Have you ever heard - when it rains - it pours?
Well, last week I told you about the death of our printer all in one and how lucky we were not to have a fire as a result. On Thursday, the day after I posted, we went out and bought the new all in one. We went right away as there was a sale on the unit through last Saturday. We also found out that there was a $50 credit if we traded in our old printer - in addition to saving money, by doing so we avoided having to go to a recycling event when next the township has one or taking the printer unit to the town garbage department as it is electronics and cannot be put out with the regular garbage for pickup. We took it home and set it up. Husband put the software on his computer to see that all worked. It did.
A day or so later we put it on my computer - the main program I use for scanning does not work with it and when I scanned with one of the other programs I have - it did not scan usable and the software seems to be set to legal size as the default - have to reset that and set up presets to use it - so everything I copied in the interim as I could not scan it, is still sitting waiting to be scanned into the computer. But hey, this is all normal with computer stuff - right?
Friday night we had dinner out and then went to Barnes and Nobles as we normally do. As we were about to leave the store as it was closing, I was waiting for husband to join me by the door. I noticed my eyeglasses were dirty and, as I have done for around 55 years that I have worn eyeglasses, I breathed on the lenses and started wiping the lenses with my shirt. I suddenly found that I was I holding the eyeglasses by the frame with one hand and the lens I was wiping with the other hand. Yes, my eyeglass frames broke.
Now, these are not new frames, but I really hate buying new eyeglasses. I hate it so much that a pair of eyeglasses which broke last summer has still not been replaced. Why do I hate replacing my eyeglasses? I like glass in my eyeglasses as opposed to the common plastic lenses. When last I purchased eyeglasses only one location around here still used glass lenses. So I anticipated having to probably change to plastic lenses. (If you wonder why I prefer the “heavy” glass to the plastic - the glass does not scratch - none on this old glasses’ lenses, while a pair I got through our old insurance company about 3 years ago has many scratches on the lenses. In addition the “visual acuity” is better with glass. Also having worn eyeglasses since second grade, I am used to the heavier glass and the plastic feels strange - my first 2 pairs of eyeglasses were not even break resistant as such had not yet been invented.) The pair I broke has progressive lenses and they are not cheap. (The pair I broke last summer had progressive lenses which also switched from clear to sunglasses - even more expensive.) So I was not happy about needing to get new glasses - even more unhappy than I was about getting a new printer unit
Husband stuck this eyeglass frame together, as he did with the one last summer, with that “it’s not a glue, the light makes it work” stuff they sell on TV - we bought it at Walmart. It did fix the frame last summer for a couple of months and then it no longer worked. So we knew we could not depend on it. He told me that we were going the next day (Saturday) for new glasses, I wanted to wait until after the weekend as generally stores are not as busy, but he insisted.
We first went to the last store I bought eyeglasses in - the one that had glass lenses when no one else did anymore. (Okay, I know that one can get glass lenses by ordering online, but I don’t order something as simple as tissues online, so I am not going to order eyeglasses online and hope that they are measured correctly.) This store is part of a chain which was taken over shortly after I bought my last pair by another chain, so it was very different when we went in. For one thing, one can no longer buy a pair of eyeglasses - one has to buy 2 pairs as the pair one buys comes with a second pair free - and there was a $50 off sale on the 2 pairs. When I saw this sign about 2 pairs, I started thinking that maybe I could replace both pairs. I presumed that the free pair had to be single lenses (no progressive, no bifocal) and figured I would ask about paying the difference on the lenses or I would get a spare pair of distance glasses for the car - when the glasses broke it dawned on us that if husband was not driving I would have had to drive home at night with my sunglasses so we decided it would be good for me to have a distance pair in the car - just in case. Temporarily now I have a pair I use for 19th century reenacting in the car - especially since I don’t know how long the fix to the lenses will hold.
We looked around and it was obvious that the frames were priced so that they were at least double the normal price to cover the cost of the second pair of glasses. We managed to find one frame which was in our price range (the second pair would be a real problem) and I approached a staff member to ask about the glass lenses. I got a luck and a reaction as if I had asked if they made eyeglasses for Martians. She checked with another staff person - I think he was a manager - and he said he was not sure if they could get them anymore. I had to fill in all the paperwork for him to check. They could get them - $500!! I thanked them and resigned to getting the plastic lenses left. Husband had thought the price was not a problem - but he thought I would get both pairs of the progressive lens eyeglasses for that - I explained that I was pretty sure the “free” pair would be single vision lens.
We moved on to another chain eyeglass store. We used to go to another store in this chain before glass lenses became a problem and had been extremely happy with the other store - but it was now closed. The frames here were even more money, with the exception of a single rack hidden in their work area (this is a fact, not an exaggeration). We left.
Husband said to me that since I was stuck with plastic lenses we should look in Costco and Walmart on Sunday when we went to both as we normally do. (Only one Walmart around here has an eyeglass department and it is the one we go to on Sunday as it is near the Costco and the Bjs we go to then.) He mentioned that my sister had been very happy with eyeglasses she got from Walmart. I pointed out to him that the Walmart’s eyeglass department is closed when we go there - so off we went to same to look.
