Friday, July 05, 2019

Mechanical Pencil Day - 2019 - Giveaway

THIS GIVEAWAY IS NOW CLOSED

Last year Cult Pens had their 05/07 (or 07/05) Mechanical Pencil Day, and it's back again this year. Head on over to Cult Pens to see the specials.

Like last year, they have also generously offered a giveaway for you - a voucher to spend on their website to the value of GBP 50 plus free international shipping. GBP 50 is about US$62. So, how do you enter the contest and win the shopping spree? Simple, you just send me an email saying you want to enter! My address is in the sidebar - About Me > View My Complete Profile. If you are extra keen, you can even double your chances of winning by leaving a comment here on this blog post. But nothings that easy, your comment has to be a little something extoling the glory of mechanical pencils. It can be a sentence or two of prose, a poem, a pun, a joke, an anecdote... a whatever. Anything will do. I will start you off with a haiku.

Wonderful Cult Pens
mechanical graphite sticks
pencils and refills

Just make sure that I can identify your comment with the email you send.

Good luck :)

Entries close at the end of 11-July. Winner will be notified by email.

ENTRIES HAVE NOW CLOSED

14 comments:

Dangold said...

(To the tune of "My Favorite Things")
... Scriptos and Pentels and even old Blackwings,
These are a few of my favorite things!
When the lead breaks,
When the twist jams,
When I lose my pad,
I simply remember my favorite things, and then I don't feel so bad.

Carl Maltby said...

Some grey marks meet up
A few curves here and there help
Who knows what it is?

Matthias said...

This is not an entry for the giveaway. I just wanting to say thank you for your giveaway.

Dashy said...

The prompt brought to mind this Reddit response I wrote some time ago:

"My pencil’s story you say?

In 7th/8th grade I started to really like math. It was the point when I realized math wasn't just arithmetic, and I started filling up notebooks with equations and puzzles. I didn't really enjoy using those random plastic Bic and Papermate pencils, they just felt too light and flimsy and never held up very long. I started looking around at nicer options, then grew dismayed because at the time even $10 was a bit too steep for a pencil.

Come Easter, I found my basket with one thing in it: A Rotring 800. I was very giddy. That thing was with me at all times, it was even usually in my pocket when I went to sleep. A couple years later, I left it on my desk to hand in a test, and when I came back it was gone. I presume someone stole it, but that's just guessing.

A couple months later I managed to buy a new one, and once again it was more likely you would find me walking around without socks than without my pencil. Sadly, it wasn’t too long before it got knocked out of my hand over a tile floor with the tip extended, and it got bent. I was furious I couldn’t buy replacement parts, but then I realized there was a warranty service option -It hadn’t even occurred to me before that you could send in a pencil for repair. A few weeks later I got it back from Rotring, and that is the pencil I have now, several years into a math degree. Every single paper and test since then, every sheet of scratch work and every line in my math notebook (a grid paper Moleskine Classic with 1500 digits of pi laser etched on the front and Dirac’s equation on the back that is just now on its last few pages after ~5 years, still need to etch the new one) has been written in .5mm Pentel Ain Stein HB lead with my Rotring 800 -And whenever I need it, it’s usually already in my hand anyway. The retracting mechanism started sticking, so I figured out how to disassemble it, cleaned it and lubricated it. The clip bent, I thought the damn thing was welded to the pencil but the moment I learned it wasn’t I spent an evening working it off, just so I could bend it back. The paint has worn to the point that I could pick mine out of a pile just by the wear pattern, but somehow the red Rotring logo looks untouched. If anything ever breaks on this pencil, I will buy a new Rotring 800, take it out of the box, remove the part I need, then put it right back in the box until I need another part.

I’m interested in mechanical pencils, but I don’t have much of a collection because I hate not using tools -And no pencil will ever replace my Rotring."

Wind Lass said...

The Zebra Cadoozle mechanical pencils alarmed me at first, when I encountered them in packs of old pencils bought at thrift shops...but they're growing on me. Short, handy, and generally full of lead.

jbwiebe said...

There was an old codger named Bart
Whose graphite was dear to his heart
He went out with his stencil
And mechanical pencil
And turned out a new work of art

Drewings said...

“Hey, do you like mechanical pencils?
Because you sure know how to advance my lead!”

Saint4210 said...

Today I tried to spread the joy,
Exclaiming the day like a little boy!
"It’s pencil day,” to my friends, I said.
The looks they gave me…I sunk like lead.

Dave said...

I'd love to extol the virtues of mechanical pencils, but, sadly, I have none! I'm counting on this drawing to change that!
lol

Unknown said...

Mechanical pencil: noun: definition.

The magical wand that converts thoughts into form. Generally used by schoolchildren and intelligent adults.

Anonymous said...

I'd love to win! Long term I love the Pentel Kerry (mine is just marked '5'). Growing up, I was a Niji 500 fan.

--
newell

Stefano said...

I quote the famous soliloquy by HAMLEAD, Prince of PENCILMARK

2B, or not 2B: that is the question:
Whether 'tis HARDER in the PAPER to suffer
The MARKS and SCRATCHES of HARD LEADS,
Or to take arms against a sea of SMEARS,
And by ERASING end them? To PUSH, to TWIST;
No more; and by a SLEEVE to say we end
The SHARPENING and the thousand natural WASTES
That WOOD is heir to, 'tis a consummation
Devoutly to be wish'd. To BEND, to SHAKE;
To PUSH: perchance to "DOUBLE-KNOCK": ay, there's the rub!

Shang-Shang said...

Why shouldn't you write with a broken pencil?

Because it's pointless!

Heyfamitsjoe said...

Greetings everyone! I hope you all have had a wonderful Mechanical Pencil Day this year!