The originial laptop

My original laptop. I'm not exactly sure how old it is. It's an Antares Parva, which is a series of Italian portable typewriters first produced in 1954. Mine's probably from the early 1960s. I got it as a gift from my folks in the mid-90s. It's in surprisingly good condition considering I've beat the crap out of it over the years : )



Countless examples of bad poetry, bad short stories, and bad love letters were written on my little friend here. Unfortunately, they were all written by me.



Obviously I've moved beyond this typewriter. Since I stopped using it, I've burned through three laptops so far. For all their conveniences, laptop computers don't seem to last long enough to make it to the status of "an old friend". Score one for analog.



In fact, four decades after it was built this thing still works. Heck, it's been at least five years since I last used it and the ribbon's still good. Look, you can barely see it, but I typed out "Blogger Sucks". Blogger doesn't actually suck. Blogger's awesome. I have a lot more confidence, though, that my typewriter will still be working forty years from now than I do in Blogger.

Forty years from today, I'll be typing just by thinking words. Then my poetry will really suck, and so will the short stories. The love letters might get more interesting.