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Saturday, August 21, 2010

Prepare to be underwhelmed


I simply cannot pass up any new, fancy, fun, cool-colored pens. One evening, this past winter, I dumped my purse and counted the number of pens and pencils floating around in there. 87. Yes, I was carrying 87 pens and pencils on the off-chance that I just might need to write something down. I wanted to have choices. You just never know what kind of writing mood you are going to be. But, my pen habit is a topic for another time.
I am here to talk about the writing instrument that I could not live without about an hour ago at Wal-Mart. (Cue the drumroll.) The SHARPIE LIQUID PENCIL. No more breaking leads! The "liquid graphite" technology eliminates broken leads! It's smooth like a pen, but erases like a pencil. It becomes permanent in about 24 hours. Seriously. Where has this been all my life? Sometimes I just feel like writing with a mechanical pencil, and well, this looks like the Cadillac of mechanical pencils. Plus, it came with extra erasers. EXTRA ERASERS! (Great! More stuff for me to lose in the depths of my purse.)
So, I pulled it out, wrote with it and was transported back to grade school when office supply companies first came out with ERASABLE PENS. Remember those things? The ink clumped up, smeared and smudged, smelled funny, and didn't write smoothly at all. But they were erasable. How awesome was that?
I am pretty sure that the Sharpie Liquid Pencil is nothing more than the 2010 version of the erasable pen, sans funky smell. It looks cooler, that's for sure. The tip is all narrow, kind of like a mechanical pencil. But it's just not very satisfying. That "liquid graphite" doesn't write very vividly or smoothly. And you don't really need that eraser to erase. Smudging with your pinky will do the trick.
Sigh. I was hoping for it to write like a true Sharpie. Because I love me a good Sharpie. Those Sharpie pens make me happy. I am a little sad that the liquid pencil isn't doing the same.
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