version after version of Bartleby the Scrivener – not something that you particularly want to do. I’ve come so far that I will finish the book at this point, but after reading several Auster books it’s clear to me that while he’s a very good writer, his books are not for me.
Meanwhile I’ve started on “The Comfort Crisis” by Michael Easter, and though it is clear that it suffers from many of the same problems that books of this kind suffer from (cherry picking or hand waving “research” over complex and nuanced topics), there are some interesting ideas within.
Fountain Pens
I’ve decided to sketch more with my Inkvent ink filled fountain pens to try and run them dry more quickly, so here’s a motorcycle sketch done with a Levenger True Writer Cappuccino with a fine nib and Diamine Nutmeg.
It’s the beginning of January, and usually at this point people’s resolutions are starting to unravel. For years I used to do yearlygoals but over 2024 I moved to using a 13 week year, or quarterly planning model. It affords me more flexibility and seasonality in my planning, and it’s a good, low stakes way to start long term planning and goal setting if you’ve never done it before.
There are those that say that you should go on a retreat to plan your year or quarter, and I’m sure that’s nice if you can afford to do it but unfortunately I can’t. What I do instead is take some time in the weekend before the end of a quarter to plan the next quarter, and this is the process I go through, step-by-step.
How I Plan A Quarter
I start my planning on a piece of scrap paper, sitting with my calendar, and start mapping out what big block of “stuff” I have next quarter. In particular I take Travel into account at this point. If I have a trip planned, then it means that I will have less time for non-trip related stuff this quarter, and I need to realize that I have less than 13 weeks to work on the rest of my goals. So if I have a week long trip, I calculate that I have only 11 weeks to work on the rest of my stuff. Why 11 and not 12? Because there’s time that will go to trip related stuff before and after I return, and it takes time after a trip to get back into routine.
Once that’s done and I realize how much actual time I have to achieve any goals, I divide my plan into Large Categories.These are areas I want to work on throughout the next quarter, and they generally stay the same from quarter to quarter.
Working Within Categories
The different categories I work on are the backbone of my plan, the basis of the quarter which I flesh out with detail during my planning session. For me these currently are (not in order of importance): Health and Fitness, Reading, Conversations, Mental Health, Creative Projects, Productivity, Professional Development, Blog, Decluttering, Money.
Page 1 of my Q1 2025 plan
I set individual goals for each category, all of them measurable, and this is the plan that I reference at least once a week, usually two or three times.
Wherever possible I set up the Streaks App and/or a tracker for the goals in my weekly plan. This makes sure that 60-70% of my goals are set on “auto pilot” and are included in every weekly and daily plan. I address the rest of my goals either when I plan my week, or not at all.
Wait, what?
Page 2 of my Q1 2025 plan
I deliberately include goals that I know that I will have to stretch or significantly stretch to get to every quarter. Why? Because I view these goals not just as a plan, but as a call to action, a bit of a challenge. A good quarter is one where I got to 80% of my goals. I great quarter is one where I got to 90% of my goals, and if I ever get to 100% of my goals, then I’ve likely not been ambitious or creative enough when setting them.
Page 3 of my Q1 2025 plan.
Life tends to throw us curveballs, and so I leave wiggle room in my plan (there are goals that I mark ahead of time as less important, and entire categories that I’m willing to neglect if things get to that), and room to recreate the plan from scratch if the need arises. The plan works for me, it’s a tool that I use, it’s not something that I have to tie myself in knots over. I refuse to beat myself up for missing a goal, because if I missed a goal it just means that:
It was poorly planned.
Circumstances/context significantly changed (a war broke out, a pandemic broke out, a family member or I got non-trivially sick, I got injured, etc).
It was a “stretch goal”.
In this case I expect myself to rethink my goals and what I want to achieve, and replan them.
A bit about my current categories and how I planned out each one:
Health and Fitness – the most “auto pilot” of my planning categories and absolutely non-negotiable. I’ve been working with largely the same goals in this category for months and sometimes years, so this is the quickest and easiest category for me to plan. It’s also one where I have the most trackers set up for: there’s a tracker for my running, swimming, gym workouts, NTC workouts and food logging. I use various health and fitness apps that track these, and the Streaks app to make sure that I work on this category daily. As a cancer patient in remission, I am not messing around with my health or my exercise routine. It’s also a must for my mental health, even though that’s tracked in a different category. If possible I try to have a road race to train for each quarter, though usually I only have 2-3 races a year, and last year I only had one. The food logging is something I do to make sure that I’m getting the fibre, protein, calcium and other nutrients I need, and keeping my saturated fat and sodium intakes relatively low.
