Trolls, Black Floods and Smelly Solutions

It's a beautiful day here in Frog Pond Holler, the sun is shining bright, but it's not too hot.. just right. Residents are half heartedly preparing for the possibility that hurricane Hannah will come this way, once she makes landfall along the Carolina coast. We don't get too excited about tropical storms up here in the mountains, but they have visited us before, so there have been a few more loaves of bread and gallons of milk going out the door down at the town market.

Here at the Asylum, I noticed the other day that I had run out of black printer ink, so I called back to the giant cage where they keep valuable crap like paper clips and hi-lighters locked up and asked the cage troll to order me a new cartridge.

"Mahala, running out of printer ink, while irritating, is hardly blog worthy.. we don't have time for this!" I hear ya'll... settle down chil'ren.. let me finish.

So this morning, the cage troll comes shlagging down the hall to my cubey, tosses a box of remanufactured cartridges on my desk, taking a moment to briefly reprimand me for going through it so fast, then disappears through the door, out in to the dark abyss.

This got me to thinking.. I really shouldn't have been out of ink yet. I only use it for printing the one big customer order, which comes once a week, but then I brushed it off.

That is, until I went to install the new cartridge.

I opened the lid, reaching for the empty cartridge.. but out of the corner of my eye, I noticed something seeping from beneath the printer. A pool of thick, black ink.

I lifted the printer, leaning it back and to my horror, discovering a giant pool of ickiness, covering the entire shelf of my cart.

My morning has been filled with paper towels, glass cleaner and trash bags. My hands are a lovely shade of lavender, it's a good thing I don't get my nails done anymore. I'd be ticked if I'd stained a set of hookerlicious ho-nails. I know from years of changing cash register ribbons that alcohol is the perfect thing to remove ink from any surface. We don't have any here, so I had the bright idea to use hand sanitizer, which is 60% alcohol, but the only kind I have is from Bath and Body. The scent is Moonlight Path.

It didn't remove the ink but now my cubicle smells like a lavender scented, moonlit whorehouse.

Yaay me.

If I can just get through today, tomorrow will be Bubbles free... then the weekend. I know, some days it seems like even the light at the end of the tunnel has been turned off because we can't afford the electric bill to keep it burning.

But it's still there. I promise.

Ya'll hang tight and we'll talk again real soon.

Later Taters!