Do me a favor, if you spend any time at all writing using a pen, get yourself a fountain pen. They are so much nicer.

@freemo Amazing, I was in a shop the other day as I’m thinking about moving back to a fountain pen, not used one since school, but wasn’t sure which of the dizzying array of options to go with (as you note, most are just very expensive metal with a label). I thought, you could have provided guidance and here you are posting about it. Thoughts for something not too expensive and suggestions on a good ink? Bear in mind, I am looking for something portable for an everyday note taking pen.

@rw Well lots of questions I need to ask ideally but lets reduce it to just a few important ones..

Do you plan to use it just for note taking, would you also like to use it to sign your name or do fancy writing in general, or no, mostly for scribbling things fast and smooth?

@freemo mostly scribbling. I sign my name less and less these days and when I do it is usually at the motor registry and they force me to use the hideous pen there.

As for fancy writing. Sadly my penmanship is more akin to a spider crawling across the page than actual writing. It is on my very long list of arts to work on, but if I am realistic I will just be scribbling notes.

Price wise... between about $100 and $300 would be a sweet spot. But always happy to save a bit or pay a little more if there is something good which would otherwise be just out of reach.

The only other element is feel in the hand. Years ago I had a pen with a nice feeling nib, but it was a screw top and the screw thread left an unpleasant groove in my fingers after long periods of writing.