Hair Spray Isn't Just For Hair

We're working on a transparency map project at our house right now. We did one a few years ago, we took a break from it, and now we're starting a new one for a new time period — the Medieval time period just after the fall of the Roman Empire. Lots of fun gore for the boys.

Another day I'll share the map project in detail, but today I want to talk about hair spray.

I've had this bottle of hair spray since 2005.

It's moved across the state lines from Illinois to Virginia in 2006 and then from Virginia to Michigan in 2008. Even though I don't use it on my hair anymore (unless I'm having a horrible, no-good, very bad day and need to tuck in an extremely stubborn grey piece), I've kept this trusty bottle.

It's great for killing bugs when you can't stand to step on them.

You know, because they're big and they crunch.

That's also assuming you have time to get your bottle before they run away.

Vacuum cleaner hose attachments also work great too. Especially in hard-to-reach areas.

It also helps to have growing boys who don't mind the crunch.

So back to the purpose of this post. Yesterday I was printing out base map after base map after base map after...well, you get the picture. And along the way I needed to print a few transparency maps. We could just put the transparency over the original map, but because I like to do things just so, I wanted to try.

Of course the transparencies I have are not the ones you can run through your printer where the ink will dry. I found that out as I was printing off four copies of one of the maps. See that little smudge on the bottom when I realized it.

I thought maybe in time the ink would dry, but after about an hour it was just as wet as it was when I printed it.

Smart chick that I am, I thought of my hair spray. I don't really know why, I just did. I'm kind of silly that way.

I sprayed on one layer, but it was too thin. I realized I needed to do it like I'd use spray paint...cover the surface completely and thoroughly.

Worked like a charm.