Geneva

Paris lacks a lake.

A Limerick

A Chief Justice in theory and practice
Is compelled to decide what the facts is
But when weighing a mandate
The thoughts tend to migrate
to notions of just what a tax is.

My Quiet Little Neighborhood

Although I live in the heart of the city, I have the luck to live a small enclave--a tiny village-like quarter--where the noise and bustle of the city are strangely absent.
How quiet is my neighbourhood? Saturday morning, 10 AM, I was standing out on the balcony with a cup of coffee, when I hear a faint "tap-tap-tap..." Looking this way and that, I spotted a young woman 3 blocks away, leaning out her window, beating on a pillow with her hand.
That's how quiet my neighbourhood is.

More Flex Pen Sketches

The brown ink (Lie de Thé) is from the Konrad; the black ink is Noodler's Black in the Ahab.

After opening up the first two channels on the ebonite feed of the Konrad, the pen is now über wet, which is a good thing with J. Herbin's Lie de Thé, which I find rather dry. I won't touch the feed on the Ahab, at least for now as the flow is just fine with Noodler's Black.
I've been slowly developing a loose round-hand script with these flex nibs—not a true copperplate script since it's too formal for everyday writing and anyway I tend to want to write far too fast for that—but something with a little style yet legible. It's getting there...

I finished the page from the previous post, en plein air. It was a beautiful, sunny May afternoon, so out to the park strode I, with the miniature W&N watercolor set, a water brush and the Ahab in hand. In the end it was just far too green out there; I was ineluctably overwhelmed by green. But over in one corner, I found a grizzled old tree and sketched the trunk then laid down a few washes over the waterproof ink. Apparently the caretakers had begun cutting off the upper trunk at some point, but I imagine someone came up and asked "What the hell you doin'?"

Noodler's flex pens

I just received the two flex nibbed fountain pens I ordered from Goulet Pens, and have been writing & sketching with them for the past few days.

Overall, I like them both--a Konrad in red tortoise and an Ahab clear demonstrator--although I expected them to be wetter and more easily flexed (they both require quite a bit of pressure to get the kind of line variation I was looking for). I still need to find the best nib/feed adjustment for my styles of writing & drawing, but for a couple of $20 pens, they're alright.

Also in the order was a bottle of Noodler's bulletproof black ink, which, as promised, can take watercolour without bleeding, and this is perfect. I should note that the Noodler's ink, which I purchased with drawing in mind, is also very pleasant to write with. It's smoother in theses pens than the Pelikan 4001 and the J. Herbin Lie de Thé which I'm using almost exclusively in the Konrad now. The J. Herbin ink shades nicely with the flex nib and because it goes down more heavily, is about two shades darker than when used in the Pelikan 120 medium italic. It is a bit too dry to really call it a perfect match however. You can bet I'll be fiddling with the feed and nib positions to try and find that elusive sweet spot.

Pages and pages of scribbling as I try to learn how to write legibly with the flex nibs.

Inking the Ahab fountain pen with Noodler's Bulletproof Black Ink.
Now I can sketch  on-the-go in my Moleskine watercolor  notebook
and lay down some washes without bleeding. (unless I want to:
the guy and dog sketches on the right were started using Pelikan 4001
black Ink in a really wet Shaeffer Targa, which I let bleed a little for shading).

Chiquita!

Cold

Second week of Siberian cold in Paris, but at least with the north east wind we get bright blue skies instead of the usual dreary low grey overcast...