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Thursday, March 24, 2011

3800 mussels, 940 blades of grass, and 500 brown dots on my hands

My teacher, Dawn Holder, is having a show in Tampa, FL for this year's NCECA (National Council for the Education of Ceramic Arts), which is next weekend.  I have been one of her busy little helpers getting everything made for this show and I have to say...NO MORE MUSSELS! 

Theme provided by NCECA for about ten of these installation shows is migration.  Dawn's project is about these invasive mussels from China that are not inhabiting the waters near Tampa.  There will also be clusters of sea grass that are native to Tampa but are now invading Chinese waters.  These will be displayed in a ten by twenty foot gallery space.  She is also bringing with her giant logs that she will cover with clay and then place the mussels into the clay just as they could come out of mud in the water.    The picture on top shows these mussels with a coat of pearlescent glaze on them before firing and the picture on the bottom is after they have been fired.  To make these mussels, Dawn and I made press molds from actual mussels in plaster.  Then small bits of clay could be pressed into each mold and after the clay stiffens up a bit, the two halves can be attached.  Before being bisque fired, they are given three layers of color sliped, turquoise, brown, and black to imitate the natural colors of mussels.  Then after the bisque firing, they are dunked into glaze and given a final firing.  The same process was used for the blades of grass.  The small patches you see on the glazed mussels are where we had to wipe away some glaze on the bottom before putting them into the kiln because otherwise they would glue themselves to the kiln shelf.  That can latter be patched up with clear nail polish.  
I also noticed this the same day I was unloading the mussels.  I currently have many many brown dots the size of the head of a needle clustered on the tips of my thumb, index, and middle of my right hand with scattering every where else on my hand and palm with a small cluster also on my left hand in the pouch between my thumb and index finger.  These spots do not itch or wash off.  They seem to be embedded into my skin.  I was beginning to freak out a lot last night and wasted a couple hours researching online about what it could possibly be but I could not find an answer.  There are plenty of people online who have posted on forums that described exactly what you see in this photo but no one had a clear answer.  I showed this to my professors today and we have found the culprit: silver nitrate.  I was making a cone 10 in-glaze luster recipe with a couple other students for my surfaces class and I was handling toxic materials.  I'll pause for a moment and just say that I work with around materials that could harm my health and I especially have to be careful with the air that I breath and wear a respirator when I am adding particles to the air around me that could get in my lungs.  This glaze called for 50 grams of silver nitrate, which costs about $100 and comes in small 25 gram pill-like bottles.  I was wearing a respirator and goggles but for some reason I didn't wear gloves while opening these bottles and emptying them into the glaze buckets.  For the rest of the glaze making process where I was in direct contact with materials, I did wear gloves.  I guess since I thought that I wasn't actually touching the material inside that I wouldn't get any on me but there must have been traces of the material on the small jars.  Silver nitrate has real silver in it and it is toxic and corrosive (which I later found out by experience).  The metal can leave stains on skin and can even leave burn marks if really grabbed by the horns.  The little amount that I came into contact with will not do any harm to me but I will have to suffer with "dirty" fingers for few days to a few weeks.  My teacher, Matt Towers, has experienced this before himself and assured me that I will be fine but this must be a lesson to me to always wear gloves!  It looks like someone dipped a toothbrush in brown paint and then ran their finger over the bristles so the paint flicked off onto my hand in the tiniest of flecks.  These spots also accompany a slowly fading rash on my wrist that I got from mixing glaze the other day...I promise to take better care of myself!

30 comments:

  1. Katie- Hey and I thought you just grabbed a glob of clay and shaped it to your vision. Reality is
    industrial accidents are just waiting to hurt the unwary. Glad you're wary. Andy, sire of Young Mr. Pain.

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  2. Thank you so much. I could not find out what these spots were but was in a chem lab and it makes sense now. whew.

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    1. OMG! ME TOO! I was so scared as to what these dots are. Yea I was also handling silver nitrate in school without gloves. Makes so much sense! Am so relieved!! Thank you so mucn

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  3. I was in chem lab yesterday and today I woke up to find those small dots on my right hand. THANK YOU! I was starting to freak out but calmed down a bit after reading your post

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  4. I'm so confused. These spots appear on my hands whenever I read certain hardcover books. I seriously don't get it.

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    1. Super weird. I just noticed these on my fingertips. Found this forum and was about to comment how I have not been in chem lab and don't think silver nitrate is the culprit for me... Read your comment and I've just set my Harry Potter and the Cursed Child hardcover down... Now wondering of it is book related. Can't say I've ever noticed it before despite being an avid reader. But it's an awfully strange coincidence that's for sure.

