"New" Typewriter

The other day I picked up a new typewriter which I had won in an auction on eBay. It's a Brother Deluxe 1350, which I bought for GBP4.99. The low price is due to it being sold as pick-up only, and as it wasn't far from my home, I thought it was worth a punt.

I've had a quick turn on it, and taken a few photos which I do not have the time to upload just at the moment, and it's a lovely machine. I'm delighted with it, especially when I see that a similar typewriter sold for GBP37. It seems to have a nice, smooth action, and although I have not mastered all the keys yet, I hope to shortly. I particularly like the fake wood panelling on the front, which reminds me of the fake wood on old American station-wagons (here in the UK we had real wood on our cars). The font is a standard "Elite" typewriter font, but I'm no expert on these matters (I'm trying to find out more about different fonts). My wife is already concerned that I may get fixated on amassing a large collection of typewriters, but in fact I only want a few more (at least I tell myself this). If I could get hold of a nice script-font model, an Olivetti Lettera 22/32 cheaply and one with a Techno Pica typeface, I'd be happy...for a while, at any rate.

Another feature on this Brother is the fact that a previous owner, who I guess must have been a student, stuck a number of football stickers on the side. Apart from the team's sticker (Manchester United) there are stickers of a few players from the team which won everything in sight around the turn of this century: Ole Gunnar Sokskjaer, Ryan Giggs and Peter Schmeichel . I found this amusing, because Brother were the shirt sponsors for United's local rivals Manchester City in the 1990s.

Back to stationery: on eBay, as in football, you win some and you lose some. I had bid on a printing set but I was unsuccessful this time around. I'll keep looking.

Another typecast to follow soon...