Life Skills .... (aka: Adventures With Cyanoacrylate)

[jeshyr]

Today's quiz is especially for crafters ...

When re-assembling the tiny model Christmas Tree prior to the festive season you discover that the star on the top has been snapped off during its storage. You decide to superglue the wood back into place - it's only a small bit - and fetch the superglue.

Upon squeezing the superglue tube, nothing comes out. Do you:

A. Sensibly stop and investigate what's going on, superglue is nothing to mess around with.

B. Give up the project altogether, you obviously aren't meant to have a star on the tree.

C. Stupidly squeeze the tube harder until the tiny plug of dried superglue that was at the tip shoots out and there is a terrifying geyser of superglue all over the tree, the star, your fingers, and the lap desk.




I'll be over here in the corner continuing to pick superglue off my now-somewhat-raw fingers.

:)

r

PS
Luckily, laughing at myself is a life skill I have long mastered. I am more amused than anything... and it's a good excuse to get a new tree.

Comments

[acelightning]

d. squeeze the tube as hard as you can; the plug of dried glue stays put, but the tube splits, creating an even more terrifying explosion of superglue onto one's hands, face, glasses, hair, clothes, work surface, chair, and walls.

actually i usually just try to remove the plug of dried glue with a sewing pin. or else the whole tube has dried up, and i need to buy more glue. (and acetone, which is chemically rather nasty but easily available in the form of nail polish remover, will dissolve CA glue. it'll also dissolve a lot of things you'd rather not dissolve, though.)

*hugs* (carefully avoiding any patches of still-wet glue)

[jeshyr]

I had indeed not thought of that option - you are more creative than I!

[acelightning]

or just more impatient... :-)

[highlander_ii]

Your new best friend is full-blown acetone - it eats the cyanoacrylate off your skin. Granted, this requires there not be a sensitivity to said new BFF. Also a well-ventilated area and possibly a face mask, depending on how much of the glue you need to remove.

[niqaeli]

as others have noted, acetone is a LOVELY dissolver of many things, being as it dissolves both polar and non-polar things relatively readily

and it is ever so easily acquired in the form of nail polish remover

(can you tell i'm taking organic chemistry currently? if not: i'm taking organic chemistry, currently. :P)

as for your survey... I'd likely be A, and would end up going at the bottle of superglue with a needle, but i AM the person who managed to splatter white acrylic paint over her pants today because she squeezed when the bottle seemed slightly stop up so I can't exactly judge THAT hard <3

[feyandstrange]

I am of the "Stab a toothpick into the plugged end" people, but that can lead to its own messes. And while I have learned to respect strong glue and the like, I have failed spectacularly with less dangerous things, like tubes of frosting or hair product.

[jesse_the_k]

My sympathies. The few times I've masked up to use CA glue, I don't put the cap back on. Instead I insert a sewing pin with a nice fat glass ball on the end. It's good to grab with a needlenose plier when I want to open it again.

But really CA should come in slim single-use packets because ...