Gocco Explosion
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Well before I start on the cover story I should say that I finally got our new car inspected. I went over to Regan's Texaco in Auburndale after phoning the dealership (and their stickers still hadn't come in) and Chestnut Hill Texaco (and their inspection machine still wasn't working). It took only about four minutes of waiting and three minutes of inspection. You'd hope a brand-new car would pass with no trouble, but if I had been going around in a nice REJECTED sticker and embarassing the dealership for a month I could have lived with that too. Can you tell that I was annoyed that the car didn't have a sticker when we picked it up?
OK, cover story. Every year we print an edition of Rosh HaShanah (Jewish New Year) cards on our Gocco printer. It's an instant photo silk screen printer that's just right for postcards and greeting cards, that is, maximum print size is about four by six inches. I saw it demonstrated on the street in Tokyo, in front of the gorgeous stationery store Itoya on the Ginza, about 15 years ago (I had been sent to the Semicon Japan trade show that year). When I told people at my company's Tokyo office that I had bought it, and when I went through Japanese customs with it, I got a lot of giggles. Maybe my prize purchase was advertised on late-night TV and not available in stores -- the Veg-A-Matic of graphic arts. It really works, though. You can make a stencil in seconds and crank out multicolor printed postcards in minutes. At the time I got it it wasn't sold in the US, and I was pleased to be the first on my block to have one, though it was tough to get replacement supplies. You can find Gocco printers in mainstream art supply stores in the US nowadays.
The way the thing works is that you put your original (preferably a xerox copy of artwork or a laser print -- the kind of ink or toner makes a difference) down in the printer, put a master stencil on top of it, put two flashbulbs in a housing on top, and close the top firmly. The flashbulbs go off and the heat burns a coating off the stencil where the image is. You take the stencil out of the printer, squeeze ink (whatever colors you want in whatever parts of the design you want) onto the stencil, put it back in the printer, and crank out prints.
Anyway, tonight Arlene had resized one of her stamp designs up to the biggest that would fit on a Gocco stencil and laser printed it out. We put it in the printer and put in the flashbulbs and pressed down to make a stencil. POP! There was not only a flash from the flashbulbs, but a whole small explosion three inches from my hand. I had dropped one of the flashbulbs on the floor, and I bet that was enough to make it shatter when it went off. I mean, they always have a warning “May shatter,” but in spite of years of taking pictures before there were electronic flashes this is the first one I've had explode. The flashbulb housing flew up out of the printer and broken glass flew around the table and floor. Fortunately the flashbulb housing was between the bulb and my face. Cleaning up set the project back ten minutes, but we got finished in time for me to index twenty stamp mounts, start a batch of bread (it's going to be 60% whole wheat, with dried fruit), and write a little. It doesn't look as thought I'll get to cut out any parts of shirts tonight.
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