Distract-B-Gone!

Strange, the chapters for Peak Fiction are being updated vaguely frequently, how could this be?

The answer is, I have finally found my ideal distraction-free portable writing device.

I have Scrivener, which I do love and have spent many an hour tinkering with my theme for, but typing away at my desk in the evenings or on weekends isn't that great because my desk is where the day job happens and so it ends up feeling like just more work.

That said, typing on the sofa using the TV as a pc screen (how I play pc games) is a pain in its own right: I have to massively change my display settings every time I switch between desk and sofa or else squint at tiny text and it's just not comfortable after ten minutes.

A manual typewriter is fine (I own one, yes) for shorter works but nothing that will need a lot of editing or need to go up on here, for instance because that means digitisation which is hassle no-one needs.

A laptop and a spot on the sofa? Feels too much like work. Plus, any pc is full of distractions.

The solution, imported from the US despite the ludicrous costs of international shipping of anything with a LiPo battery?

Ladies, Gentlemen and Eldritch Beings from Beyond, may I present to you, the Pomera DM250US:

There are actually two models of this, the DM250 and the DM250US. The first is the Japanese model available online through various places for pretty much worldwide delivery. It comes with stickers to convert to an ISO-ish keyboard and can be switched to English language but there are limits (like a character count and no word count option, or the half-size backspace key to make room for the Yen key) to this so some people don't get on with it because the conversion isn't thorough enough for the device to ever become a comfortable typing/writing experience in a language other than Japanese.

The US model with its word count feature and English dictionary/spellcheck and ANSI keyboard is, unfortunately, only sold and shipped inside the USA. Something about the lithium battery and not having full certification for international sale, which makes sense, the product testing for that involved would be very expensive. That said, there's nothing stopping someone getting it delivered to a friend, family member or drop shipping service (I used Stackry. Expensive in the end for reasons I'm about to cover but worth it!) and then getting it shipped on to somewhere outside the US.

The only issue with this is paying for extra shipping and maybe a handling fee from a shipping service. In my case, Stackry charged an extra $12 for handling because the lithium battery makes this a 'hazmat' item for shipping. Then, because of that battery, the only international shipping options available are the higher-end ones due to no carrier wanting a random LiPo sat in their supply chain for days or weeks, they want that shit gone ASAP. So you're stuck with expensive first-class and priority options.

Then. Because the UK is like this, I got stung for customs. Cost me like an extra $150 to cover shipping costs and fees all told. Thankfully, I had been an early bird VIP backer for the Indiegogo campaign and had saved much more than that on the RRP of the Pomera, otherwise it'd've been way out of my price range once shipping and customs came into the mix.

For me? It's been worth it. I've already spent hours typing, racked up thousands of words, used the outline view, the split view between two documents, tried the app link and the pc file connection and all that. The DM250US only works with .txt files but that's fine, I use Markdown and Scrivener sorts it back out on compilation and I just use Scriv's external file sync system to make moving the files into Scriv easy too.

Barely visible in that first photo is my handmade leather pouch for the Pomera, with a tuck-in flap and a gold HTV vinyl design on the front. Not at all visible, is the skin I've put on the top. The soft-touch plastic is a finger print magnet, and that's fine for the bottom which you don't look at and the area around the screen which you don't handle, but the top of the lid? I didn't think it would bother me but it's pretty bad for picking up little smudges and marks. I bought (on sale, of course) a black leather Dbrand (no-one else does leather) skin for the Xbox Series X and took the piece that would go on the bottom of the Xbox (if it were horizontal) and cut a skin out for the Pomera. Works a treat, feels nice when you're opening the Pomera and doesn't show fingerprints etc.!

The screen protector you can also see was ordered custom sized from Protection Films 24, I picked the Brotect brand and got two because I was likely going to mess the first up. As a note, they don't come by default with an application kit like dust removal stickers and a smoother or anything. I sized mine 89.0mm x 152.0mm (radius 2.0mm) but if I ordered another I'd go for 90mm x 153 or 154mm instead. The install would be trickier to line up but it'd give fuller coverage. I managed to get one on with only one lingering air bubble but the Brotect has the tiny, tiny air removal channels and after two days that was gone and I've had a perfect, matte screen ever since except for that little border around the protector.

The only downside is that when I do need to look something up or check my maps etc., I need a separate device but I'm keeping my reference material to actual hardcopy books or my eink ereader and I don't check the maps that often so it's not too much of a bother when I need to grab my phone or pc to check something.

I really get more out of being able to go sit wherever I want and just, you know, get to it. A relatively quiet but quite tactile keyboard for a small chiclet-key thing, a good screen with white-black and black-white plus brightness options (oh, this baby is fully lit for night time typing if you want :p ), solid af battery life and enough memory to eat hundreds of thousands of words across scores of files. I just decide I want to write, open the lid, wait like 3 seconds and I'm back to where I left off in my last file. Amazing.

And the evidence is on this very website, parts 4 and onwards of my terribad AU fic (excluding Karian's interlude in 4.5) were all written and edited on the DM250US. Love it. It's my baby. It goes in my satchel if I'll be travelling by train etc., and is sat next to me now ready for some actual, proper, comfortable, feet up, on the couch writing time. Thanks to King Jim of Japan for making what is, for me, the perfect writer deck.