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Saturday, March 8, 2014

Kiln Shelves on the Edge of Forever


If I had a time machine - let's say it's a single-use, like those little plastic cameras they leave on the tables at wedding receptions - three possibilities would be in a tight competition for which single use I put my one chance at time travel:

  • The obvious, of course: kill Hitler, or Pol Pot, or one of those other murderous bastards who really needed killing before they could commit their bloody acts; or
  • Go back and tell my 1982 self, with my handful of graduation-gift money, to buy shares of Microsoft; or
  • Go back to December 2013, and tell my last-December-self to just scrape and grind the kiln shelves then, because I am going to hate it ten times worse when I go to bisque at the leading edge of mud season, and find my shelves not ready. It's like have some really inconsiderate studiomate. Except it's me.
I'd probably go with option 3. I've watched enough Star Trek to know that messing with the timeline is dangerous business, so the one with the least far-reaching effect seems wisest. Also, it's doubtful I could pull off a murder, if I could even bring myself to kill someone who hadn't done anything yet; and getting my 18-yr-old self to listen about anything sounds even more improbable than the time machine premise of this whole exercise.

While I am waiting for time travel to be invented, however, I might as well be grinding these shelves.

I'm back. That is my least favorite job! I'm never excited to mix glazes, either, but once I get started I can kind of get into it. Shelf grinding is just, well, a grind.

I'm considering an investment: either some kind of power tool to make this go more easily, or replace all of my shelves with Advancers. The top half of my stack are Advancers already, and they are far far easier to clean, and don't need kiln-washing. Not to mention they are easier on my back.
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6 comments:

  1. brandon phillipsMarch 8, 2014 at 11:56 AM

    Angle grinder and diamond cup. A bit of an investment but I can grind 40 shelves from the wood/salt in quick order, about an hour or so.

    ReplyDelete
  2. goejMarch 8, 2014 at 3:49 PM

    Also got my self a small angle grinder, safety Googles, gloves and dustmask, so now i can do my few shelfes in like 5 minutes. No sweat, just a lot of dust :-)

    ReplyDelete
  3. DirtKicker PotteryMarch 8, 2014 at 5:59 PM

    Advancers are worth every penny.

    Since you brought up Star Trek.. I'm always telling my husband that I desperately need a replicator. The greatest machine never invented.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Michèle HastingsMarch 8, 2014 at 6:23 PM

    Like you, we have a mix of advancers with other shelves. We also have an angle grinder. We are two potteries combined into one which makes for lots of shelves... but it also means we get lazy with shelf grinding.... oh set aside, we have extra shelves, we'll grind it later. Which leads to a whole lot of grinding and kiln washing to do one day.

    ReplyDelete
  5. Lori WattsMarch 9, 2014 at 5:27 AM

    You all have convinced me! I have to wait until after the Pottery Tour ($$), but I'm looking on Amazon for an angle grinder. And a replicator!

    ReplyDelete
  6. Lori WattsMarch 9, 2014 at 5:34 AM

    Make it so!

    ReplyDelete

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