The clock reads 2:58 a.m. I guess this is what you could almost call an “all-nighter.” That’s what my friends used to do back in college the night before a term paper was due. It was called “pulling an all-nighter.” It was a status symbol of sorts but something I never did – well, except for one time. There I was with my Olivetti typewriter plinking away into the night. I didn’t manage very well, and my eyes kept closing of their own accord. To add insult to injury, I kept forgetting which cartridge was for black and which one was for white.

I bet many of you don’t even know what I’m talking about, so for once, I’m going to explain to the younger generation something about hi-tech in the ’80s. You see, when I was a little girl, my parents had what was called a manual typewriter. I couldn’t even use it. Each key had to be pressed down very hard, unlike the electric typewriter that I learned to type on. Well, my parents’ version had these ribbons of ink on rolls that had to be put into the typewriter in a certain way. By the time I was typing, those old-fashioned ribbons were obsolete, and cartridges had come into fashion. These devices were inserted into the side of the typewriter: one with the black ink tape and one with the white eraser tape. If you wanted to remove a mistaken letter or word you had typed, you would align the typewriter just so and then retype the error over the white tape, and it would erase it. Oh, we thought we were so fancy.

My husband and I found some dining room chairs at a lovely consignment store. We were looking to replace our own dining room chairs, which we had found several years ago in a similar shop. We spotted these “new” chairs after debating long and hard about another set of chairs we had discovered in another display close by. Those other chairs were in mint condition but unfortunately had a hefty price to go along with them. It was while we were debating whether to buy them that we stumbled across this other set. These chairs were more in keeping with my husband’s and my taste, and the price was less than a third of the other ones. It was almost a no-brainer, and before we knew it, they were sitting in our dining room.