Saturday, January 21, 2017

Bad day in the studio . . .

I used my studio light table yesterday morning. No problem. I want to use it again in the afternoon, it doesn’t come on. Could the bulbs be burned out? The power strip light isn’t lit. Do power strips go bad? Let’s replace it with a different one.

The plug to the power strip is behind a heavy cabinet full of slides. A cabinet with a bookcase on top. Okay. Maybe I’ll work on that later.

I go to the counter where I’m making an accordion book. It’s all nicely folded. I just need a cover for it. I have one all prepared. I brush glue onto the substrate, place the cover paper on top. FACE DOWN! What the . . .

I immediately pull it up and attempt to remove the glue. The paper isn’t liking me rubbing it with a wet paper towel. I can “fix” it (maybe), but in the meantime the glue on my accordion book substrate is beginning to dry.

I set the ruined cover paper aside and quickly pick up another paper that will work fine as a cover and set it onto the already-glued book. I turn on the tack iron to heat the page so that the glue will incorporate itself into the cover paper and the substrate I’m gluing it to.

The power strip that the tack iron is plugged into doesn’t come on. What the heck is happening here? All my studio lights are on. The plug to the power strip is nowhere near the light table plug. The studio has power, but the power strips are apparently power-less.

I put my brush into a container of water to clean off the glue. The brush pops out and water splashes everywhere. Onto the counter, onto some extra papers I had set aside, AND onto the newly-glued cover of my accordion book.

I go for a walk. The artist has left the building.

©Carol Leigh
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