For KT...moleskines in the news...

[terrie]

I thought of you when I saw this article in The Washington Post last monday...

Some excerpts:

"One was a hand-held digital assistant, rigged with an extra 128-megabyte memory card. The other, a little black notebook called a Moleskine, the style similar to those used by Hemingway, van Gogh and others who hung out in Paris cafes."

"They bond online about Moleskines, often sharing their need for order. "I know some of you, like me, are multiple-Moleskine nerds," wrote one, setting off a chain of 118 responses. "It's sad, but this is how God's made us." He offered a way to keep them all straight: label the spines with an icon for each Moleskine style."


"When talking about their notebooks, users employ different pronunciations and joke that there are several: Mole-skin . . . Mole-skeen . . . Mole-skin-ee. But Moleskineus, an online retailer, calls it a mol-a-SKEEN-a."

"A more recent convert is Annie White, 25, an economic consultant for the International Food Policy Research Institute, which works to cut hunger and malnutrition worldwide. She carried a 5-by-8-inch Moleskine (there's also a 3.5-by-5.5-inch version) while studying in Europe last year. She visited one of Hemingway's Paris haunts, Cafe de Flore , while reading "A Moveable Feast," his memoir of 1920s Paris. She ordered an espresso, as evidenced by the keepsake receipt glued inside her Moleskine: 4.40 Euro."

"White checks the Moleskine blogs every few days, seeing what others are up to. But she's drawing the line at $40 extras. "I am not," she vowed, "about to buy these pens that they talk about."


Unfortunately, the online edition doesn't have the pictures...want me to pop the article in the mail to you???

Terrie

[ktinkel]

Originally Posted by terrie

Unfortunately, the online edition doesn't have the pictures...want me to pop the article in the mail to you???

No, I don’t think so — the text was vivid enough. (You had to get me started, didn’t you!? )

I enjoyed the article. I have been using elastic-closed bound writing/drawing books for a long time. Always buy them when I am in France, in fact. The moleskine (which is definitely pronounced mo-les-KIN-eh) is a fancy version, and since I haven’t been traveling, about the only one I can find.

It is utterly practical (as any woman with a messy handbag and a crapped-up notebook can attest). But of course it is also pretty, and their paper quality is superb.

Why don’t we (in the U.S., I mean) make interesting and useful notebooks? All right, I grant you the steno pad — it is superbly useful. But interesting? Attractive? No, don’t think so (the ones with grey lines on white paper are nicer than the ones with green paper, without a doubt — but classy? no one would say so).

And of course they are large-ish for the handbag.

I have several little books with elastics to hold them closed, in dimensions from 4X5 to 4.25X5/6.25 inches. One is a moleskine; others are paper-covered (and the elastic punks out after about 18 months, unfortunately). And several others, also properly bound, but with no elastic (I use the rubber bands that come around asparagus for those — usually purple, a quarter-inch wide, and durable).

It is a brilliant format. Why are we deprived, I wonder? <g>

[Steve Rindsberg]

As long as we're grumbling about notebooks ...

I like small ring binder ones best but they're all either too small or too large.

I'd like to find one that's in the 3 x 5 inch range; plain old lined notebook quality paper would be fine - this is just for notes and reminders and to-do lists that get tossed out when done.

I've got one that's 2.5 x 4 but that's just a smidgeon too small.

[ktinkel]

Originally Posted by Steve Rindsberg

I like small ring binder ones best but they're all either too small or too large.

I'd like to find one that's in the 3 x 5 inch range …

I had such a thing. It was about half an inch thick, and it came with a to-do, calendar sort of program I used to run on the Mac.

It came with letter-size sheets, punched, and perfed so they fit the book, but I am pretty sure I also found other kinds of paper at Staples, in the date book section.

If I looked hard enough I could probably find that book. It was nifty, now that I think about it.

If it doesn’t have to be a ring binder, you could use those spiral-bound 3X5-inch index cards. Jack used to use those. But the spirals made it kind of wide for many pockets.

[Steve Rindsberg]

Heck, all I need is the notebook and paper. I suppose if my handwriting were better and I didn't mistrust the thing so, I could use the Palm. Well, sort of. Notebooks don't break when they fall out of your pockets and hit the ground.

[terrie]

stever: Notebooks don't break when they fall out of your pockets and hit the ground.

Indeed...but when they fall into a mud puddle...'-}}

Terrie

[ElyseC]

Originally Posted by terrie

Indeed...but when they fall into a mud puddle...'-}}

Well, Palms don't take kindly to muddy baths either.

[Steve Rindsberg]

Originally Posted by ElyseC

Well, Palms don't take kindly to muddy baths either.

Voice of experience?

[ElyseC]

Originally Posted by Steve Rindsberg

Voice of experience?

Thankfully no!

I do have a friend who dropped his and cracked the screen just one day after he bought it. Ouch. He had to pony up for repairs and while it was away at the factory he bought a thick, rubbery, cage-like industrial case for it, so he could keep it with him on his belt all day at work as facilities manager at a university.

[jrabold]

Thanks, everyone, for cluing me in on the Moleskine. I added one to an amazon.com order, it arrived today, and I'm immediately charmed by it. Very good design. It came with a little multilingual product history, tucked into a rear pocket.

Something about it reminds me of a particular brand of another kind of consumer product. One doesn't ask a person whether the hat she's wearing is "a Tilley hat" but rather whether it is "The Tilley Hat". I love mine, and thank the Canadians, our good neighbors to the north, for producing it. www.tilley.com