Mario and Luigi, My Spanish-Italian Homeboys.

Mario (left), an Olivetti-Underwood 21, and Luigi (right), an Olivetti-Underwood Studio 44. Internally, the exact same machine.
Mario (left) and Luigi (right), drug-taking, murderous videogame characters, plumbers, and racist Italian stereotypes.

These I got last week. I haven't been keeping up with the blog as I should. Luigi came first. Sadly, there is a problem with the carriage return. I'd love to fix it but I don't see why it's not working right, and I'm not willing to take it apart. It is fully funtional otherwise, if I'm inclined to manually turn the knob to advance to the next line. It is a wonderful typer, though.

Mario came a few days later and I just about fell off my chair. It's perfect in almost every way. The action, the typing, the return, the feel of it...like brand new. I've never seen anything like it. If necessary I could use parts off Luigi to fix it, but I doubt I'll need to. These are both over 45 years old. I've stopped buying typewriters, at least for now, but if and when I do it will be exclusively Olivettis and Underwoods. I'm really impressed by the quality and beauty of them.