Typing Test

I remember how nervous I used to get when I would have to take a typing test in school or during a job interview.

That was back in the days of typewriters and when you had to use liquid "White Out" for typing errors.

White Out was not my friend. I would end up with it on my clothes, in my hair, all over the typewriter.....and you could still see my error. I remember once my typing teacher in 9th grade, Mr. Ploof, came in the room and was laughing at me. He told me I looked like I got in a fight with a White Out bottle............and the White Out bottle won!

Because White Out was so not my thing, and the later invention of correction tape was even sooo much worse, I learned to NOT make typing mistakes. If I could get it right the first time it saved me so much time, trouble, stained clothes, messed up hair (I have even had White Out in my eyelashes) in the end it was my obsession and typing errors were my ultimate fear.

I was the carriage return queen. My little bell would be tinging away. Oh how I loved the typewriter and carriage return!

When I was in high school I could type 86 words per minute. After I graduated and went to school for stenography my typing skills were pretty good.......125 per minute. This was all with NO mistakes.

I remember going into job interviews. It was always the same......

"Now is the time for all good men to come to the aid of their country"

I still think I could type that at 200 words per minute......or possibly more.

My hands would be shaking. The person interviewing me would be standing over my shoulder (which I cannot stand to this day. If I am on the computer, writing or typing.....DO NOT stand over my shoulder!!! Bad things will happen to you!!!)

I would finish the typing test.......with no mistakes......(heaven forbid they would get out the RED pen and start circling........that was even scarier than the White Out). Then I would be told I could type. I already knew that and had told them that, but now that they had seen it for themselves, it made it so.

I was always a nervous wreck. I never enjoyed it, and the thoughts of it bring back butterflies in my stomach and the thoughts of blue eye shadow, the smell of Aquanet mixed with "Gee Your Hair Smells Terrific" and dark "nude" nylons.

I miss the days of the typewriter. I have never and will never type as good on a computer keyboard. It doesn't have the same charm and charisma, and I can't hear the "ding' to monitor my progress.

I found a "Typing Test" online that I took.

Everything changes with time. Even typing tests. It is random words now....no longer:

"Now is the the time for all good men to come to the aid of their country".

(They have done scientific studies....blah...blah....blah (I guess in the 1980's they didn't have scientific studies) ).

Since we have talked about that sentence extensively I feel compelled to let you know its history.

It was originally:

"Now is the time for all good men to come to the aid of the party".

The sentence was devised to test the speed of the first typewriter in the fall of 1867, in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, during an "exciting political campaign" by Charles E. Weller. "The" was later changed to "their" and "party" to "country" in typing textbooks.

I haven't taken a typing test for so many years, and I have never taken one on a computer keyboard. Here are my results (with no mistakes :) ) but much slower without my "ding".

See how you do!


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Typing Test