Reading – pretty self explanatory, this category has been with me for years. I try to read between 2-4 books a month, and this reflects this.
Conversations – this category is all about having real conversations with people – not just liking their posts and messaging them. I set a goal of meeting certain people face to face for coffee, a meal or any sort of outing, and another for talking with friends that are abroad on zoom. Beyond this I have weekly recurring goals of calling people – usually between 1-3 friends a week. Yes, you need to schedule and track this. You’re busy, it’s easier and less risky to message people and so we stop calling them or meeting up with them, and we trick ourselves into thinking that these messages are the same as having a real conversation with these people. It’s not the same. It’s worth investing time and effort into this, I promise. Even if you have social anxiety, even if you’re very busy. I’m going for a minimum of six 1:1 get togethers with friends, and 3 zoom calls (though I’ll likely get 5-6 zoom calls in).
Mental Health – most of this category is automatically tracked in the Streaks app and is part of my daily plan and daily routine. I suffer from cancer related PTSD so I don’t neglect this stuff. If I do the panic attacks return and I physically dread them, so this, like the Health and Fitness category, is a non-negotiable category. It always happens. What goes in here? Journaling, daily gratitude (goes in my journal), meditation, and other things that I may write about later in a separate post.
Creative Projects – this is a fun category, and it’s here to remind myself to enjoy my life. It included sketching goals, Lego building goals, photography goals, etc. I try to get at least half the things in this category done.
Productivity – this is here mostly as a reminder to plan every day, plan my week, and perform a shutdown routine on workdays so I don’t think about work when I’m not at work.
Personal Development – these are professional personal goals, usually tied to learning new skills or obtaining a certain certification.
Blog – I used to track this as part of my creative projects, but as I ended up neglecting this blog for a month or two last year, I separated this to its own category so that I can give it more focus. This is tied to a weekly tracker and just tracks the amount of posts I publish a week.
Decluttering – lists things that I want to get out of my house over the next quarter. Simple enough.
Money – this is a list of money related things that I want to take care of – pension and investment reviews and plans, saving up money for certain goals, reducing certain bills, etc. This is a useful category because if you’re anything like me then this is something that you dread and will put off unless you force yourself to be really on it.
Since I’ve been working with most of these categories for a long time and since many of them are repeatable, much of my planning is just reviewing and copying over last quarter’s plan. The rest of the plan is things that I put a bit of effort into researching before I commit to, sometimes drafting them a few times before settling on my final quarterly goals.
I hope this inspires you to create your own quarterly plan. Let me know if it does and if there’s anything else you want to know about my planning setup.
It’s the beginning of 2025, so it’s time to go over my full planner setup for both work and home. None of this setup is truly new, as I’ve used much of it during part or all of 2024, but there are a few tweaks and minor adjustments that I’ll highlight. As I use a 13 week year (or a quarter) in my planner, I started Q1 of 2025 on the 29th of December and not the 1st of January.
The heart of the system is my weekly planner. I started a new one in 2025, and after some deliberation I decided to splurge on a Leuchtturm1917 Bullet Journal and not just the 120gsm edition because I like the endpapers and it was only a few dollars more.
The setup of this planner is divided into two parts:
Lists
I crossed out all the bullet journal related headers and created list pages of my own from page 3 to (potentially) page 75. Currently they include: Unread Books on My Kindle, Mindful Consuming (a list of things that I actually want to watch, not algorithmically recommended), Conversations not Connections (A list of people that I want to invest time in, not just like their Facebook posts. This makes sure that I don’t fall out of touch with people, but actively initiate phone calls, meetups or skype/zoom calls for those that are abroad), List of Courses that I’ve Enrolled To (I started this list during Covid, and it tracks which online courses I’ve enrolled to and need to complete), Things from Abroad (a running list of packages that I’m expecting. Yes, I know there are apps for this, but writing it down helps me be more aware and careful with what I’m buying and how much), Blog Post Ideas (self explanatory), Books to Review (self explanatory), Medium Post Planning (as part of my focus on work, I decided to make my work more visible by writing more Medium posts this year). I will be adding to these lists over the next year, and copying them over to the next notebook once I finish with this one.
Quarterly and Weekly Planning
Starting at page 76, this section will include four quarterly plans and four 13 week double spreads. Each quarterly plan can take up to four pages (Q1’s plan takes 2.5 out of the 4 currently, but that’s OK. The extra is in case something major happens and I need to work out a pivot or significant change into my plans), and is divided into various subsections. I’ll write a separate post about my Q1 plan and how I worked on it, but you can read about the process here.
