#46 Clicking pens with really strong springs

Get clickin’.

There are three big ways the deed goes down:

1. The Non-Stopper. You’re mindless fiddling with a pen when you notice it’s got a great spring… so you start clicking it over and over again. Your brain gets into a rhythm with the sound so you click faster and faster and faster and faster until your thumb slips or you break the thing.

2. Mission to Mars. Here’s where you turn the pen upside down, push it into the table, close your eyes, and rocket launch it across the room. Make sure you look away casually so nobody fingers you in the police lineup later. Special points if your pen lands perfectly in your French teacher’s bun.

3. Part of the band. I love it when random noises star as percussion sections in impromptu jams in your Brain Garage Maybe it’s the guitar slide noise you get from your seatbelt while drumming on the car dashboard. Maybe it your windshield wipers adding rhythm to your car stereo. Or maybe it’s the clicking pen at the back of class while tapping your textbook and stomping your sneakers.

Twisting bubble wrap till it machine gun pops, cracking thinly frozen puddles, and pushing those little buttons on soft drink cup lids all scratch the same strange itch in our brains as clicking pens with really strong springs.

Do not question the

AWESOME!

Photos from: here and here

32 thoughts to “#46 Clicking pens with really strong springs”

  1. when no one is around, I love doing the mission to mars at work :)

    makes me feel like a kid again & theres nothing wrong with that!

  2. I love a clicking pen, helps me think! Just the other day I’m clicking while my husband is driving. I hear, “Chop, chop suey- pick it up- chop suey…” through laughter I ask, “Say what?” He sings it again, says, “You know that song? Big hit in the 80’s!”
    OMG, maybe we are meant for eachother after-all. At least “The Farmer” might think so!

    1. Unfortunately, having never gotten into Potter I don’t catch this reference. But, while on the topic of YA fiction…

      IS EVERYONE AS EXCITED ABOUT THE NEW HUNGER GAMES MOVIE COMING OUT NEXT MONTH AS I AM?????

      That is all.

      1. Cannot wait !!
        the 14 year old and I are going opening day. I am trying to get my 17yo to read the book so he can go too. (always trying to get him to read I made the deal with my kids that whoever reads the book will get to see the movie.)

      2. YES! TOTALLY EXCITED!! I was just in a bookstore yesterday, and they have a whole bunch of new HG stuff now – a book about the making of the movie, which I had to totally restrain myself from buying. Don’t want to spoil the experience. Not sure how I feel about the new cover art on the new paperback release, though. I like the understated original cover – what? there’s an awesome book in here? who knew?

  3. That pen-headed woman in the pic was me back when I had longer hair and always wore it in a ponytail. At work, I stuck pens in there all the time; quite often I’d attempt to stick one in, only to bump against a few others already in there. Pulling them out always meant the loss of a few hairs…ouch! Never the clicking kind, though. I’m not a fan of using clicking-type pens. They’re usually hard-bodied and, since I like to chew on my pens like I do straws, I prefer the softer plastic of simple stick pens.

    1. I was a big pen chewer back in school.. but somehow lost the habit over the years and didn’t think about it until now. And it sounds like I was like you – not just a “put my pen in my mouth to hold it there for a second” kind of guy, but a real “chew the pen until it is deformed and gross and now I’ve guaranteed that no one is ever going to borrow this pen from me ever again” kind of guy.

      Never had enough hair to stick ’em anywhere though. :)

      1. “chew the pen until it is deformed and gross” ME! Hey, at least no one steals my pens! I suspect I’ll be buried with a misshapen, gnawed pen in my mouth…LOL!

  4. Clicking pens is my second favorite thing to do with them in meetings. (For the record, actually taking notes probably comes in 5th or something).

    I’m a big “pen spinner”. I don’t even notice that I do it (and for some, it can be even more annoying to be around then pen clicking), but I’m constantly spinning my pens either over the back of my hand, or twirling it quickly through my fingers. It’s become habit, and I don’t even notice it. Until once in a while when I have a mis-step and then pen goes flying out of my hands, and leaves a big blue streak down my dress shirt. Ooops!

    1. Ive picked up this pen spinning from my boss.

      so often I’d be sitting in his office while he is reviewing a few jobs & he’d spin his pen. Then i’d notice when I get back into my office, i’d be psinning my pen too.
      took me a while to master it though! But now, i hardly drop the pen! :)

    2. OK, I will admit it. I have pen-spinning envy. A few people at my office can do it, but I’ve never mastered it!

      1. I remember when I didn’t know how to do it either.. but then one summer in high school I went to a month long nerd camp and we spent most of the days in lectures, and 90% of the nerds at the camp were EXPERT pen spinners.. I was so jealous, I spent the month determined to learn how to spin my pen too. So, there you have it – nerd camp is good for something!

        1. Come to think of it, all the people at my office who can do this are nerds. So the math checks out.

  5. Clicking pens are AWESOME!
    They are also a great stress reliever. I often find myself clicking a pen when I get agitated.

  6. That is a great way to describe the satisfaction that comes from clicking or popping things…..”scratching an itch in our brain”.
    Love it! Such a weird phenomena to get such satisfaction out of these things, yet we all do them.
    The other day I got my daughter a glow stick, actually a glow “wand” with a heart atop it, for Valentines day. You have to bend them and the stuff inside cracks to make it glow. I get real satisfaction out of that cracking sound!! I think I buy those for my daughter every now and then just to crack them!

  7. Have you ever noticed how there’s always a blue pen (with great spring in it) there for you when you need it the most?

  8. For Valentine’s day, my boyfriend surprised me by showing up on my doorstep. I wasn’t expecting him because he goes to college about an hour away. As a present, he got me “The Book of (Even More) Awesome”. He had read through the book and placed sticky notes on the pages that reminded him of me. They were sweet and funny. It was the best present I’ve ever received <3

  9. Nothing beats the hefty click of the Parker with the arrow clip on the side. I bought my first very own Parker in Bright Yellow. Kept it way past the life of the ink. Now I own my Poppy’s black one. I mean the click brings me back! Solid.

  10. My grandson took my pink click pen out of my purse yesterday. First thing he did was draw a happy face on their front door! I gave him paper, he drew a kitty and dog; wrote and told a story, (he’s a mini Monsieur Cabinet and Neil, in the making)! Then he tried to pull the lid! Perfect opportunity and day to teach him how to click! Well, his eyes popped, and he let out a big woo-hoo! Within seconds, much to his and our surprise, he did a 1,2 and 3 too, when until July, he’s not even two!
    (Being able to use- to, 2, too and two in one sentence…AWESOME TOO:)

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  12. I do that all the time, And I agree….
    It’s TOTALLY AWESOME!!!!!!!!!!!!!

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