Production: Changing Toner

I spend a lot of my time playing with copy machines. Making copies, unjamming paper, dealing with staples, and adding toner.

I just finished adding toner to our machine and my hands were black. My nails still are.

Oh toner. Do you have any idea how many times I've found myself covered in toner? So so many. Hands, face, clothing. Head to toe. The worst are the toner cartridges like the one pictured above. No matter how careful you are, they make a mess. And if there happens to be a problem where the toner goes in, a broken copier, you're just screwed.

Yes, I have a toner story.

It was my first week on my first feature as a PA. I was attempting to make copies of script pages and the copier decided to give me an "Add Toner" message. I figured this was something I could handle, how hard could adding toner to copy machine be really? I could totally do this.

I ask the Production Secretary where the replacement toner is and I get to it. I pull out the cartridge, follow the instructions, so far so good. There is some shaking, some patting, and I'm ready to go.

Er, right.

I try to dump the toner into the machine. It doesn't seem to be going anywhere. You're supposed to be able to see the level of toner in the cartridge decrease. I see no such thing. So I'm thinking maybe it's emptied and I just don't know what I'm looking for.

Oh boy am I wrong. When I pulled that cartridge off of the copier... toner everywhere! Crap.

I clean up the mess and try it again. Still no luck but at least this time I know what to expect when pulling the cartridge off and manage to not make another mess.

Two goes and the copier is still out of toner. It's time to ask for help. The secretary joins me at the copier. The two of us together still can't get it to go but we at least manage to keep the mess to a minimum. Of course at this point, between my first spill and the subsequent failed attempts we've managed to waste about a quarter of the toner.

As the secretary and I are about to give up and call the maintanence guy, the APOC happens to walk by on the way to the restroom. He sees us struggling with the toner and decides that he can make it work where we have failed. Whatever. We step aside. The secretary returns to her desk to finish whatever she had been working on.

He goes through the shaking and patting and dumping. He has the cartridge on the copier, he starts to pull it away, I see what he's doing...

"Wait! That's going to spi..."

Toner. Everywhere.

He takes one look at the mess, looks up at me, laughs, and runs away.

"What the hell? I'm telling everyone you made this mess!"

He spares me one glance over his shoulder and grins.

"You go right ahead honey." And he disappears into the men's room.

I get to clean up the mess. At least ten people walk by and see me knee deep in toner.

"What did you do to the copy machine??" I get that question more than once.

"It wasn't me!"

Once the mess is cleaned up I call the service guys and make a sign warning people that the machine is out of service.

OUT OF SERVICE.
THE APOC EXPLODED THE TONER.
SERVICE COMING MONDAY.

Done and done.