Then come 13 weekly spreads, each one taking two pages. The left side of the page has the weekly calendar, with events on it plus my exercise plan for the week. It’s also where I note things that I want to remember that need to happen on a certain day that week. Every week on Friday or Saturday evening I plan the next week, and for this side of the weekly plan I mark significant weather events, plan my running, swimming and gym schedule, transfer important events and meetings from my calendar (these are all things that I need to prepare for actively), and set reminders (like clean the cats’ water fountain on Friday, or replace filters on things, etc).
The left side of the page is taken mostly by various trackers, and by my weekly goals (they go in the empty spot in the middle) which I select from my quarterly goals each week. Any goals that can be managed by trackers are managed by trackers – either trackers in my planner, or trackers in the Streaks app. The reason I don’t track everything in an app, is to make sure that I have to reference this planner at least once, likely twice a day, every day. That helps keep the weekly goals, which are tied to the quarterly goals, top-of-mind.
I use two different colours of ink for these pages – when I plan the quarter I create 13 weekly spreads with just the dates and the “Weekly Tasks” title with the week number. Then I work everything else in on a week by week basis with whatever fountain pen I am using at the time. That helps keep things clearer for me without me having to spend a lot of time “prettifying” my planner.
Weekly page in my home planner
Daily Plan
Every day I take a sheet of A5 Kokuyo KB paper and write the day and the date on top. Then I write a running list of tasks that I want to complete that day. This includes chores, daily routines, and tasks that I’ve pulled from my weekly planner. I cross them off as I go along, and at the end of the day either I flip the page and create another daily planner for the next day on the other side of the page, or I crumple the page up (if it’s used on both sides) and throw it into the recycling bin. I don’t keep these pages, since anything important in them is already in my journal.
I recently started tracking if I prepare a daily plan for every day at work and at home, and the reason is that I’ve discovered time and again that if I don’t have a plan, I am liable to just get back from work and veg out with a book or silly YouTube videos.
Monthly Plan
The monthly planner is tiny, and its only goal is to give me a better feel for how my month looks, and what major events lay ahead. It also tracks some things – books (which I track on a monthly basis), running (I track this twice because I also want to get a feel for my monthly load), swimming (the same – tracked on both weekly and monthly basis to get a better feel for my training load), gym (which doesn’t appear in the photo below because I haven’t finished creating the page), blog (how many blog posts I’ve written this month), and there’s usually an Apple challenge tracker.
Monthly planner
What About Projects/Backlog Items?
Most of my long term projects are tracked as part of the quarterly plan. For instance, I’m working on getting a certain professional certification this quarter, so I have that certification listed under my professional goals. The breakdown of this headline to individual tasks is something I do in the project specific notebook that I’m using for my study notes, tips that I’ve collected about the exam, etc. I then can just reference the headline task (the certification name in this case) in my weekly and daily plans, and reference what exactly I’m supposed to be working on next in my project notebook. It saves having to copy a lot of things over and over.
As for general “backlog” items (shopping lists, packing lists, travel plans, things I want to get to sometime in the future but aren’t part of my quarterly plan, recurring tasks tied to various medical checkups, etc) – these are all managed in the Things app. It’s easier to manage recurring and long term tasks like these in an app, and when it comes time to actually do them I reference them (or sometimes copy them) into my weekly and daily plans. I have very few tasks in Things, and sweep of the tasks there once or twice a week is enough to ensure that I haven’t forgotten anything.
Work Planner Setup
This consists of a Leuchtturm1917 dotted A5 hardcover notebook that I bought at the local art museum, and Maruman Mnemosyne A5 with blank paper (though I also use the squared paper Mnemosyne indiscriminately, if that happens to be what’s available). As I work 3 days a week from an office and 2 days a week from home I needed a setup that’s as simple and as light to carry as possible, and after some trial and error this is what I’ve been using for over a year.
My work planner and a piece of blotting paper – a must with this paper
The work planner, my Leuchtturm, is a daily planner, with each day divided into three parts. The top of the page has the day and the date, and the upper third part of every page is for the tasks I plan on working on that day. I deliberately make sure that less than half of the A5 page is left for tasks, because otherwise I’ll just jam in much more than I can do in a day and then feel bad at the end of the day for no good reason.
