Stephen Fry Finds The Perfect Permanent Marker Pen

It is a fundamental predisposition of friendship that a tall man in a green cape should leap to fill the void vacated by a man wearing casual slacks and with a heart as open as his wallet or crotch. Heavens! It is I, Fry, loyally standing in for your good friend Richard Madeley, today indisposed on account of a visit to The Richard&Judy Studios by Ms. Davina McCall. However, let us not dwell on this unfortunate event, except to say: shudder. If, indeed, shudder is enough when discussing a woman with the tattoo of the Tai Huen Chai Triads on her wrist. We can only wish Richard well and hope that neither he nor Judy is sold into the Far East flesh trade.

Somewhat cowardly, I have remained at the rear to fill in for this blog’s unfortunate author. ‘Fill in’. Such a common term for a lofty ambition. Were I a humbler man, I might well have forgone my duty and left his blog to run wild today, capering about like some council estate scamp. Unlike the constant flow of traffic at my website, poor Richard struggles to attract visitors. I intend to affect change. After all is said and, indeed, done: your Great Uncle Stephen has a knack for taking up the reigns and doing a splendid job. I will spend my time most wisely and review a remarkable piece of kit that has come my way.

The Sharpie Jumbo Sized Fine Point Permanent Marker Pen is a class leader in ergonomic design. The model provided to me for review was a shade of red that has pretensions towards the crimson. Styled after the fashion of a liquorice torpedo, the pen immediately sat proudly in my gifted hand and I was soon taken with the desire to write a sonnet. Fourteen lines soon followed, with the Shakespearean sestet terminating in a deliciously rhymed couplet; something that failed to happen when I reviewed the Papermate Expo Grip Pen earlier in the year. As the words began to flow, the Sharpie’s aroma began to cloud this reviewer’s mind and reality dulled like a bleak Whitsunday afternoon in Formby. This was not the heady brew of cheaper marker pens! Oh no! I recognised the slight infusion of an aroma not unlike that of lightly toasted coffee beans. That, at least, is what I told the large purple pixie who sat swinging his legs idly on the top of my monitor as I put down my pipe and began to type up this review.

Both Mr. Pixie and I believe the pen to be a leap forward in permanent markers designed for the family home. The Sharpie forgoes the clumsy design of the standard W.H. Smith Permanent Markers, without the expense of the BIC XL400 series. We regret the lack of rubberised barrel and there was no opportunity to extend the life of the pen through upgrades or refills. Remarkably, the Sharpie’s nib more than made up for this deficiency. A cleverly fashioned point, it provides fingertip control for those small annotations one might wish to make in perpetuity. Again, it is a marked (pun most craftily intended) improvement on the chisel tips of its class competitors. In the twenty four hours since I’ve been road driving this model, I have scribbled the Fry moniker on a dozen lamp posts in the West End region, signed my autograph on three breasts, two kneecaps, and a most tricky septuagenarian elbow covered by a copious amount of hard skin. The Sharpie handled all with remarkable (another deliciously inserted pun) ease. The nib remains as pert as ever; a fact that causes your reviewer to blush quite considerably.

(I have been since reminded that the Sharpie should be used on neither human nor animal flesh. Should you find my hastily scribbled signature on your breast, kneecap, or, indeed, pet, I advise you to wash it off immediately. In my excitement to mark you with my name, I might have inadvertently caused you severe kidney failure. Deary me! Since we have no guidance on inanimate flesh, we can safely assume that the Sharpie is perfectly suitable for marking up any cadavers, zombies, or other undead creatures you may have lying around the house.)

Indeed, the only flaw that I can see in the Sharpie is one that Mr. Pixie pointed out to me as we amused ourselves by dialling numbers randomly into the telephone. That is: longevity. One struggles to imagine how many lethal doses of kidney busting ink the good people at Sharpie have squeezed into such a handsomely profiled barrel. Were I to begin to pen a long poem consisting of nothing but Alexandrines rhymed incongruously with the occasional word of Latin or French, would the Sharpie last the distance? I think not. Nor does Mr. Pixie to whom the Alexandrines is the most perfectly formed line for epic verse.

For this reason, both your Uncle Stephen and Auntie Pix must withhold their full recommendation until our poem is writ. Were you to use it as the manufacturer recommends, inscribing your initials on lunch boxes, frisbees, and beneath the eyelids of your family pets, then the Sharpie might last a good deal longer than we have estimated. Then it would indeed warrant your purchase and this reviewer would be left to feel a rather foolish old chap. Lordy!