Urgh. I’ve just had one of those nasty Riso failures that gets you covered in ink.

The master roll got stuck. Subsequent attempts to unstick it led to the thin sheets tearing down the middle as the machine struggled to reattach them to the printing drum. The beast was making growling, grinding noises as she tried to reset.

Something remained, deep within the machine, that was tearing the master paper. This is a new machine, and I don’t know whether it’s possible to flip up the print table like you could on the GR range, so I found myself pulling out all the movable parts like drums, and discharge chambers so that I could see through and work out where the obstruction was.

Then, James Herriot-like, I had to get down on my hands and knees and insert my entire arm into the delicate parts to grab the offending bit.

Following that, also like James Herriot, I had to scrub my forearms with washing up liquid to get the muck off my elbows.

Poor girl. She’s sounding a lot more contented now. All in a Lib Dem’s day’s work.