The last thing I do before signing out at work is to fill in the next day’s page. That includes pulling out the next tasks I plan on working on from Jira (we use Jira to plan tasks and projects at work), and leaving about half of the task area open for things that will pop up during the day. The nature of my job is that I’m constantly working on about 50% unplanned things, so I have to leave myself enough room to take that into account.
Next come the meetings, which I track under a separate heading. I set them apart so that they don’t disappear into my ever changing task list. This is also useful for me to reference when I’m planning my day, both in terms of how many tasks I think I can get to, and in terms of preparing for certain meetings.
The Notes section is where I write down things that I need to take into account or remember that day. If a team member is taking a day off I note it here to remind myself not to message them. If I am on “on call” duty I note it here so that I can significantly reduce the number of tasks I’m working on that day. I also look ahead a bit, and if I see a project deadline looming, I’ll note it in the notes section, so that I remember to prioritize my tasks accordingly.
Daily spread in my work planner
The Mnemosyne serves as my “dashboard” and catch all. If I’m working on a project, this is where I’ll plan out the project before inputting whatever relevant tasks there are into Jira. I reference and work with this page while I’m working on the project, and that’s why I view this notebook as the “dashboard” for my current work.
The Mnemosyne is also where I keep a running list of things I want to get to. All of these things will have to be formalized into Jira tasks before I can work on them, but it’s useful for me to have them down on paper first because I think better on paper.
Maruman Mnemosyne “Dashboard”
I don’t use scrap paper at work as I want to be able to reference these things in the future, and as a rule I don’t journal about my work tasks.
That’s my full planner setup for 2025, and as all of it has been in use throughout 2024 with great success I doubt that it will see much change.
This week and next week are pretty busy, so this update will be short and in bullet points:
I wrote three Inkvent fountain pens dry, leaving me with 17 (!) pens to go. I’m prioritizing the pens based on how damaging the ink can potentially be, so I’ve written the Star Bright inks dry (Chilly Nights and Noble Fir) and I’m working my way through the shimmer inks and chameleon inks next.
I spent a few minutes every day for the past 2-3 days unsubscribing from various email lists, store newsletters and SMS message lists. The joy of a less cluttered inbox and less noise on my phone is fantastic, and it took less time and effort than I thought.
I’m still reviewing 2024. It’s going to take a while because I have such a busy start of the year.
Goodreads have really started to gamify and commercialize their site more, and so I’m using it less. I know there are alternatives out there but I just don’t have time to actively seek them out at the moment – let me know in the comments if you have any recommendations.
I don’t do resolutions (or yearly themes, etc. I do quarterly plans with quantifiable goals), but my stationery goals for 2025 are to buy nothing (or as close to nothing as possible) and to use what I have instead. I have too much stuff and it’s time I used it.
I checked out the Tournament of Booksshortlist and decided yet again not to participate. A few years ago the list had interesting and exciting contemporary fiction, but now there are only a slack handful of shortlisted books that seem worth reading, and I’ve heard of many of them from other places already. It’s a bit of a shame as I had a lot of fun following along when I did.
This is the time of year when people set resolutions, themes, goals, intentions, words of the year, etc. Ambitions are high, intentions are good, but well before March most of these efforts will be abandoned and forgotten. I’ll be writing about my quarterly plan and my 2025 planner later on, but for now here are three habits that worth keeping in 2025 and in general, and a few tips on how to get into them and persist:
Exercise
Any amount and any kind that you can do is excellent. Let’s repeat that: ANY amount of exercise and ANY kind of exercise is a tremendous win. Start with walking if nothing else speaks to you, but try to make sure it’s a brisk walk and not a shuffle if you can. It doesn’t need to take an hour, and it doesn’t need to be 10,000 steps. Remember, anything you can do is good. Local gyms and community centres usually have classes you can try out if you want to give yoga, pilates, kickboxing or jiujitsu a try.
Running offers the best “bang for your buck” in terms of time and money invested per health and fitness gains, but not everyone can run, and not everyone enjoys running. If you want to give running a start, I recommend using any “couch to 5k” app, and then transitioning to the excellent guided runs and training plans in the free NRC app to keep you going. If you need someone to keep you accountable, either join a group of some sort or find a friend or family member to work out with.
The NTC app offers a huge variety of training options – from yoga to full equipment gym workouts, with some excellent body-weight workouts in between. Swimming is a great low impact way to build up cardio and a bit of strength, and weight-lifting isn’t as intimidating as you think – a pair of dumbbells at home is a great way to start exploring it. Yoga with Adriene is great way to get into yoga if you don’t or can’t take a class and the NTC app seems too intimidating.
