Don't lend out your pens. This is my advice to fellow journalists. I've lost maybe 15 pens in the last four days. The worst part is that I keep seeing the people I lent them too. Particularly with a name tag showing your press affiliation, it's not such a good idea to bring up the point later. If they've maliciously taken my pen, then I'm just going to make a scene. If they did it by accident, then it will be an embarrassment to point out the fact.
I even asked to borrow a pen from someone who I had lent one just yesterday. It was, of course, my own pen that was offered to me. I gave it back after I was done, of course. In retrospect, maybe it was a test. If not of any sense of moral turpitude, then at the least a clever way of measuring just how Canadian I really am.
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