It’s a common problem. You need to stick two things together. Perhaps you don’t have welding or soldering equipment lying around the house so you buy some glue. Now, I don’t know if you’ve been in an adhesives aisle recently, but the choices are overwhelming. Not only that, but ephemeral. I mean the bonding action has improved since I was a kid, but the problem is I can’t use glue fast enough. Like the old-fashioned White Out, you open a container and use it as quickly as possible because it’s going to dry out. I was reminded of this when I needed to stick some fabric to plastic (don’t ask). I tried some Elmer’s left over from when my daughter was in middle school sometime in the second Bush administration. That didn’t work.
Then I found a bottle of Gorilla glue. The problem is that it sticks to itself. So much so that I couldn’t get the bottle open. I could see there was some liquid life in there, but the top half of the contents seemed to have congealed and clung to itself. That wouldn’t work. I eventually found a tube of plastic glue and since one of the pieces for my project was plastic, I figured that’d work. Still, it made me wonder about the conscience of those who make adhesives. Surely they must know the mindset of, “oh, I’ve got lots of stuff to fix, so I better buy a reasonable size bottle.” Only, the fixing comes at widely spaced intervals and the glue can’t last that long. Various Crazy Glues are the worst. They’re one-time openers, just like White Out.
My most recent trip to the adhesive aisle brought a moment of clarification. Although I try to reduce waste, one company (not a sponsor), was selling little, tiny tubes of Crazy Glue. Single-use units. And you get six/eight per shot. That works for quite a few applications. Still, I’ve got a number of half-full (I’m an optimist) bottles of various glues that can’t seem to get over themselves. I guess the lesson we’re to take home is buy in small quantities, even though the unit cost is higher. You can always buy two, no? Things don’t break at convenient times, unfortunately. You run to the closet to see what glue you’ve got. Then you drive to the store to get some that’s not all gummed up in the bottle. It’s a dilemma. Just like that nagging question of why someone’s trying to stick cloth on plastic.
