Tuesday, October 13, 2009

Tuesday Tips and Helping Hands and Eyes


I got my new DELPHI GLASS catalog.



Remember when you were a kid and the holiday Sears catalog would arrive? I'd spend hours looking it over, thinking about all the cool stuff.

When the Delphi Glass catalog comes, it's just like that. I think anyone who reads this blog knows, I'm a tool loving fool.


I have soldering stands. Two sizes, to fit my two sizes of soldering irons.

And I have magnifying lights. But I don't have a third hand. What's that?


It's something that holds things in place while you use a torch or soldering iron, so you don't get burned while you work. But your items stay still, and you can clamp things together. This one has a spotlight built into it. And two little helping hands.

Helpful for things like making glass birdhouses. Or adding tiny loops to pewter. It's so tempting sometimes to just reach down and hold onto things, but I can't. Burn warning!

I've been cheating and using wooden clothes pins. So far nothing has ignited. Don't you think this would be much safer, yes?


I saw this cool tool. It has the magnifier. And a lamp. Plus a soldering stand for the soldering iron. And best of all, it has a double third hand built right in. SWEET!

I think I must have this. Maybe I'll get a coupon for Delphi with a discount. I'm really sure I need this. And it's not expensive, as tools go.

Tools! Wonderful Tools!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Well, the lightning strike fun never ends.
I went to do a load of laundry on Monday, and the washing machine wouldn't turn on.
OH NO!
I opened the dryer, and the light came on. HMMMMM.
I got a wooden chopstick from the kitchen and poked the Ground Fault Plug Reset Button. The light came back on in the electric plug.

WHEW - I thought - The washing maching isn't fried!
Then I remembered.
The DEEP FREEZER CHEST is plugged into that same Ground Fault outlet.
And it's been TWO WEEKS now since the lightning strike.

I leave the rest to your imagination. I will just say that I wish, REALLY wish, I had tried to do laundry and found out about this a long, long time ago.

Just picture a fairly full chest deep freezer that's been unplugged and warming up for two weeks.

I need say NO more!

9 comments:

Katie said...

Ewww...I have an inkling of what that's like...After Hurricane Ike last year, we were without power for a week...The fridge and the deep freeze were the last things we wanted to mess with. Luckily, my stepdad came over to help my hubby with the cleanup...I couldn't deal with the smell. They even did the cleanup of the deep freeze...I (somehow) managed to take care of the refrigerator in the house...

TesoriTrovati said...

Oh Miss Lynn! I am horrified by that thought. Not just the fact that you have lost a whole freezer full of food...but that you haven't done laundry in two weeks! (Just kidding on that last one!)
That is just awful. I know that it is never fun to have to deal with these things, but you always seem to take the setbacks so graciously. I am wishing you a moment of pure bliss to center yourself and forge onward... enjoy the day! Erin

SummersStudio said...

Lynn, you definitely need to treat youself to the most elaborate, coolest, third hand tool. One can never have too many tools. And when the deep freeze goes, you need as many distractions as possible. I can sort of imagine the haz mat situation you are in here having done this once with my mother's freezer. I never imagined that a lightning strike could wreak so much havoc. Think of that third hand and all the fun and wonderful creations you can make with it.

LLYYNN - Lynn Davis said...

Ladies, you made me laugh, and I need it SO MUCH, thanks from the bottom of my chest freezer - which is now chemically restored, empty and plugged back in.

You hit the nail on the head, it was Le Grand Stink around the house!

Erin, I knew I was telling on myself when I admitted I hadn't tried the washer since the lightning strike. What can I say except, I have LOTS of the necessaries and MANY pairs of black work pants, LOL!

And to think I was worried about the washing machine, the first thing I thought was NOT THE LAUNDROMAT, PLEASE! Tee Hee

LeAnn, I like the way you think! Yes, for mental health purposes, I do believe a spotlight magnifier soldering stand third hand is just the prescription! Funny, funny.

Mellisa said...

I'm impressed that you ventured to open the freezer- I think I may have been tempted to just cart it off to the landfill! Clearly you have too many clothing options that you were able to make it two weeks without laundry...or were you wearing your pjs at that point? :)

LLYYNN - Lynn Davis said...

Mellisa, I can only claim that the change in seasons saved me, we went from 70 degrees F to 40 degrees F over that time, and I started getting out the sweaters and put away the short sleeves ... otherwise, I would have been wearing sweatpants to the office, most likely.

I did find a new use for the wood clothespins that I talked about using instead of the third hand ... for the nose-closing part!

Having lived on the Gulf Coast, I always keep two or three milk jugs full of water frozen in the freezer sections, it gets you a day or two. But not this many!

Beverly Herman said...

LLynn I envy the fact that you can go two weeks without doing laundry. After the fifth day around here I am counting down to Friday when Art does the wash!
The freeze smell...It wasn't just in the house..it was in the air for weeks and weeks after Katrina.
Treat yourself to that new tool. You deserve it!

Anonymous said...

Oh mom :D

Matt has a third hand. I thought that was a euphemism until he showed me what he meant :D It's great, it's how he used the soldering iron to fix my glasses...y'know, the ones I've had since high school!! Okay, so I'm planning to get a new pair of glasses this fall (FINALLY), so no more heavy equipment to keep me in lenses!!

And on no about the freezer! I'll be hoping it was filled with more milk jugs of water than food, 'cause otherwise .. eeeewwww!!

LLYYNN - Lynn Davis said...

Jenny, I'm laughing about Matt's soldering your glasses - because when I fell over the dog in the dark hallway and broke mine, I tried to solder the hinge! I now have a pair of bifocals that don't fold shut, like peg-leg glasses. And don't tell me he's got something I want unless I can run off with it ... LOL!

Beverly, I don't know what it says about us that we didn't even think to check the freezer, but the hubby's computer was replaced within 3 days. Something wrong with that, I'm making up a list of the top 10 things to check after a power outage, and the freezer is on the list!

I thought about storms because of the ice storm power outages, but when that happens you just take everything outdoors to keep it frozen!