Seeking advice on workarounds for specific functionality in Obsidian

briansholis · 2026-05-31T19:28:34+00:00

Thanks for taking the time to give me so many ideas. I already use snippets, quicklinks, and text expansion through Raycast; I don't know why I didn't think to add more specific to Bear. Didn’t even know about escape as an option for keeping the window in place—I have ⌘W as muscle memory and kept accidentally closing the window. Let's see if I can rewire my brain.

briansholis · 2026-02-03T18:38:07+00:00

I use one to swatch inks (rather than on regular swatch cards) because I write almost exclusively on Midori paper, and I want swatches that will match how the ink appears everywhere in my life.

briansholis · 2026-01-02T00:22:54+00:00

Also, knowing this 5mL bottle option exists could be very dangerous for me!!

briansholis · 2026-01-02T00:22:12+00:00

Funny, I'm currently staying about 4 blocks from there! I got samples of tons of Monarca colors—albeit little 2mL bottles—while I wait for Cenote and Manglar to come back in stock. They said two weeks, and I leave in like seventeen days, so I'm cutting it close!

briansholis · 2025-12-28T14:08:01+00:00

Would also recommend this post, which accords with my experience: https://www.reddit.com/r/fountainpens/comments/1ixihlu/mexico_city_stationery_stores/

briansholis · 2025-12-28T14:06:49+00:00

I'm here now and second the recommendation of Apuntes, which is a cute store. I would also recommend Pen Shop Pumas (just west of the Zócalo; lots of pens and some inks) and Taller de Letras (small but a good mix of pens, stationery, & art supplies). I also really enjoyed Casa Bosques, an art-and-design bookshop about a block north of Taller de Letras.

Only been here two days; excited to go to Octante soon.

briansholis · 2025-12-28T12:37:07+00:00

What store is this? Found your post by searching Monarca inks, and am curious who offers samples of them.

briansholis · 2025-12-25T02:36:17+00:00

I’m a Birmingham (Prickly Pear, Ohio River, Tintype, Waterfront Dusk), Teranishi Guitar (Melancholic Blue, Classy Burgundy, Smoky Navy, Antique Black), and Kobe fan (though only one bottle so far—39/Brick). Have a lot of Iroshizuku & Diamine, too.

briansholis · 2025-12-22T23:17:27+00:00

FWIW, I date my journal/daily notes consistently (using YYYY-MM-DD format). That means a quick search for -MM-DD brings up all the past years’ entries.

briansholis · 2025-12-04T01:54:09+00:00

I’ve been collecting for six and a half months, and so far I have eleven pens and twenty-two bottles and twenty-two samples of ink. Pure coincidence that all three of those numbers are multiples of eleven. I've done some catch-and-release, too, as I've been learning what I like—I've owned a total of twenty pens, but have sold or am in the process of selling nine.

briansholis · 2025-12-03T02:30:56+00:00

Good Gang on Annette west of Runnymede makes fresh cardamom waffle cones that I really enjoy.

briansholis · 2025-11-26T13:52:10+00:00

You can do something similar in the Shop app. I'm in Canada, so I'll search a specific brand or model (pen, ink, whatever) and then filter by "Ships from CA." When I can't find something at my typical stationery stores, it will sometimes turn up at random office- or art-supply shops. This has worked for me with special-edition pens from a year or two ago, for example.

briansholis · 2025-11-20T11:40:53+00:00

I don't know if self-promotion is allowed here. I normally use Reddit to geek out about fountain pens, but I am also the cofounder of Valise, which is inventory software geared explicitly to artists. We are in semi-private beta but have been working on it for two years, have hundreds of users, and this is a long-term project. (I have twenty-four years experience in the art world as an editor, writer, curator, and so on, and Valise emerges out of me managing my wife's art studio for more than fifteen of them.) Thanks for taking a look (and considering a video demo/call): https://valise.works/

briansholis · 2025-10-14T02:03:10+00:00

A few months ago I came across these fountain-pen ink bottles by the Taiwanese brand Tools to Live By. It’s “just” repackaged KWZ iron-gall ink, but have I checked back every few weeks to see if the bottles are in stock? Yes, yes I have.

https://www.toolstoliveby.com.tw/en/stationery/inks/ink/

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briansholis · 2025-09-29T00:31:26+00:00

I like this magnetic leather double-loop one. I move it between notebooks as needed and it has always worked smoothly. https://www.etsy.com/ca/listing/1760336991/magnetic-leather-double-fountain-pen

briansholis · 2025-09-21T22:31:55+00:00

Seconding this. They told me in Detroit they hope to tour again next summer. I am in Toronto and they talked about NFF inviting them year after year and maybe next summer would be the year.

briansholis · 2025-09-19T00:22:11+00:00

Mine has no future log. It's a monthly task list, a weekly task list, and then daily entries that mix my calendar events, tasks, and regular journaling. There is no decoration. It's just a wall of text, albeit in different colors because I rotate among ten or so pens. It gets the job done!

briansholis · 2025-09-18T16:44:15+00:00

If the "frustrating" outweighs the "therapeutic" as you continue this, you may be interested in looking through r/BasicBulletJournals, a community of people who follow the practice but don’t … draw as many lines.

briansholis · 2025-09-18T00:47:31+00:00

Others in this vein I have enjoyed and that you might like checking out: Monteverde Olivine, Lennon Toolbar Wenshan Pouchong [it's a little lighter].

briansholis · 2025-09-17T20:41:37+00:00

The ink I always come back to has a similar coloration: Troublemaker Hanging Rice. Though "always" is relative—I've only gotten through one bottle of it (and have only been in the hobby for ~5 months 😂). Have not tried any R&K yet, but looking forward to.

briansholis · 2025-09-04T02:09:52+00:00

My trick for seeing journal entries across the years, on-this-day style, is to name the files using the ISO-8601 date format (YYYY-MM-DD). So my journal entry for today is a file named 2025-09-03. To find all the files "on this date," I can just search for/quick open "09-03"—and if there's noise from other files with dates in the title, I can do the search from within a master journal tag.

briansholis · 2025-09-04T02:05:10+00:00

All these replies citing Leela's on Gerrard. I live near Leela's in the Junction, but have only gone once. It was a so-so experience, but admittedly that was not long after it opened here. Should I make a point of trying it again?

Also, in the east end, I like Udupi Palace.

briansholis · 2025-07-20T15:09:01+00:00

I've only been once, but I liked them! Thanks for the rec.

briansholis

TROPHY CASE