I finally decided to try a Pilot Metropolitan... and I hate it :(

[Image description: A white fountain pen with a silver clip on the cap and a silver zebra stripe band around the middle lies on a blue dotted grid desk pad.]

I impulse bought a Pilot Metropolitan (F) about a month ago and have had the worst experience so far. First it took 3 days of experimenting (squeezing the cartridge, flushing, cleaning, shaking, incessant scribbling) to get it to write at all. Then I noticed the nib was a bit off-center in the feed so I aligned it and it wrote pretty well for a while. This morning I grabbed it to take some notes and it won't start, even after a flush with water and re-seating the cartridge. This isn't my first fountain pen (not even my first Pilot!) but I'm really disappointed because the Metro seems to be such a popular recommendation as a solid, inexpensive starter pen. Did I get a dud?