Getting My Geek On

I’ve mentioned in the past that I enjoy using a fountain pen, both at work and for private correspondence.  I don’t have a big collection… just two: an antique black Schaeffer Balance is my every day pen for work and play, and a Namiki Vanishing Point pen is the one I travel with since it is virtually immune to leaking in pressurized airplane cabins.

But several days a week I have a problem:  I sometimes wear shirts that don’t have a breast pocket.

For the Namiki this isn’t a problem since the pen's pocket clip is an integral part of the one piece body (no removable cap), so I can simply slip the pen inside my shirt and clip it to the placket between two of the buttons.  This is especially okay when wearing a tie since the tie hides the bit of the pen that protrudes.

But most fountain pens – like my antique Schaeffer – have the clip attached to the removable pen cap; which means that if I clip the pen to the shirt placket, it could come apart and let the pen fall inside the shirt with the nib exposed.  A recipe for a badly ink-stained shirt.

So I took a small leather case that was originally designed for a knife sharpening stone, and Macgyvered it to be able to attach to one of the buttons and be concealed within the shirt.  I’m pretty pleased with the results.