can just sit down and focus on writing what should be an easy and straightforward paper in a few hours
I have trouble doing that with the serial fiction I’m working on, and I love writing it.
The thing with pens is to have so many that there always is one if you need them. I have five or six (don’t remember) distributed throughout the lab.
I have at least 5 in my backpack at all time.
Black and blue Pens, mechanical pencils with refills, possibly a couple permanent markets of different colors, all of them in a convenient side pouch on my backpack.
I’ve become accustomed to using blue, purple, red, green, pink, and black pens.
The colors really make my notes easier to visually scan. Especially if I’m trying to keep a topic on one page and end up filling in gaps with sideways notes or diagrams.