What should I use to connect my empty toilet paper rolls? I'm building a pyramid made out of empty toiler paper rolls. I'm creating the pyramid as a bunch of rows, with the first row being a singe tube, the second one has two tubes connected, etc. (When it falls over this makes it a lot easier to reassemble, and makes it more portable (although at 36 rows it's sort of impossible to move.).)


Click link in first sentence for full-sized image.

But I need something good to keep the rows together. I've tried using


Tape
Glue
Staples


Each of these was insufficient in some way.

Tape

  

This was easily the worst, and also my first. I took two rolls, and a length of tape, and put the tape on the ends, the thin part. Sort of like [/][\]. On both sides.
This didn't work well, as the tape didn't always stick. It also got dirty and fell off. And when the pyramid fell, the tape would often fall off, defeating the purpose.

Glue

  

This was okay (my second try). I glued the rolls to each other by the sides, sort of like []|[].
This worked... meh. The glue took a long time to dry. When the pyramid fell over, the rows would sometimes snap. Not often, but as the glue got older, it started to break more often. And it was very, very, hard to move the position after it dried.

Staples

  

This might be the best so far. I staple them twice, like

[]-[]
[]-[]


(that's two tubes, not four)

They don't take that much effort, and they usually hold. But they tend to fall out/bend if I leave the row bent for any length of time.

Is there something else that I can use that


will hold if the row is bent
is easy to apply
is readily available
won't make a mess?
Paperclips (even if just from behind, though from both front and behind would be sturdier; each tube would be clipped to all the tubes adjacent to it).

[Edit: oh, btw, the ends of the paperclips should penetrate through the adjacent walls of the tubes for greater stability of the lower rows as the pyramid gets taller]