Soccer, basketball, baseball and other group sports are great ways to expand your social circle, and tennis, pickleball, badminton are great ways for couples to work out together.
The easiest way of getting into the habit is doing a little something every day, and doing it as soon after you wake up as possible. That way you start the day with a win and some endorphins, which is always a nice way to start your day.
If you think you don’t have time to work out, be honest with yourself and track your time for a day or two. How much time is spent on social media? Binge watching TV? Mindless scrolling? Could you cut some of that out? Could you go to sleep a little earlier and wake up a little earlier so you can have some alone time to exercise and clear your mind?
If you already have a solid exercise routine in place, take the time to diversify it if you can. This goes particularly to us runners: strength train. Swim. Cycle. Do things that aren’t just running, because just running is one of the main causes of such relatively high injury rates amongst runners compared to other athletes.
Reading
Most people don’t read, which is their loss because reading is a superpower. Train your brain off the social media dopamine hamster wheel and teach it how to focus for significant stretches of time by picking up a reading habit. You’re standing in line bored? Open your Kindle app and pick up that detective novel or space opera from where you left off. Replace TikTok, social media and YouTube with books, and make sure that they’re books that you want to read. Don’t go off bestseller lists or influencer recommendations or whatever one this or that award, or is considered a classic. When you’re getting back into reading you need to gradually train your mind to get used to this activity. Start with a book that really interests you (not one that’s impressive), and start with a physical copy because they’re easier to read. Reading will do to your brain what exercise does for all of your body: make you better, stronger, faster, healthier and happier.
If you’re already a reader, then mix things up a bit: if you only read non-fiction, read fiction for a change and vice versa. Try something new, because you may just end up liking it. If you’ve only done light reading so far, pick a challenging book and work your way through it. Treat your brain like a muscle you are training, where you gradually progress to bigger and bigger weights. Challenging books are often the most rewarding, but you probably should start with them.
Journaling
Digital or analog, it doesn’t matter, journaling is worth doing. Gain insight to yourself, unleash your creativity, and let loose to your thoughts in a safe environment. This is the path to self improvement, learning to be kind to yourself, and having a positive mental attitude towards life.
If you’ve never journaled before, start small and simple: pick a notebook that you will enjoy writing in (whatever speaks to you, no matter what other people think), use whatever pen or pencil you fancy, and write 3-5 things you are grateful for each day. Add more sections to your daily journal as you go along: a “story of the day”, an account of what you did or what you consumed and what you thought about it, a nightly summary, etc.
Make it a ritual of sorts: write in your journal every morning and evening, every time you switch between major tasks during the day, or when you feel the need to respond to something (don’t post online, post in your journal instead).
Don’t be intimidated by gorgeous and elaborate works of art in various journaling forums, blogs and on Instagram. These are journals as craft projects, and while they are nice, they aren’t what we’re trying to get to here. It’s OK to add stickers and bits and bobs to your journal, but its purpose shouldn’t be to be photographed and posted. It’s there to work for you, so treat it like a workhorse, not a circus pony. Also, remind yourself that many of these journal photos are there to sell: stickers, washi tape, pens, notebooks, ink, the poster’s journaling course, etc. People rarely show off their “real” journals because if you’re honestly journaling only for yourself, that’s just not something that you’ll want to share.
This book won the Booker award, the 2024 Booker award, and for the life of me I don’t know why.
Though the book’s subtitle is “a novel”, at 137 pages Orbital is basically a novella. Mostly it’s a book about nothing, involving six people that you are guaranteed to not care much about, set in the International Space Station. Garnish the whole thing with a mountain of purple prose, and that’s Orbital for you.
Could Harvey have come up with a more interesting premise involving the International Space Station (ISS)? Of course she could. What if Orbital would have been set during the pandemic, with astronauts basically stranded up there, worried about their families and friends, worried about their resupply or how to get back home (see also the eight day space mission that will last for nine months). What if one of the astronauts that was meant to return from orbit refused to return? (It happened in the past). There’s no end to the interesting dramatic situations that being in orbit in the ISS offers. Harvey will have none of that.
The astronauts themselves are a dull lot, that you learn very little about. There’s a religious guy with a postcard that’s supposed to be profound but isn’t; there’s an Italian guy that went scuba diving on his honey moon; there’s a Japanese woman who’s mother dies of old age (spoiler: that’s the drama in the novel); there’s a woman that’s possibly Irish, possibly British that has a peculiar non-relationship with her husband, but don’t worry we don’t get to explore that. And there are two Russian guys. That’s the extent of the characters in Orbital, and that’s how well you get to know them or care about them.
