Wednesday, September 17, 2025
To think that my previous pair of glasses lasted nearly twenty years, and yet my current pair almost two
So there I was, sitting in the Compute Room at Chez Boca cleaning my glasses. I was holding them in my left hand, and I had finished cleaning the left lens and had started cleaning the right lens when …
SNAP—
I now had a literal pair of glasses. The bridge on my glasses had snapped cleanly in half.
Well, gosh darn it, I thought to myself. What I said out loud, though, was “XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX!”
I did my best tape job, and then Bunny drove us (because I wasn't about to drive with a pair of glasses that might fall apart at any second) to the store where I had purchased my glasses.
Of course they don't sell those frames any more. They still sell Flexon frames, just not the ones I have. And because they can't just take the existing lenses and recut them for new glasses (because I now have progressive lenses) it'll take a bit over a week for the new glasses to be ready.
Aaaaaaaaaahhh!
In the meantime, it was suggested I try going to a jewelry store to see if they could temporarily solder the two halves together, because the clear tape clearly wasn't cutting it.
So then Bunny and I went to a nearby jewelry store, and while they didn't have the equipment to do that, they did suggest we head out to International Jewelers Exchange out in West Boca. It's a large, flea-market like jewelry store with multiple merchants inside, some of which do repairs.
West Boca and the International Jewelers Exchange it is!
Asking around, we found Mike, who also does eye glass repairs. When he saw the glasses, he had bad news for us. “That's titanium—my equipment doesn't get hot enough to properly repair it,” he said. “You can try the laser and welding store upstairs, they might have the proper equipment.”
So we trudged upstairs to the laster and welding store and asked. “Sorry, no,” that guy said. “I mean, we can try soldering titanium, but any slight pressure and ‘POP!’ it will fail. Our equipment just isn't hot enough to properly handie it.”
Well, I thought, gosh darn it. This time, I managed not to say “XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX” out loud.
So now I'm back home at Chez Boca. The 3M micropore tape and a small segment of a toothpick for structural support appears to be working, although my glasses are now a bit floppy. But it's holding, and it should be fine until next week.
“XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX!”
![[Self-portrait with my glasses taped together]](https://www.conman.org/people/spc/about/2025/0917.t.jpg "Nerrrrrrrrrrrrrrrd")