Shanghai'd from the Typewriter Brigade thread

I was in one of my local vintage stores today, procrastinating, and an Underwood (y'know, from that indecisive period when they said 'made in Italy' and looked for All The World like the Olivetti portables...) set my typewriter radar off. White/cream color, cream-and-maroon case, jammed, bent typebars, absolutely filthy, flat rollers, filthy filthy filthy platen that had been typed on with no paper in, sluggish action, dust lodged firmly in every crevice, had been left out at toddler-level in an open case...asking $40.

I'm sure it wasn't in such sorry shape when they got it in; even years of writing abuse couldn't get it THAT dirty I'm sure. (Unless the previous owner was an absolute moron with no regard for their things, but I highly doubt that was the case...) It made me sad, because it was pretty and I wanted it, but no way was I shelling out $40 for something that I'm only going to have to seriously rehab to make usable. Even if it is in the color I want. Grrrrr....

Also tragic was the Smith-Corona Sterling that they wanted $48 for and was in even sorrier shape than the Underwood. I don't even want to think about it, the poor baby. I wanted to beat the girls at the counter about the head and shoulders with my purse, sobbing and screaming obscenities and bemoaning the fate of these beautiful machines, then run away very fast before they could call the police. While hauling the Underwood off with me and attempting to zip the case at the same time, cooing reassurances to it the whole time. They might not even call the cops, they'd be so perplexed.

So that's my story, I've had too much coffee today and written jack squat, I'm somewhere to the tune of 13K behind, and I'm sitting here procrastinating and sobbing about typewriters.

This place is getting to me. I think I'm getting the Fear.

xo
julia

p.s. I had a serious case of The Fear driving home tonight. From Marysville to Utica on I-94 it was fog so thick it was the movie adaptation of Silent Hill, even with my brights on. No amount of windshield wiping would do. When I pressed the brake, I could see my own red lights because the fog was so bad. Now imagine me driving down the freeway in a fog out of a horror movie (ten foot visibility, tops) in my long coat and earflappy hat with fruit leather hanging out of my mouth, hunched over the steering wheel like a madman. Yeah, the other drivers thought it was funny, too.