More from Doctorow

Well, not from Cory Doctorow personally, although, if he checks out the occurrence of his name on the internet, I'll at least wave "hello!"  Actually, I didn't want to title this post with Doctorow's new addition to the English languhage:  Enshittification.  I do not, however, mind calling it to mind by name-dropping.  And now, that I have blurted out the term, I'm ready for another rant about the enshittification of my world. 

😡

And here it is.  I am really annoyed with Pentel.  I have a number of pens hanging around, and I do tend to use whatever is handy, so none of them are going to waste.  However, I really like gel pens.  And, well, I really like to write with turquoise ink.  In the days when I used a fountain pen, that little bottle of Skripto ink was my favorite, and I used it for years.  These days, for whatever reason, I use fountain pens rarely and must depend on pen manufacturers to meet my need for turquoise.  

So I bought pens from Pentel.  And I bought refills.  It's bad enough to be using a plastic pen, I know.  Using refillable pens is the least I can do to try to mitigate the waste of this mode of writing.  

Imagine my frustration when I found that Pentel's pens can't be opened to replace the ink.  

Now I know that there are instructions out on the internet to help us poor clods figure out how to open the pen.  What I want to know is:  Who designed a pen that needed such instructions?

And just as importantly:  Why are they lying?

I've tried to wrap the barrel with materials that give me more traction.

I've tried using pliers.  

It won't open.

Now you might think that an old lady might just be too weak to open these pens.  I'm not too weak to open any of my other pens, so, again, I ask:  Who would design a pen to be so difficult to open that not even tools can be used to open it?

And why?

Is this yet another case of corporations designing products to promote waste while they rake in more money?  Aifinkso.  And so this is another corporation that will be checked off my list.  No more Pentel for me---even if it does mean I will have to reduce my use of turquoise ink.  I'll use up what I have, break 'em down for recycling, and stick to pens that do open for refills---if I can find any that will take standard sized refills.

😡And why are the refills not standard-sized?