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71 Bouquets of 5 balloons – all on my own……. but I ran out of helium.

I have now upgraded myself from Chief Bonehead to Legend as today I did 71 bouquets of 5 balloons on my own.

Now then….. 71 sets of 5 is not a problem if nothing goes wrong. I arrived at Hall 3 in the ICC at 12 midday all chilled out and ready for action.

As usual I didn’t think it was worth taking the split second sizer (I can’t be bothered with plug sockets and all that stuff).

I set my cylinder facing the wall and used the gap as a sizer (this works fine as long as the cylinder is not moved).

I made 1 bouquet just to check my skills and placed it on a table – looked cool to me so yes I am a legend. Then I popped off to mess around with 71 party packs. I returned, inflated a few balloons (about 50) and decided it was time for lunch. So off I popped to the ICC restaurant to see what the chef had to offer a humble balloon man like myself.

Anyway……. I returned once more and began inflating and bunching. As the balloon weights are boxed in 12′s I bunched the balloons 12 at a time and 12 on a table (the tables closest to where I was working).

This helped to break up the boredom and keep an eye on where I was at. I completed 2 tables and was happily blasting away when the pressure in the cylinder began to die. Slight panic.

Now then….. as a rule I usually take twice the helium required for a job (unless I’m doing a 10k release – in which case 20% extra). The bouquets consisted of 2 foil stars (which were inflated yesterday) and 3 latex. S0….. I only had to inflate 213 latex balloons, easy peazy.

I had loaded an N10 (which usually inflates around 205 balloons), a 1/4 full N10 and just for luck 2 disposable cylinders.

Right, well, I reckon whilst I had  been swanning around the cylinder must have been leaking slightly. So… I only managed about 150 from the cylinder. Another possibility is that as the balloons had been custom printed they were rounder than usual (because they’d been inflated before) and so used more helium.

Anyway…… I had issues. To cut a long story short I used the 1/4 full cylinder and then I counted the number of 12″ balloons inflated by the first disposable – which was 22. I then bouqueted everything and found I had 59 bouquets.

I had 12 bouquets to do and 1 disposable cylinder – I needed to inflate 36 balloons with a cylinder that would only inflate 22.

One option I considered was half filling the balloons and then using my mouth (50/50 helium air split). This would probably be OK if I didn’t get any balloons burst – but realistically I needed more gas.

This was a school boy error for a legend like myself.

Now days gas companies are not open on Saturdays – and when they were they closed at lunch anyway.

The first thing I did was look for an odd cylinder in the delivery yard. I am like the child catcher from Chitty Chitty Bang Bang – I can sniff a balloon gas cylinder from 100 yards. And my skills were good – I found 2 Linde cylinders but they were both stone bonk empty.

Not to worry as I am the Birmingham balloon don (as well as a legend (or possibly a bonehead)). I have helium in every restaurant and car show room – there’s loads of gas around every corner.

So – the closest place was the Mailbox and off I went on a new mission for helium. I parked down the side of the mailbox and walked into the front entrance of a restaurant I supply. I didn’t recognize the manager in charge. I was expecting to ask if I could borrow my own helium but as I didn’t know the lady in charge, she wouldn’t know me and…… if I asked and she said ‘no’, what would I do.

I also supplied the restaurant next door – but they used N30′s and I didn’t want to be dragging one of those around (I was in a place that used N20′s).

So…… I walked though the kitchen, into the back, picked up an N20 and walked out the back door with it. Down the lift, passed security and carried the cylinder to the van and away I go – you see I am James Bond.

Now then – you might think this is stealing (and you’re probably right), but lets not forget the cylinder is on hire from me and remains the property of Air Products at all times, I was just borrowing it for half an hour.

So…… I return triumphant and finish the bouquets by 4pm (I was only out of the building 15 minutes). It takes me a while to walk the 71 bouquets to the tables but I’m soon gone. I take the cylinder back to the restaurant (this time driving though the security barrier) and as I’m placing it back in the cupboard the manager saw me and says ” do I need to sign”

“No, no need to sign” I said with a smile.

david@balloon.com