Shorthand

[tamborine]

Do all police detectives write shorthand?

https://ibb.co/LC6f3LS

[lankeela]

Not sure if they still have typing pools but I have just been reading the gov.uk Covid - 19 Response document and was thinking some poor keyboard jockey had to type all that up - must be a nightmare knowing it is going to be scrutinised by millions.

[Jackdaw33]

Domestic Science was the old name. It later became Home Economics then Food and Textile Technology. God knows what it's called now.

[tamborine]

Wow lucky you, Lankeela. The most I achieved working for London solicitors was writing actors contracts for client Lionel Bart & free tickets to his shows ;)

[Barmaid]

I have seen some police statements that are barely literate!

I learned shorthand (Teeline), which has proved extremely useful for taking a note. I still use some shorthand, but have developed my own system which I can read but no one else can. I always use an ink pen though since you can write far quicker with one (I use disposable ones so when one runs out, I just pick up the next one and it saves having to cart a bottle of ink round with you).

However, I do now tend to type a note. I touch type at quite a speed (and employ shorthand in my typing). It annoys Mr BM no end that I can hold a conversation with him and still be typing very quickly.

[Hopkirk]

My brother went on a typing course (many years ago).

He was the only guy in a roomful of women.

[Jackdaw33]

I find that writing in pencil is even quicker. When I was at university I always wrote my notes in pencil then wrote them up in a legible form later in ink.

[andy-hughes]

tonyav - // Not one lad that I knew ever did shorthand or typing. //

You should have done the RSA Certificate In Office Studies course at Newcastle College that I took (and passed!) - there was a roomful of blokes there hacking away on a weekly basis.

[tonyav]

Don't think that would have been my scene, andy.

[jno]

true, tonyav, you'd probably have enjoyed the ladies' lessons much more.

I never was a secretary and never took lessons and never had shorthand, but I did learn to touch type and was pretty good at it. My skills have fallen off since I retired, partly because of cramped seating arrangements at my desk, partly because some fingers seem to have slowed down (a skilled analyst could probably read my posts and decide exactly which ones).