PAPER, INK, KEYS...

Look at your desk. Do you have a typewriter there? No? Do you have a keyboard then? You must have something on your desk or you would not be interested in typing at all.

Okay then, whatever you use is okay with me. Whatever. It’s your choice. But it isn’t the same if you use a pencil – that is called writing.

Typing on a typewriter involves a great deal of skill. These machines are old and stupid and they make noises that give me a headache. But they are what my Mama used and what her Mama used and they are what I use.

Computers are okay and keyboards can be nice but I want to talk about typewriters first.

So, sit down and keep a straight back. Look at the typewriter and look at the letters on it. These are called keys. I don’t know why because they do not unlock anything but there you go, another stupid English word…

You have to put your fingers on the keys in a certain way and hit the keys to make a print on the paper. This is called typing.

Touch typing is when you can touch your nose when you hit the keys and I can do that very well. In fact, I can type with one hand and manicure my nails with my teeth.

Violet can only type with two fingers and even then she gets ink all over the place and it is up to me, Vita to clean the stupid desk. That is not why I am here and I think that it is slave labour to make me do these things but if it stops Violet from squawking in my ear then that is good because she gives me more of a headache than the typewriter does.

Typing is handy because it means that you don’t have to write anything, only if you want to sign your name at the end of the letter.

The paper goes in at the top and when you get to the end you have to use another piece of paper.

The ink makes the letters and when the ink is run out you have to put more ink in.

There is a bell that makes a noise when you get to the end of a line and that bell makes my budgie Mr Scrimpy flap his wings and say “I told you so.”