number 2 pencil

plural number 2 pencils · alternative № 2 pencil

1. PhilippinesUSA pencil which produces a specific shade of dark gray, often required for test-taking and the completion of official forms.

   "Mrs. Landry, I forgot to bring my number two pencils! Does that mean I flunk this test?" Big tears filled Joey's eyes.

   2006, Barbara Slater Stern, curriculum and teaching dialogue: V. 8, page 33

   3 more examples

   I snapped to rigid attention when the teacher barked, "Clear your desks, get your number two pencils out, and get ready for your exam." Exam! What exam?

   1990, Allender Crabb, Lawrence J. Crabb, Larry Crabb, Dan B. Allender, Encouragement: The Key to Caring, page 30

   You shall not, I repeat, not, touch them with your finely sharpened number-two pencils or any other marking instrument until you are explicitly told to do so.

   2003, Trey Ellis, Platitudes: & the New Black Aesthetic, page 64

   In using this system, absentee voters were instructed to mark their ballots with number two pencils. The optical scanner rejected ballots which were marked with instruments other than number two pencils.

   2006, Barry H. Weinberg, The Resolution of Election Disputes: Legal Principles That Control Election, page 128

   Synonyms: HB pencil, number 2

2. USA standard, ordinary pencil; one which is not colored or mechanical or in any other way unusual.

   How would that yellow number 2 pencil look as an ornament, inserted through a pierced ear-lobe or nasal septum?

   1997, Jared Diamond, Guns, Germs, and Steel: The Fates of Human Societies, page 1

   2 more examples

   Stand back as we attempt to capture and charm the most poisonous lead on your desk — the diamondback Number 2 pencil!

   2002, Irv Furman, Amazing Irv's Handbook of Everyday Magic, page 78

   I do the actual writing on my computer, of course, but I find that jotting down notes with a number 2 pencil gets my brain working in a new way, helps me see the facts from a different angle.

   2004, Kate White, 'Til Death Do Us Part, page 28