The novella takes place during 16 orbits of the ISS around earth, and there’s a giant typhoon that takes place during a few of these orbits. There’s a weird “white saviour” bit, but without the “saviour” part of it with the Italian astronaut and a poor fisherman’s family that he met during his honeymoon and we’re to believe they kept in close touch with for years until the story takes place. Don’t worry – Harvey doesn’t want drama anywhere near her work, so there is none even at this point.
What there is a lot of is self-involved, bloated purple prose about the beauty and fragility of our planet, space and humanity. None of it is earned, none of it is attached to the narrative, all of it could have been cut out – but then there would be no Orbital.
I rarely review books that I dislike, and I should have given up on Orbital a quarter of the way through, like I originally wanted, but I didn’t. So let this be a warning to you: not all Booker award winners are worth reading.
I’m finally done with reviewing the Diamine Inkvent 2024 Black Edition calendar and it’s been exhausting. I haven’t been able to get a proper buffer for the even this year, which meant that I was chasing every post every day.
On the plus side, it was nice to dust off 25 bears and sketch them. My sketching and my blogging had been in a rut recently and this event kickstarted them, so I am grateful for that. I also got some lovely comments from people, which is always wonderful to read.
Wild sunset today
Cal Newport
The latest episode of Cal Newport’s Deep Questions podcast was excellent, and in the final segment Cal discussed his new approach to making a quarterly plan. It’s worth listening to, but basically his idea of pillars and foundations and focusing on a certain pillar at a time really resonated with me. My next quarter will be focused on craft as a pillar, as I want to earn a professional certification and work towards a deeper understanding and more hands on experience with certain more obscure aspects of my job.
Reading
I finished reading the HBR “Dealing with Difficult People” book, and started reading Paul Auster’s “The New York Trilogy”. So far it’s a very Paul Auster book, for good and for bad.
Impressionism
I went to see an Impressionist exhibition, celebrating 150 years to the movement, at the local art museum. The exhibition itself was nice enough, but a bit thin in terms of the artwork on display. There was also a nice print exhibition, and an excellent retrospective exhibition dedicated to Moi Ver. It was wonderful seeing a master photographer at work, and his design work is also worth seeing.
Ci-Contre Moi VerCi-Contre Moi Ver
I went to the museum store later and went a little wild, purchasing a handmade ceramic cup made by a local artist, three postcards (which I wrote on and will give away), and a Leuchtturm1917 A5 dotted notebook that I didn’t need but I wanted anyway. I bought a Leuchtturm notebook the last time I was in that store, and it’s now my work daily driver notebook, so I assume I’ll find use for this notebook soon enough. The paper isn’t perfect, but it’s good enough for me for daily fountain pen use.
For the introduction post to 2024’s Inkvent, see this post.
Diamine Inkvent 2024 Black Edition is the fifth edition of their Inkvent calendars, and I’m sorry to say that it’s by far the worst. Partly it’s 2023’s Inkvent Purple Edition’s fault, as it’s the strongest of the Inkvent calendars to date and so it created high expectations for the Black Edition. But there were several things that went wrong with this year’s calendar that made it an overall disappointing experience:
There are four previous Inkvent calendars, and there’s only so many ink shades in the world. The black edition featured a lot of inks that were pretty similar to ones seen in earlier Inkvent calendars.
This year’s “special effect” was “Extreme Sheen” and it just doesn’t have the same impact as effects like Chameleon and Star Bright that we saw in previous calendars.
The “Extreme Sheen” effect didn’t improve all the inks it was applied to.
Almost a third of the inks in this calendar were in the “dark and bland” range: grey, brown, black. There’s only so much joy a brown ink can spark.
There were very few bright inks and not all the bright were great (see Lemon & Lime and Fruit Cocktail discussed below).
A good number of the inks had very little festive appeal. This wouldn’t have been a big deal if Diamine hadn’t set the festive bar so high: they deliberately name their inks for festive or wintery things. Previous Inkvent calendars did much better in this regard (the first ones, the Blue Edition and Red Edition took this a bit too far), so it’s hard not to be disappointed in the Black Edition’s performance on this front.
