There were a couple of rain showers
today. The air has cleared up from
"smoking a whole pack of Export A
cigarettes at once" to "1980s LA
smog."
Down in the Kelowna area, it sounds
like just under 100 houses burned.
They haven't announced how many burned
in the North Shuswap. Needless to say,
more rain would be great.
Micro news:
I bought a manual typewriter on eBay.
It's a Brother. They're very common
(over 10 million made between 1961 and
1980), boring, cheap, and apparently
really nice to type on. I read a
number of forum posts and blogs and
many of the self-annointed experts
express surprise at Brother's quality.
Growing up, we had a couple of
Smith-Coronas. I think one was a
Silent-Sterling and the other was a
Corsair. Later, when I was in
university I had a couple of the
Smith-Corona PWP word processors. The
first had a six-line LCD display. The
second was an upgrade with a full
amber monochrome monitor. Back then, I
used to compose and edit papers by
hand and then type up the finished
product. That seems like a million
years ago.
The last typewriter I owned was in the
late 1990s. It was a beautiful green
Olympia SM4, purchased in the era when
there was nothing as despised and
useless as a typewriter. It cost $20
and would surely fetch about $800 on
Etsy now. It was really nice to type
on -- as long as you didn't need to use
the shift key. Lifting the carriage
involved putting about 800 pounds of
pressure on your pinky finger.
In any case, I'm looking forward to
the new typewriter. There will soon be
'no computer Fridays' at the office. I
think I'll bring my transistor radio.
