F’zer gave me a mat cutter for Christmas, something that I had asked for.   I was really happy to get it, but for one reason or another I didn’t actually get around to using it till today.

I found out a few things.   First of all, I remembered pretty well how to use a mat cutter, since it’s been about 20 years since I cut mats on a regular basis (when I was working in the camera store).   Second, when they say “use it on a level surface” they really mean it.   I think all the mistakes I made were due to my putting the mat cutter on the floor, on top of my cardboard fabric-cutting board.   Well, what can I say, there really is no flat surface in this house big enough to support a mat cutter and a large piece of mat board.   I’m going to have to see what I can do about clearing off the big work table in the garage.

Third, cutting mat board is easy.   Cutting mat board when you’ve got a 25-pound cat who absolutely, positively, will not get his butt off your work surface…   well, let’s just say I’m locking his ass in the bathroom before I ever get started on a mat cutting project again.

Which will likely be tomorrow.   I got out the cutter today for a specific project:   Putting a new mat in the frame that now holds the rubbing of my friend Bob Haney’s name, from the Vietnam Memorial in Washington.   The frame is the right size, but the mat that came with it (designed for panoramic photos) isn’t. But I could not find that frame anywhere today when I looked in all the places I thought I might have put it.

While I was looking for the frame, the cats had a major territorial dispute over who would get to flop out in the middle of that grand expanse of cardboard on the floor.   Before all was said and done, the cat tree had been knocked askew, pictures on the piano had been overturned, I’d been scared right out of my desk chair by a flying feline and the two of them had pretty well smacked each other silly.

Tybalt won.   And Calypso sat on the piano glaring at him and snarling softly to herself for a considerable time afterwards, as if there were not plenty of room on the cardboard for two cats.

I eventually decided to cut a double-opening mat for the Chinese prints that have been on the wall over my dresser since we moved in here, and that’s when I discovered the logistics of mat-cutting and utterly futile cat-removal.   Let’s just say that my first attempt was my practice mat.

F’zer found the missing frame tonight, because it was just visible from his chair.   I had indeed put it on top of the books in the living room bookshelves, but I’d shoved it so far back I couldn’t see it.   Sigh.   Well, at least I looked for it in the right place.

So, tomorrow I try again.   With every last cat in the house behind locked doors.

Hope you'll recommend my posts via your favorite social media. Just don't copy the material as your own.