Here’s all this year’s inks in order (read further on for a breakdown of each group and buying recommendations):
All the 2024 Inkvent Col-O-Ring ink swabs
Blues
There were six blue inks in this year’s Inkvent:
Two shimmer inks, Diamine Baltic Breeze and Diamine Icy Lilac. These are nice inks that are very similar to one another and similar to previous blue shimmer inks from past Inkvents. These go into the “nice but not exciting” category, and score decently on festive appeal.
Two “Extreme Sheen” inks, Diamine Vibe and Diamine Cosmic Glow. These feature the new effect for this year’s Inkvent and feature it well. Overall these are two of the strongest inks in this year’s calendar in terms of “wow” effect, even though they’re not exactly holiday themed.
One chameleon ink, Diamine Snow Globe. The chameleon effect is always nice and interesting, but the base blue ink is nothing new, and it also goes into the “nice by not exciting” category.
One Star Bright ink, one of only two Star Bright inks in the calendar, Diamine Chilly Nights. The fact that there are only two Star Bright inks in this calendar contributed to this year’s Inkvent being so underwhelming. There is no greater wow effect than a Star Bright ink on a dark ink, and Diamine Chilly Nights really delivers on that front. The base blue black is very nice, and if you enjoy using shimmer inks then Diamine Chilly Nights is definitely an ink to consider.
All in all the blues in this year’s Inkvent were the strongest overall group by far.
All the blue Inkvent Col-O-Ring ink swabs
Pinks and Reds
There were five pink and red inks in this year’s Inkvent:
Three standard inks, Diamine Wilted Rose, Diamine Cranberry and Diamine Lullaby. Diamine Wilted Rose is a nice and interesting “antique” rose colour, Cranberry is a decent but not overly unique ink, and Diamine Lullaby is on the “barely readable” spectrum. Of these three the standout ink is Diamine Wilted Rose, and it’s not a “star” ink by any measure.
One scented ink, Diamine Forest Gateau. I loath scented inks so I won’t elaborate on this one.
One chameleon ink, Diamine Winterberry. This is the standout ink in this group, one of the few bright and festive inks in this calendar, and a great ink to buy if you’re looking for a “Christmas greeting cards” ink. A breath of fresh air among the washed out and dark colours of this year’s calendar.
All the red and pink Inkvent Col-O-Ring ink swabs
Greens
There were only four greens in this year’s Inkvent:
Three chameleon inks, Diamine Lemon & Lime, Diamine Mint Twist and Diamine Pine Needle. Lemon & Lime is unusable even in a wide and generous nib as it’s way too bright and light to be readable. Diamine Mint Twist is the standout ink in this group, the one with the most unique base ink colour. Pine Needle is nice enough, but there have been plenty of inks in this colour before.
One “Star Bright” ink, the only other one in the calendar, Diamine Noble Fir. It’s not as impressive as Diamine Chilly Nights because the base ink colour isn’t dark enough for the Star Bright effect to have the most impact. It’s a good, bright green ink though.
All the green Inkvent Col-O-Ring ink swabs
Oranges
There are three oranges in this year’s Inkvent:
Two “Extreme Sheen” inks, Diamine Grotto and Diamine Sleigh Ride. Of the two Diamine Grotto is a great ink, and Sleigh Ride is poorly named and features a rather unattractive combination of an orange base and green-brown sheen. If you like rust effects you might enjoy it, otherwise, Diamine Grotto is the better choice.
One scented ink, Diamine Fruit Cocktail. I think that this is the worst ink in this year’s calendar for having a combination of scent and zero shading.
All the orange Inkvent Col-O-Ring ink swabs
Darks – Greys, Browns, Blacks
There were seven (!) inks in this category in this year’s Inkvent:
Three standard inks, Diamine Marley, Diamine Tundra, and Diamine Potpourri. Of the three Diamine Marley is by far the best, with Diamine Potpourri being too light to be readable (I could have placed this ink in the pinks category, but it’s so greyish and washed out that it felt more in place in this category), and Diamine Tundra being greyish brown, if you’re into that shade.
Two shimmer inks, Diamine Nutmeg and Diamine Salted Caramel. Of the two I prefer Diamine Salted Caramel, though there have been similar enough inks in previous Inkvents for you to feel free to skip this one.
One chameleon ink, Diamine Wishing Tree. The strongest ink in this group and one of the best inks of this year’s Inkvent, Wishing Tree has a great combination of a fantastic base ink colour and a lot of added interest from the chameleon effect.
One “Extreme Sheen” ink that was supposed to be the highlight of this calendar, Diamine Good Tidings. I found it far from “extreme sheening” and the sheen effect was a very unattractive dirty yellow.
