I brought my pen-cul!

This past Saturday, I attended the best session the Arkansas Literary Festival has ever offered, IMHO.  It was a couple of weekends ago that I noticed on my twitter feed that @letsgetshort (real name: David Rees) would be doing a workshop at the AR Lit Fest.  I was beyond thrilled.  He of GET YOUR WAR ON and now How To Sharpen Pencils also caught my eye on twitter with his talk of a conceptual restaurant featuring kale and a dry as hell wit.  I do like to laugh!  As much as possible! #ff

Anyway.  Saturday, we met up with Matt & Blair.  We checked out a couple of other sessions, which were very good, and had a very tasty lunch together, but the highlight of my afternoon was attending the above-mentioned session.  Frankly, I was a little nervous dragging ATM to this event because I wasn't feeling positive that Rees would pull off a one-hour workshop on how to sharpen pencils, ffs.  Needless worry, David is pretty fucking hilarious.  Non-stop laughter for an hour and there were tons of hee hees.  It was awesome to look around and see everyone in stitches!  It was so much fun, I tried to recount the day's happenings to friends later that evening, but I abandoned that idea pretty quickly because it was one of those 'you had to be there' ordeals.  But, still, I thought I'd give it a go here because I've got photographs!  And, still, you probably would have had to have been there!

So, David was a panelist on an earlier discussion we attended in the morning.  Afterward, I bought his book and had a little chat with him.  He asked if we were coming to his talk later in the day: yes.  I asked if I should bring my pencils: what kind do you have? All kinds, one with the American flag on it, colored pencils, eyeliner, and some #2s: bring the #2s.  OK!  100% real wood, made for scan-trons:

Rees with his three volunteers, including Matt R on the end there!  These three were interpreting a chapter of his book titled "Sharpening Pencils for Children".

This fella did the novelty pencil-sharpening technique called Sharpening A Pencil Behind Your Back.  

Mike here did the novelty technique called Sharpening a Pencil "With Your Teeth":

Ahem.  This technique is called Sharpening A Pencil In Front Of A Car.  I told this gal afterward that I would not have done this humiliating pose and probably would've told Mr. Rees where he could stick his pencils.  She was a really good sport:

Rees with his El Casco M430-CN.  He claims it's the 4th most expensive thing he owns and he has a house and a car.  

After the session, I hired David to sharpen my pencil.  He used a shaver-style sharpener:

The artisan at work:

The results.  Please note the bag of shavings.  He returns a job's shavings, as they are part of the pencil and your property.  Also, the sharpened pencil is protected by rubber tubing to prevent breakage.

Certificate of Authenticity:

Autograph, in pencil naturally:

And, finally, my first attempt as sharpening with a pocket knife.  Not bad, I'd say:

A tip for eye-liner users: freeze 'em before you sharpen them.  


Fun day.