Vehicle of Dreams

Post-Script:
When you're young and struggling to start a career, you're more likely to be geographically flexible. But, as you settle down into a job, start a family and buy a house, there's this tendency to begin to relate to your town and neighborhood in the way that a house becomes a home.This is the context from which I explore my neighborhood and reflect upon its aging.

(Typecast via Olivetti Underwood 21 onto endless roll of paper, images via Lumix G5)

Waiting for the Other Shoe

(Typecast via Olivetti Underwood 21, photo via Lumix G5)

Ballooning Photos

Post-Script:
Click here to see the entire Flickr set of images from this year's balloon fiesta. Typecast via Olivetti Underwood 21 (with fresh ribbon), images via Lumix G5.

Changing of the Guard

Post-Script: No, my typing desk usually isn't this uncluttered, but I had to do something to make the photo a bit more appealing. As for the 2nd photo, that Remington Rem-Riter portable typing instruction booklet came in the Olivetti 21's case, when I purchased it at the thrift store that's no longer in business. Which begs the question of where the booklet came from, and which also reminds me of how I found this machine in the first place.

I might have mentioned in a previous blog entry the story of this typewriter, how I walked into a thrift store that was in a little strip mall on the corner of Lead and Yale near UNM, saw the typewriter case and inquired as to the machine's condition and history. Turns out the typewriter had been brought into the store by a man who claimed to have ridden to New Mexico in the late 1960s on a motorcycle and traded his bike for this machine, intent on establishing himself as a writer. I never did learn his name. But inside the case, along with the Rem-Riter instruction booklet was the original receipt for the typewriter, that indicated it had indeed been involved in some sort of trade-in, because the addresses of the office machine store and car lot were on the same block of Lomas Blvd., about the same location where today Brown & Smith still hangs their shingle, one of several typewriter shops still doing business in Albuquerque. Perhaps it is the same shop but with a different name. I don't know what works of literature this machine might have produced throughout the intervening years, but it's a fine enough machine for serious typing, and thus I'm going to have to get a fresh ribbon installed.

 I do notice the tops of the letters seem to be a bit light, as if the slugs aren't striking the platen exactly even. Could be an alignment issue, a platen issue or an artifact of needing a new ribbon. Old man Brown, at the typewriter shop, knows me as "the guy with all the machines that he doesn't want to pay to get fixed". In other words, I'm a tightwad with my money. Perhaps it's time to circulate some of my machines, one at at time, through his shop for service.

(Photos via Lumix G5 "Toy Camera" scene mode, slight curves adjustment in Photoshop to boost mid-tone contrast.)

Once Fresh Dreams of Youth

(Written using iAWriter on iPad2, typecast via Corona 4 on endless roll of paper, photos via Lumix G5)

Carbon Paper Casting

Post-Script: Of course, using carbon paper with one's endless roll of paper could prove troublesome, since you can't find an endless roll of carbon paper, unless you did one of those Breaking Bad-style, late-night break-ins to the carbon paper factory. Which I don't recommend. Typing via carbon paper reminded me about the Summer of '08, a formative time in the Typosphere when Strikethru and others were coating paper with thick layers of colorful crayon wax and using that as a form of stencil to type upon, transferring the colored wax to another sheet. I also tried typing onto aluminum foil, which was interesting. For those of you new to the Typosphere, it might provide hours of fun doing some research into the archives of the Typosphere, and try your hand at pressure-transfer typing.

Book-Casting, Part 1

Post-Script: I've wanted to do this for some time, excerpt some of my favorite passages from my favorite books, retyping them onto a manual typewriter, as if it were somehow possible (or permissible) to revisit the experience of what it must have been like for their respective authors to have held in their hands their finished manuscripts. The experience of sharing some of one's favorite writings with a wider audience is important, I think, to developing a deeper culture within the Typosphere. Certainly this week was rich with good material from Richard Polt, Fossils Without Fear, and Typecast. I certainly feel that the importance of typecasting has to go beyond mere typing about typewriters, that these machines still have some life left in them for the composing of truly creative works. Or, in the case of this posting, typing excerpts from the creative works of others. I've not made any conscious effort to retain historical accuracy regarding the type of machine each respective author might have used in drafting their manuscripts. In the case of Kerouac there are references to both a 1930s Underwood (at the Kerouac museum) and a Hermes 3000 (at auction at Christie's); most likely he used a number of machines throughout his career. Meanwhile Searcy may have likely used a word processor, being as how his novel was published in 2002. I'll probably continue to do this in the future, excerpting passages from my personal library to share with you.

Party On!

Post-Script: I normally avoid politics as a general policy of my blog, but some things are too obviously important to ignore. If this post offends you, feel free to visit some other time when I'll return to discussing more important matters like photography and typewriters. Images via Lumix G5, typecast upon endless roll of paper via Corona 4.