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5
Mar 09

How-to: Fit a Montblanc Meisterstück into a Filofax

Yes, I am aware of Watermans, and even Pilots writing better. But I also happened to find the rare Fisher space pen refills that were made for Montblancs, and man they work well! I also found the pen quite inexpensively. Admittedly, my friends know me as a techno-whore, but I am very fond of my Filofax. There’s something quite grand about writing out your day, schedules, and addresses in the real world. I’m not a GTD freak— I just like to jot some to-dos and appointments. And yes, I do sync the iPhone, because I will forget anything and everything.

It disturbed me that the Filofax pen loop diameter really only fits thin pens and their own slim pen, which I have since thrown out. It’s also odd that you can’t find any information. For the record, Lamy Safari pens won’t fit either.

I thought about it for awhile, and tried to figure out a way to get this nice pen to fit. I dug around my desk drawer and found:

  • a uniball vision pen
  • a long, wooden golf tee

No, I’m not much of a golfer. If golfing means getting the lowest score, then the only way I can accomplish that is by not playing.

Simply, I stuck the uniball pen in the loop (which fits very well, albeit a tad tighter than slimmer pens), and plied the golf tee underneath. I then let the stretching duo sit overnight.
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The result: a perfect fit for the Montblanc. Slides in and out easily, but lots of tension to keep the pen secure.

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Yes, the pen does hang a bit out over the top edge, but it fits well, and is plenty compact enough for portability, using the Pocket-size Filofax. Additionally, a U.S. Passport fits snugly in this version of the Filofax.

Happy writing!


27
Jan 08

Apple iPod Camera Connector revisited

The Apple iPod Camera Connector is a small plug with a USB jack to download images from cameras, in both JPG and RAW/DNG formats. JPGS are viewable, but RAW formats are not, on the iPod itself. I had some issues, but none of serious despair.

I bought this iPod device in hopes of downloading imagery without a computer while traveling, and while it does work, there are some clear caveats. I recall finding a Wiki site some years ago that listed compatibility with media readers; alas I have no luck currently in locating that information. I had purchased a Belkin Hi-Speed USB 2.0 15-in-1 Media Reader & Writer for that purpose some years ago with an older iPod (Photo, I believe) to offload JPG files from a digital camera, and confirmed that indeed worked.

However, using that setup—with a card reader—did not work for either of my cameras: a Canon G9 and a Leica M8. Though the reader did not help (the fifth-generation iPod simply showed no photos available for download, and imported nothing), I did find that connecting the cameras directly to the iPod connector resulted in complete file downloads.

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From there, you can easily copy over files from a disk-enabled iPod (check “Enable disk use” in iTunes), or import from a photo-editing application. There are a few caveats to this approach, namely, the speed of transfers from camera to iPod is fairly slow; transfers for four 10MP DNG file took approximately 1-2 minutes. Yes, four (4) pictures. That severely impacts camera battery life, and additionally, this process also requires power from the iPod. Although an issue, I pack an iGo charger with dual power connectors to charge most of the devices I tend to bring along. The upside is, importing from a computer is fairly quick.

Here’s another fairly extensive review of the connector. Also, here’s an interesting write-up on another storage technique.


17
Dec 07

XBox HD-DVD player

Get the XBox DVD player with King Kong. Tomorrow, apparently they’ll bundle the $50-value Bourne Ultimatum trilogy with it. Not a bad deal.