And here we pinpoint the age gap! I was a sophomore in high school then, I think.

Your high school offered Chinese? I’m depraved on account of I’m deprived!

I’d been wondering how old you are, given that IBM Executives were starting to get a bit long in the tooth when I was playing with them. But I guess you were probably typing on that particular model younger than I was. (I also always used to switch type balls in the Selectric to get real italics rather than just underlining things.)