I've admitted to my accident proneness in the past, but this particular blunder frustrated me to no end. I keep a grocery list on the frig. It has a magnet on the back, and sticks up there quite nicely. It's in a central location. and the fam jam can add items to the list as they run out. I'd just run out of pages and was getting out a fresh notepad, but it had no magnet on the back. In my mind, I thought tearing off the magnet from the old pad and gluing it to the back of the new one would solve the problem. Boy was I wrong.
I was so proud of myself for coming up with this simple solution. It would be cost efficient and recycling all at the same time. I gave myself a little pat on the back for my brilliance. The Good Book says pride cometh before the fall. It didn't lie.
I unscrewed the tiny cap and squeezed the super glue tube expecting a small stream to land on the back of the magnet. What I got was an explosion of sticky stuff all over my hands. In the past, I'd avoided super glue in general because the stories of folks gluing their fingers together scared me to death. I'd used it only when absolutely necessary to avoid that very thing, and it had just happened to me!
There I was, super glue all over both hands, trying to figure out how to get it off. If I turned on the faucet, would my hands stick to the knob? A towel was completely out of the question. I accidentally stuck two fingers together and had a slight panic attack prying them apart before the glue dried. (The stories were true by the way, because the effort it took to separate my fingers was no joke.) I leaned into the kitchen counter and jumped to lunge myself towards the faucet to turn the hot water on with my elbow. My arms are short, so this was no small task. It took a couple of tries, but I succeeded!
For your information, hot water does not wash off super glue. I couldn't really rub my hands because I was petrified to stick them together again. Using the hand soap was not an option, my elbow had no chance of reaching it. I just stood there with my hands under the hot water for a minute or so, then shook them to fling the water off. That was a total waste of 60 seconds.
After my hands dried, I picked up the container to read what I could use to get the stuff off. It should've been dry by now, but nope! It only resulted in more wet super glue on my hands, and I threw the tube down on the counter so I wouldn't have it permanently attached to a finger. I retrieved nail polish remover and poured it on my hands, rubbing feverishly and praying it wouldn't take the skin off. It worked a tad, but I was left with dried, hard glue all over my hands that kept me from feeling the tips of my fingers. I tried filing it down with an emery board, but that didn't work either. I tried picking it off, but it wasn't budging. Finally, I surrendered. It would have to wear off in time.
The next day, I was scared silly to shampoo for fear of getting my hands stuck in my hair after re-wetting the glue, but something magical happened. With a little scrubbing, the shampoo took the glue right off my hands. I was free! Can I get a "Hallelujah?"
Holy moly, I'm staying away from super glue from now on. I've scrubbed off the hardened residue from the countertop, thrown the tube of pure evil in the trash, and put the whole ordeal behind me. Lesson learned. Until I purchase a magnet-backed version, the new grocery notepad will just have to sit on the counter beside the frig.
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