Therapeutic weekend on many levels… that doesn’t necessarily denote positive – but it does denote necessity. Cryptic? Sorry.
I’m knocking out stuff on that running list of pet projects that have always seemed to haunt me… Getting those custom trash cans finished seemed to break that imaginary dam in my head preventing things from getting realized. *Evidence that I’m getting my shit together – (*or the ADHD management is working.)
So this weekend I finally tended to my broken sunglasses which had been sitting in my car door pocket for the last six months.
I’m something of an apologetic Oakley snob. While I’ll agree with you that laying down three hundred plus bucks for a pair of sunglasses *seems* excessive… I’ll point out that I’ve had my pair for nearly a decade… and they *do* possess some of the best optics on the market… and hell – common’ man… they’re friggin titanium! I mean… common… that’s COOL.
Oh alright… fine… it’s an excessive penis thing…
I do stand by my longevity argument though.
At the risk of sounding nostalgic about something as ridiculous as a pair of sunglasses… I’ve experienced a lot through those first-generation Romeo X-Metal frames…
Australia… countless road trips…. seattle,… (twice)… Florida…
My grandfather looked through these frames as I rolled his failing body around for what would be one of his last trips outside into the sun before leaving.
When we were in South Carolina and playing in the surf – they got swept off my face…. I figured they were gone forever. (You couldn’t even see your feet through the silty rough water.) Five minutes later Kevin would blindly reach out his hands under the water and they’d wash into his grasp miraculously.
I’ll probably be burried cremated in in them… and guess what… there will be a pile of ash with a pair of Oakleys sitting on them because they won’t incinerate.
Oakley has a rehab program and for 50 bucks – I can send them in and have new lessees put in and the rubber bushings replaced.
The pet project… (besides simply just getting the info together and sending the damn things in) – was to try and remove the powder coat on the glasses and get to the titanium.
I asked Osbscureo-The-Magnificent, (my father) – if he had anything in the Corbett Museum of Oddities and Conspicuous Compulsive Consumption, (my childhood home).
He vanished into the back of the house and returned with a few sheets of 1500 grit wet/dry sandpaper. (I was hoping for a Dremmel Tool)..
He insisted that trying to alter the finish of my glasses mechanically ran the risk of taking too much off and botching how the pieces fit together.
I worked on the pieces in the idle moments over the weekend with great results. Doing it by hand produced this weathered patina… (they’re not perfect shinny – but more like some weathered UFO alloy that looks like it’s been banged around during re-entry or something).
I’m going to cash in some favor points and fed-ex them in from work today… Suspect I won’t get them back before we leave for Maine – bummer… but at least I got it tended too…
It’ll be like getting a brand new chicken.