I think I'm going to go get myself on trouble.

I was going to send two nibmeisters requests for suggestions for the custom nib I've been talking about and let them duke it out. BUT, turns out one is in Japan for a few weeks, and there's a smoking crater where my patience is supposed to be, so I'm going with the first. He suggested a 0.5 mm cursive italic for an M200, which will be a custom order. And since I expected either that, a stub italic, or a "there's no way I can do all that in one nib. If you're willing to compromise on...", AND the other guy doesn't generally work on the "tradition" line of Pelikans, it sounds good to me and I think I'll give it a go. So, my master plan to take over the fountain pen world is to order the custom nib and maybe a Taccia Continental Royal Purple from him (because I'm a brat, and he has it the absolute cheapest I've seen, and I know he'll wave his magic nib-checking wand over it before it ships), and order the M200 that it'll go in from isellpens.com along with a cheap Hero "51" clone with one of the "star trek" nibs if they have a color I like, because I'm geeky like that. That'll about clear me out for this month, with a little left for play, and then next month I think maybe if I don't fritter away too much (or I'm smart enough to get it first), I might get a Namiki Falcon.

One part of me says I should wait until the Sheaffer ringtop and the Esterbrook with the 9314-F I've got coming arrive and try them out first. (It insists it's the sensible part.) But another part of me (which I say is the sensible part) says that after trying the Pelikan M150 (ooh... so nice...), there is no way any Esterbrook nib will ever be smooth enough for me, and even if the Sheaffer perfectly recreates the writing I want the way I want, no lever-fill ringtop will ever be able to keep up with a full day of intense story writing. Hell, I've killed full sized lever-fills with that. Can't guarantee an M200 will make it, either, but it's got a better chance and will give me warning if it won't. (Clear ink window, let's you see how much you've got.)

Now I just need to figure out what nib I want to get on the M200 when I buy it. I know from the M150 that I like the fine, but I already have a perfectly nice M150 with a fine nib I like. I'd like to try an extra fine, but Pelikan is somewhat infamous for not doing them well. Of course, it hopefully won't be in there for long, but if I end up not liking the customized nib, it'd be nice to have an easy fallback.

So, there it sits. :)