The frame prices were much better in Walmart and I we found several frames which are the style I like. Okay, at one point I was suddenly finding lots of frames I liked, but they all seemed a bit wide. I brought one to husband and mentioned this - I was looking at the men’s frames. Typical, I always know when I have hit the men’s shoes department (as opposed to ladies) as I start to find shoes I like. We finally settled on a frame. I went to employee to get a price (we planned to look at the glasses in Costco the next morning before deciding). The young woman employee (staff here was much nicer than in either of the chain eyeglass stores we had been in) started asking me about which coatings I wanted. I explained that I normally buy glass, but no one has them.... She priced them for in glass! The last time I bought eyeglasses I had asked there and was told that they did not sell them so I was happily (for once) surprised. I ordered them. Husband pointed out that they had very low price on their cheapest eyeglasses and I ordered a pair with plastic lenses to keep in the car - 20% discount as I had bought the other pair. I do not have either pair yet, but I am sure they will be fine. Either way you will hear about them.
Today I went to NYC to a client. The ride in to the garage I use normally takes me 45 minutes, the ride home 2 hours - plus a short subway ride each way. In Queens on the way to the garage there was a crazy - or lost - 18 wheeler driver. I was in the right lane and he started making a right turn from the center lane, cutting in front of me. In addition he had made the turn at the wrong point of the intersection so he could not pull into the cross street as the cars on the far side heading out of the street were in his way. I looked up and thought my car was about to destroyed as the side of the trailer was moving towards me. I backed up as far as I could. A man appeared - he may have been with the truck driver, more likely he was from a near by gas station - and had the cars behind me back up so I could back up further. The first car in the cross street who had been waiting to pull out when the light changed had backed up as far as he could and he made a U turn - oh, by the way, I am not sure that the cross street he was turning into was not a one way street the opposite way. Somehow he finally made the turn - missing me by less a foot! Not a great start to the work day.
Coming home every main road had at least one accident on it - no, really, even the ones which were not ones I could use to drive home and even roads in the surrounding states and north of NYC. I generally use secondary roads to come home as it is during rush hour (I go in after rush hour in the morning), but had hoped to come on a main road as I finished an hour early - noooo, the secondary roads as usual. It took me almost 3 hours to get home. I did make one stop though along the way home to walk a bit and stretch my legs and use the - well you know.
Now today was a beautiful day. It was in the 60Fs and almost springlike - record breakingly warm in some locations for the day. We are currently waiting for snow. Once again, originally it was an inch or less, which became 6-10 inches as of yesterday and now there are blizzard warnings, schools announced as of this afternoon and early evening that they will be closed tomorrow - we are now, as of the 11 pm news, expecting 10-12 inches or more. Husband is in a tizzy - he does not like snow as we have to clear the driveway, as well as he is now always afraid of losing our electricity. (We lost it in major hurricanes - Sandy being one of them - a year apart, and a day after we got our electricity back after Sandy - we lost it in the nor’easter that came through. Understand we had a devastingly major tropical storm and just over a week later had a major winter storm.)
If you are in the path of this storm - stay safe. If you were hit by the recent tornados in Louisiana and Mississippi - or any other of this odd horrible weather patterns we are having - I hope you and yours are alright.
THOUGHT OF THE WEEK (formerly of the day - makes more sense if I only list one thought a week) -
This week’s thought is the direct opposite of last week’s thought. Last week’s thought was not to try to reinvent the wheel - ie. if a way to do something exists don’t try to come up with a new idea. This week’s thought is to think outside the box. (Yes, I know both are cliches.)
How can I now be suggesting the opposite of last week? Well, sometimes one works and sometimes the other does. If you have looked for an established way to do something and have not found one or are not are happy with what you find - look elsewhere.
Let’s use doing the laundry - yes, the same laundry that last week I did not “reinvent the wheel” to find something to sort it into. I don’t hate doing the laundry (other than sheets as I mentioned in a earlier post), but I don’t love it. I also do not like getting up and out of bed in the morning. So I wash and dry the laundry at night. It generally takes me two nights to do this - I don’t start until husband has gone upstairs to the computer after dinner and the 11 pm news. (Right now I have the load of towels in the washer and the load of regular clothes in the dryer.) I put the dried laundry in the basket and bring it upstairs when we go to bed. When I do the regular clothes load I lay husband’s shirts across the rest of the laundry in the basket. His shirts are the most likely items to wrinkle. When we go up to bed I take the basket up with me. I hang up his shirts before we go to bed to keep them from wrinkling. The next morning after he is up and out of bed and at his computer (he is working when he is at the computer, which is why he is there so much) I take the basket of laundry to bed and sort and fold it. My shirts - generally tee shirts so wrinkling is not really a problem - are tossed to the foot of the bed. The rest of the laundry in the basket is folded (my socks are rolled, his are folded - it is personal preference) and put in stacks around me on the bed. When I get up the laundry is put away except for my shirts. Oh, if there has been a load of jeans - not done weekly - those are also tossed to the foot of the bed. I will hang my shirts and the jeans that night when we go to bed - and generally there is more laundry done the second night and another basket to sort and fold the second morning - this one primarily bed linens and towels.
This is not how one normally does clothes, but it works for me. Although when husband first left his job and was home I did find out that 1 - he does not like having laundry folded and stacked on him while he is asleep and 2 - when he rolls over all the laundry has to be folded again. :-)
If we did not think outside the box - husband would not have his loom in our living room - no place else to set it up and use it.
In our RV we have particularly learned to think outside the box as storage is limited and items must be stored where they fit and where they will not be moving around while the RV is in motion - hence our shoes are stored in a cubby (with a door) over the bed. They only need to be reached (generally) in the morning and at night when we are getting up in or going to bed in, the bed and keeping them here leaves places which are more easily accessed free for other items.
So, if you need to find a way to do something first look to see if there is a common way to do it, then look for alternatives - no matter how the alternative is.
No comments:
Post a Comment