"Inky, binky, bottle of ink..."

I like writing by hand sometimes. Yes, a good keyboard is still about the fastest way for me to write, but sometimes a good pen in hand is just what the doctor ordered. Six months ago, I decided to try something a little different in my writing toolbox: a fountain pen.

I believe in starting small when pursuing a new interest, so I worked to find the cheapest way into the fountain pen world. I settled on Pilot's Varsity pens (amazon), finding a three-pack at my local Staples for seven dollars.

Well, it turned out to be a lot of fun; I like the smooth feel of the writing and the fun of having an old-school fountain pen. But going on buying disposable fountain pens to feed the addiction? I'm not so keen on that idea. And my new fountain pens were running out of ink fast!

So I started looking at buying a more permanent fountain pen. But then I found something that made my (web-browsing) ears perk up: some folks had successfully refilled the "disposable" Varsity with new ink.

I bought a 3-ounce bottle of Noodler's black ink (amazon) and tried it out. It worked! And with the new ink, my writing was smoother than before!

So that's a win. But the money side of things is pretty sweet, too: Each refill of the pen takes about 2 cc's of ink. In my $12, 3 oz bottle of ink, there are 88 cc's, giving a price per refill of 44 cents! (Far cheaper than the $2/pen price of new ones.) Refilling takes only two minutes, including setup and teardown time, and I've refilled only once in the six months I've had the pen.

Plus, having a bottle of ink hanging around is pretty awesome.

Another example of how it makes good financial sense to "go reusable", even if the product is touted as disposable.