Great post. What a lot of work!

I bought a couple of those moleskine journals on a rec from someone I know and while I usually don't go in for the hype, these things are pretty nice. One failing I find is I often want my own handwriting/text to look good enough to match the journal. I'm loathe to scribble (I hate to tell you) and sketch and strikeout. That's not conducive to good work, I think.

There's a little stationary place in the East Village in NYC that sells nice little journals (ruled, cloth binding, no elastic or nerfty pouch) for about a third the price of the Moleskine. The covers aren't as nice and the paper is standard, but I feel I can scratch them to shit without a second thought. Useful when you're writing-to-get-to-whatever-it-is-you're-writing-that-isn't-what-you-thought-you-were-writing-about. You know?

I want my journal to be a place where I empty my head like an upturned bag, not where I disassemble it in an orderly fashion (presumably to reassemble it later -- it ain't goin back together...).

What an image: emptying your head like a bag!

I have a moleskine journal but when I see the pics of their journals other people post, I feel I have to tuck it away out of sight. No cool doodles; no arcane diagrams; just lists of things, or some point-form jottings, for the most part.

I wonder if some people keep private journals, for grocery lists and whatnot, secret and separate from their public, photoblogged journals?

Many, many thanks for the links.
As for me, I finally found a use for all the nice notebooks I buy: scribbling notes for weblog entries...
so, basically, this is like many other technology switches - weblogs are not simply outdating paper journals; instead they may change their use. Today, I would probably post my feelings about a book after - or instead of - scribbling them on paper, but there will always be thing I write that I don't want to show.

MJ, that's exactly it. My journal work isn't photogenic -- backslanted writing, scribbles over stupid turns of phrase, Leonardo-esque sketch-free.

Rose, I find the web/computer has just help me define what is my artistic "work" from what is my daily grind. Lists go on the computer (for those lovely reminder messages that help me get things done), notes go in the book. The problem with writing myself reminders in books is that I seldom look back a few pages to be reminded....

Re: an emptied bag -- poet. Sorry.

Don't apologize.

(There are worse things to empty than a bag.)

Wow, so many links to visit on pens...thank you! I visit Danny Gregory regularly and saw his pens entry. I love his and many others' journals full of neat sketches and lovely text, and feel ashamed of my sketchbook! It's mostly full of notes about my processes, ideas, and sometimes copied artists statements by other artists that I identify with, to help me write my own! The sketchbook is NOT a work of art. However, a great pen is a joy and makes such a difference to my handwriting and the few little thumbnail sketches I do. As for blogging ideas/notes, they are on scrap paper and on the computer....hmmm, maybe I should get a lovely journal for this?? Isn't it interesting how similar writers and some visual artists are when it comes to journals?

Even non-artist journals can be visually very interesting--sometimes they become scrapbooks featuring quotations, different handwriting as you use different pens, paper cuttings or ticket stubs... I think that the habit of showing "ordinary things" on websites -- down to grocery lists -- may help even us bookish people to look differently at the tools of our work (not that we must show them, of course!)
I used to save lovely notebooks for "later" (goodlooking things? important things? learning to draw?) Now I simply use them.
I have a good story about a found sketchbook, I hope to find the time to post it soon.

I know exactly what you mean! I, too, have often bought a attractive journal and saved it for "later."

When you post your story, feel free to link here. I will get mio marito to translate.

uhm, I tried pinging this entry but it seems id didn't work. the story I mentioned is now here:
http://todrownarose.blogs.com/blog/2004/06/a_found_sketchb.html