Repairing glasses without using tape

My current glasses frames are two years old and the earpieces have literally rotted away. They had split open along where they meet the arms and were barely holding on. Eight months ago I had my eye doctor order new earpieces for my glasses and they have been on back order ever since. Giving up on ever getting replacements earpieces I decided I needed to do something.

I had some small diameter shrink tubing and thought I could make it work as a replacement. I ended up using two layers of tubing and a third on the ends to help round end over. They are a lot smaller than what they replaced but they feel great and even better they look great. If I do it again I would add the short piece on end in first. That way there wouldn't be a seam that could potentially irritate my ears.

Poor man's Chicken Alfredo

For awhile now I have been slowly stocking my pantry for times that I'm unable to make it to the grocery store. Times of bad weather, injure or illness, or times that I simply do not wish to leave the house, I want things in the pantry that are easy to prepare. To stock a pantry I needed things that I could eat even as a normal meal as the item needed to be rotated out when it gets closer to it's expiration date.

I started an experiment on making the Knorr brand pasta and rice side dishes into a main meal. Some didn't do do well but the other night I hit a home run. Combining Knorr Alfredo side and a can of Tyson chicken chucks I made a simple version of chicken Alfredo, it's not as good as the Olive garden but it does taste great.

I followed the instructions on the bag of the Knorr side. I drained the juice from the can of chicken and added the chicken to the pot one I had everything boiling. I finished following the instructions and it was time to eat.

Stocking up food for emergencies doesn't have to be expensive, you can only go so far with MRE's and peaches in can.

Woodworking bench, part 2

I have been working on my bench these past couple of weeks. Unfortunately I didn't have my cell phone at the time so didn't make any pictures during the process. Really the only thing everyone missed is the layout and cutting the dado's out for all the half lapped joints that I used for the cross members and stretchers. The joints were glued and I added screws for extra strength.

I drilled the holes in the top stretchers for the carriage bolts I will be using to secure the top to the base. I wanted to be able to separate the two in case I ever had to move the bench to another location. Once the top is done the whole thing will be simply to heavy to move as one unit.

The top had holes drilled into it to mate it to the base, the top was also counter bored so the heads of the carriage bolts will sit below the surface once they are epoxied in place. the plywood top will then be laminated with the wood flooring I have saved that dad rescued from a building from the early 1900's. I thought of screws and then lag bolts coming up from underneath but decided that the threads would eventually be worn loose.

The feet were finally done, I drilled the feet to accept a 1/2" threaded coupling and used a 1/2" carriage bolt as the adjustable foot, with a hockey puck for it to stand on. For more information on this idea and to give credit to where I had gotten the idea please visit Dan's Shop bench leveler feet. I really liked this idea, my shop's floor is nowhere near level so I knew that one side of the bench would had to be shimmed up to make the work surface level. The only difference between my feet and his that I used a cross member as the foot so drilling the hole went through side grain instead of his being end grain.

I still have several things to do before the bench is finished so hope you be looking forward for part 3.

No longer in isolation

Friday I finally received my replacement phone from Straight Talk. Surprisingly with all the bad reviews they have had I received a brand new sealed in the box Samsung Galaxy S4 mini. I'm only aggravated at the fact I was never notified of the package being shipped or provided a tracking number.

Not sure of the methods that they use but when I bought my phone and had it shipped they required a signature at delivery which was a hassle for me since the FedEx driver likes showing up while I'm still asleep from working the night before. But with the replacement being the same phone and being new condition I didn't understand why it didn't have the same requirement. I didn't know the phone was on my door step until I finally got up to get ready for work. The inconsistency boggles the mind.

They also informed me that they would compensate me for the time loss due to the phones being swapped. Haven't received a card and my balance hasn't changed. Still the same service end listed. Yet another lie from these people.

Woodworking bench, part 1

I have always wanted a nice heavy woodworking bench. I have made a few and even bought a cheap one from harbor freight, all were light and they wobbled. So with the new shop being filed out I decided that it was time for a real bench. I began by laminating spruce 2x4's together to create a 3x3.5" timber. This was milled down on the jointer until all were even and squared.

Just finished cutting the tenons.

Re gluing the two 2x4's that separated near the tenon.

The feet were joined to the legs by mortise and tenon joints and the cross pieces were half lapped and screwed. I could have done mortise and tenon joints on everything but it would have been a harder project on me just beginning more traditional joining methods.

Testing the fit.

Soon I will be laminating the 1 1/4" plywood and tongue and groove flooring to create the top. Will mount the bench vise and drill a few dog holes.

The great cookie fiasco

I have been eating Girl scout cookies ever since my sisters were in girl scouts. My favorite cookie was the Thin Mint, seems like it is the most popular of all the girl scout peddled cookies. Over the years I have watched my favorite cookie box shrink do to rising costs. Every year I have bought several boxes to survive me through the off season, cookies stored in the deep freezer last most of the year, not sure how long they would actually last, all are eaten by the time the cookie season is back and its time to restock.

This year has been a good year, I actually ordered a case of Thin Mints just for myself. Then I discovered the bad news, the companies that make the most popular cookie on the planet went and changed the recipe. To pacify the vegetarians they made the most beloved cookie vegan. There is a reason why milk and eggs were part of the recipe to begin with, it made the cookie good. Now the divine dessert has become artificial treat to appease such a small group.

The cookies still taste somewhat the same to those that only partake of the chocolate minty disk occasionally, but to those that worship the chocolate covered wafer, it leaves an artificial aftertaste.

Customer Service incompetence

Four companies that I had to deal with in the past week all have one thing in common, customer service incompetence. With my cellphone not wanting to function correctly I had to deal with Straight Talk's joke of a customer service center, these mindless drones simply read off a script from the computer screen no matter if you inform them you already performed the task they are wanting you to do, turn the phone off turn it back on, take the Sim card out, replace it, did that work? No I already did this yesterday when I called.

Suddenlink has also failed me, called to have a appointment made for a land line to be installed, no problem, "I have you set for Thursday between 4 - 6pm." No one ever showed, called to find out my account had no appointments scheduled. Also had the problem of when I called through Hangout dialer since my cellphone was acting up the call was being placed somewhere in Texas. This cause the problem of Suddenlink's routing customer service to a area that didn't serve my own area. "Sorry I cannot help you let me transfer you..." over and over again.

Both the postal service and FedEx has grown incompetent. The postal service had kept me on hold for a total of 2.5 hours waiting to resolve a problem of where my package was instead of where it should have been. FedEx is the newest offender, had a package scheduled to be picked up today, they never showed. After calling five times and being hung up by the automated line I finally got through to a live person. He tried to claim they had no information on such a package scheduled. He magically found it then claimed it was scheduled for the 25th and not today the 24th. That's a lie since I had called previously and was guaranteed that someone would be at my house to pick up the package between 6 - 8pm.