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    2. Have you figured out what these specs are?? I have worked with silver nitrate before, but not in a long time. Then I saw your comment about books....and sure enough the day before these dots appeared I was reading a book on the airplane. That is the only thing I can think of that is similar in anyone's situation.

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    3. Has anyone seen a doctor about this? I too have gotten these dots while reading a book on a plane. I also got it while laying down on my stomach, supported by my elbows. I have a feeling it’s a circulation issue.

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  5. Silver nitrate... That makes sense. Thank you for saving me a whole lot of worry.

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  6. Hi Katie, did these spots wear off for you? How long did it take to disappear? Thanks for posting this because this is exactly what my 16 year old daughter has and she is worried it may be a health issue.

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  7. Please update if these specks do fade away.....

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    1. Was just wondering if you are in Florida? My son just had this happen too at school! This web page saved some worrying!

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  8. Whew!!! Thanks to your post this saved a lot of worry tonight! My son is in HS and just had Chemistry this week and they used Silver Nitrate! We will notify school !! Worried mom are you in Florida was just wondering if our kids are at the same school!

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  9. I am a Operating Room Nurse and we use silver nitrate sticks for coagulation. I was holding the bottle yesterday without gloves and woke up to the same exact spots all over the palms of my hands. First time it has ever happened to me.

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  10. so what is the measure remedies that one can take to cure it

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  11. These spots are scatered on my palm to fingers,,, but i never handle any chem product like silver nitrate, yu got yur answers but me wat can b the other causes ,,, m worried.

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  12. I had brown dots identical to the ones in your picture suddenly appear on my palms today. I work in a lab but don't ever handle silver nitrate. However, yesterday I was wearing nitrile gloves all day. Do you think this could have caused the dots? I was quite worried when they appeared suddenly.

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  13. Earlier in the week I was involved in an activity in Anatomy where I ended up getting poked in my fingers and hands a lot and when I saw the dots on my hands I got scared and thought that I had developed some life threatening disease or something. I'm also currently taking chemistry AND ceramics so I'm not sure in which class I was exposed to silver nitrate but I feel relieved reading that the tiny black dots will eventually go away. Thank you for posting your story.

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  14. I discovered that I had these same dots across 4 of my fingers on my right hand. I got really scared. But as I was reading this I remembered that I had just performed a lab that used silver nitrate in my high school chemistry class.

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  15. I have these spots all over my palms. When I woke up this morning, I noticed more on the back of my hand and on my fingers. I haven't been in contact with silver nitrate though. 😕😕😕

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  16. Ohhh ... Exact happed with me. I got plenty of black spots in between my middle finger and index finger of right hand also those spots on left hand's plan 18-20 dots. I also used silver nitrate . What should I do now ?

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    1. I would try washing your hands a lot.. but by now they should probably be gone..

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  17. I also have the little black spots on my fingertips, but I have not been in contact with any silver nitrate over the last few days. Any other suggestions???
    - A worried teenage girl

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  18. Can someone help me please??! I have these exact same spots on the tip of my toe. It may have something to do with being a dancer on pointe shoes, but I still don't know what it is, could it possibly be fungi?? SOMEONE HELP ME PLEASE!

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  19. thank you very much!!i was starting to freak out i thought i had cancer..thank you again

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  20. a lot of things can cause them. i get little dots just like this in the middle of my palm. My derm said mine was from heat and staining from tannins in my work. he thought it was a common fungal infection at first then thought it might be a less known one called pitted keratolysis but then ruled that out... just heat heat transferred tannin stains. lol

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  21. Normally I don't learn article on blogs, however I wish to say that this write-up very pressured me to try and do it! Your writing taste has been surprised me. Thank you, quite nice article. And also with our web site, Add Hunters you're going to benefit from our international usages!Items listed on Add Hunters include electronics, pets, cars and, vehicles and other categories including land and property. Feel free to visit our web site http://www.addhunters.com damac seaviews

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  22. I don't know if I have the same problem as everyone else here or not. Over a year ago I noticed three black dots in my right middle finger. I thought it was a splinter and my mom proceeded to try and dig them out of my hand, but within 5 minutes they just reappeared. Since then, they've just started to multiply, but they all remained localized to the tip of the middle finger in a section where my visibly raised from the rest, and had a bunch of wholes in it. It's like looking into a small bee hive. Yesterday, I noticed there's another black dot on my index finger. I haven't been in a lab in almost three years though, and neither of these are going away.

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  23. Hello! I have had similar dots on my fingers, I was handling with silver nitrate too, but I don't really know how to get the dots off of my skin. I have been washing my hands and seen a little improvement.. what do you guys think?

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