bubble bubble toil and trouble

There is very little so satisfying as standing back and having hundreds of finished cards, cards you designed and finally printed, laid out just ready to be folded and sent off to stores.

It was almost the only redeeming thing to the horrors of last week, which was one of those weeks where just nothing seemed to go right. What follows is a list of the most major problems.

Iggy (aka the Warthog) was being a real beast. The platen took ages to adjust evenly, and then once it was, I couldn't shake a worrying clanking noise. The folks at Briarpress alternately think it's nothing and something awful. I've been instructed to listen with a screwdriver.

A locked up chase exploded while printing, spraying furniture into the press. You'd never imagine that a little piece of wood could bend a half inch thick piece of metal so dramatically. Luckily it's just the gripper bars, which I don't use anyway, so I can take my time getting it fixed/replaced.

Then, frazzled, I put the chase back in upside down. This lead to the destruction of two of my favorite guides and some irreparable dents in my favorite Boxcar Base. Doh! In my defense I would like to point out that it was a symmetrical polymer plate centered on the base which was neatly centered in the chase. This chase has now been painted on one side, clearly indicating BOTTOM.

Frustrated beyond belief, all printing switched to the Vandercook for the remainder of the week. She was far more compliant.

Still not finished - a set of wedding invitations I printed Friday and Saturday came out delightfully. Then I caught the date typo. The client had signed off on the design, but nevertheless it will need to be reprinted. On the bright side, I've got a nice addition of samples to my collection.

Those were only the PRINTING problems.

• our phone lines went down, and perhaps had been having problems for several weeks (verizon came and fixed it)
  
• the flood a few weeks back left a lingering mustiness in the carpets (carpet cleaners finally came, only evicting us for about three hours and leaving a whole new kind of wet carpet smell)
  
• I stepped out of my car into six inches of water in the parking lot (luckily I had one spare sock in the shop - I have no idea where it came from, or why there was only one, except that it was definitely mine, and it was dry)

Thank goodness for neat rows of finished cards.