It’s not everyday that you get invited to a birthday party at a glass blowing studio (great idea). My uncle had done glass blowing as a hobby for years, but he was a scientist with expertise in combustion, so I took no comfort from his experience.

I learned the following things: You don’t mix red with any other color because it overpowers the other color. You don’t touch certain parts of the blowpipe because it’s really hot (good tip). And you don’t tug on Superman’s cape (okay, I already knew that one).

You wipe the end of the blowpipe off with alcohol to clean it before blowing into it. I don’t like to drink and drive, so I opted for making a paperweight (even though I haven’t used paper in years), for which you don’t have to blow (so I don’t know what to call what I did).

The staff of the studio kept things simple for us (thank you), but I think we used things called pincers, markers, blocks, tweezers, and paddles, based upon my post party investigation (https://www.thehouseofglassinc.com/dictionary.htm). The most important tool, however, was the staff, without whose considerable help we would have wound up with items that looked like they went through the transporter in Jeff Goldblum’s version of The Fly, instead of the very nice pieces we crafted.

There were many conversations at the party, but my favorite (which I gratuitously mention for a couple of my followers) was the one I had, with a guest who knew him, about the eating habits of former St. Louis University Billikens basketball coach Rick Majerus. You just can’t pick that kind of information up on the street.

The only thing missing from the party was background music. Perhaps a nice oldies medley including Ring of Fire, Glass Onion, and Blowin’ in the Wind would have been appropriate.