All the dark Inkvent Col-O-Ring ink swabs
Summary
So these are the inks that I would consider buying from this year’s calendar (with the addition of Diamine Winterberry if you see yourself needing a festive red ink): Diamine Marley (interesting duo-chrome ink), Diamine Wishing Tree (duo-chrome interesting base shade ink with great chameleon effect), Diamine Grotto (great base orange ink with attractive extreme sheen), Diamine Mint Twist (unique green with a chameleon effect), Diamine Vibe (attractive dark turquoise ink with great extreme sheen), and Diamine Cosmic Glow (great royal blue base ink and wild extreme sheen).
All the inks that I would consider buying Inkvent Col-O-Ring ink swabs
As a reminder, this year’s Inkvent wasn’t sold out, which means that if you’re interested in these inks and haven’t yet gotten the calendar you can expect it to be on sale in various places soon enough. It’s a great way to get a good amount of varied ink samples, and each little bottle is good for at least 2-3 fillings (plus there’s a big 30ml bottle in day 25).
Midyear, at around June or July, Diamine will come out with the “Black Edition” of these inks. These are 50ml editions of the Inkvent 2024 Black Edition inks, in gorgeous glass bottles. They make for great gifts, and are worth getting as they’re very well priced for the “premium ink” experience.
I have 20 fountain pens filled with Inkvent inks in rotation at the moment, and it will take me a while to work my way through them. Will I do Inkvent again next year? I don’t know. The price plus shipping has gotten steeper every year, and this year’s calendar was a pretty big disappointment in my opinion. When pre-orders start for next year’s Inkvent (if there will be one), I’ll have to really consider it.
What are your favourite inks from this year’s Inkvent? What did you think of the Inkvent Black Edition?
Day 25’s ink is a full 30ml bottle of Diamine Good Tidings, a black ink with what is meant to be gold Extreme Sheen. I used an Esterbrook Estie with a Journal nib to test this ink out.
Col-O-Ring swab
I don’t think that I could be more disappointed in a “grand finale” Inkvent ink. Diamine Good Tidings would obviously need to be black because this is the Black Edition of the Inkvent calendar, but the choice to make it an “Extreme Sheen” ink was a poor one. I understand the logic behind this choice (“Extreme Sheen” is a new ink property for this year’s calendar, so of course the ultimate ink of the year needs to have this property), but the result is very underwhelming. The sheen is barely observable, and the result is just a deep black ink.
Different angle of Col-O-Ring swab
Even on original Tomoe River Paper you can barely see the sheen, and when it appears it makes Good Tidings a less attractive ink to behold, not a more attractive one. The choice of silver shimmer or a chameleon effect would have been better for this ink. When the sheen does appear it’s a sickly yellow colour, not the gold that Diamine were likely going for.
Writing sample on original Tomoe River paper
On Rhodia paper Good Tidings simply looks like a very saturated black ink, with no visible sheen. The drying times aren’t great, but if you’re looking for a solid black fountain pen ink Diamine Good Tidings is pretty good.
Writing sample on Rhodia paper
On Midori MD Cotton paper the sheen becomes more visible, but it’s far from what I would term “extreme sheen” and it mostly fades to the background. You can barely see hints of it in the writing in today’s bear sketch:
Bear sketch on Midori MD Cotton paper
Only at a sharp angle and close up you can see the yellowish gold where the ink pooled, such as in the eyes. The nib I used lays down a generous amount of ink, so I would have expected to see more of the sheen than actually appeared here:
Close up of the sketch on Midori MD Cotton paper
The final bear for this year is Tossi, designed by Margarete Nedballa, numbered 115 out of 399 and made by Clemens Bear (so he’s a German bear). I don’t normally like clothed bears, but I liked this fellow’s hat and the way that it matched his unusual nose, which is why I got him. He’s from a store in York called “Christmas Angels” which was wonderful and is now closed (it didn’t survive the pandemic). It was dedicated to Christmas toys and decorations all year round, and had a collectors’ teddy bear room on the top floor.
The bear
Diamine Good Tidings is a nice black ink that I will likely use quite a bit, but for the crowning glory of this year’s Inkvent it’s a bit of a disappointment. I was expecting something with more pizzazz, more of a wow effect.
That’s it for this year’s Inkvent. I will be posting a summary post with buying recommendations and an overview of all the inks over the weekend. In the meanwhile have a Merry Christmas, a Happy Hanukah, and peaceful holidays.
Writing at Large 