In the time since I have started my studio design course, I have struggled through the many strange and wonderful assignments my professors have previously assigned. I never thought that one would lead directly to my near death. In the past week, this has happened twice.

This public service announcement is brought to you by a local struggling college student.

Our assignment is to create a floating device, using only two 4X8 ft. sheets of cardboard and one roll of packing tape. We are not allowed to use any other materials whatsoever. Said float should support one person on your team of three (guess who got the short straw?) without getting said person wet.

In an attempt to “stretch the rules”, (which was encouraged by our supervising professor, a “think outside the box” drill, if you will), one of my teammates got the bright idea that if we could somehow make a glue out of the materials at hand, we could better seal our joints. As my two comrades live in the dorms, without access to a stove, guess who got that job?

I knew this was going to smell bad, so I cleared my three kiddos from the room, opened up the kitchen windows, and switched the exhaust fan on high. I then wadded a rather large amount of packing tape into a loose ball. You’re smart, you can see where this is going, right?

I grabbed one of my oldest small frying pans, one that is rarely if ever used anymore. I tossed the ball in and turned up the heat. I took several shots with my camera as the thing started to melt.

And melt.

I realized in quick order that I was actually photographing fumes as they rolled off of this disgusting, sticky, horrible smelling mess. I was actually across the street from a tire factory when it blew up about 10 years ago, and it was much more pleasant than this goo. I believe I now know what The Bog of Eternal Stench was intended to smell like. I grabbed a trivet so I wouldn’t scorch my table, and holding the abomination as far away from my nostrils as possible, I set it down. I stuck my palette knife in the guck in the hopes that I just might still be able to spread the stuff over the fake little joint I had prepared.

Nothin’ doin’! I couldn’t step within a foot of my kitchen table without fighting the urge to gag. Repeatedly. I stepped away, and as I glanced back I noticed my steak knife was stuck fast, and my palette knife had melded with the mess. It probably would have made great glue, had anyone been brave enough to get close to it before it hardened. I tossed the whole mess in the trash (after it had cooled) and took it immediately to the curb.

Four hours later I was still nauseated. I almost poisoned my fool self, I think. So to recap, under no circumstances, should you try to make glue out of packing tape. I don’t care if you find yourself in sudden need for just a little bit of glue to finish your AOL CD sculpture, or if you are suddenly struck with divine inspiration for a fantastic practical joke, if only you had a bit of glue… Don’t be cheap, go buy real glue.

I told my partners that if they had anymore bright ideas they could test them themselves.

This worked just fine until I found out what we were doing next. Stay tuned to Part 2 of Public Service Announcements for Idiots.