I'm pretty bummed out about my glasses & other things

[ghostjmf]

I don't want to talk about the other things, but the glasses are important to me. So I needed a new prescription. I didn't fill the last new prescription, 4 years ago, because prescription fillers have a way of breaking my frames, then saying "they were fragile". Yeah. (They are fragile from corrosion due to the oils from my face, not because I regularly stomp on my glasses, or something like that. A lot of people's frames are fragile for this reason.) So usually I pick out new frames 1st. I am in love with my current frames, but they were very expensive 8 years ago (around $300.00), I didn't buy 2 pair, & now they don't make them anymore.


Prescription-filler said they could put new lenses into the current frames. They are the place I bought the frames & lenses originally, in 2003. But head-person. who I had originally talked to, wasn't there when I brought them in. I should have just come back when they were there, but for all I know they would have delegated this anyway. And I couldn't schedule revisit easily.


I got glasses back Wednesday, after a surprise medical test at a completely different facility; a routine thing I've been told not to worry about for years now suddenly is something that "protocol says we have to give you a CT scan" about, so I had a CT scan, which meant I had to drop my metformin for diabetes 48 hours so as not to overtax my liver with both that & the barium drink for the scan.


So I was off my "feed", so to speak, anyway, but was very glad later in the day to get glasses back. I was told they were fragile, but they were intact.



Until this morning, when a lens popped out.


I was told to bring them right in, which I did. I was told it would be "no problem" by the main person in the store. Then I was told it was a problem, but that they were ordering me new lenses. Why they can't take the glasses apart again to put in these current lenses, again, I did not ask. Partly because I was afraid to. So far, the store is doing this stuff for no more money, & I've already given them $260.00 for the lenses alone, plus the "one hour to put them in" that was originally advertised, so I've got to tread lightly.


It appears the lenses weren't cut to the right size so they would fit perfectly? The new ones won't arrive until Monday. I explained I had an audition tomorrow at which I might be given a test that requires glasses. (When I took that RI J! in-person test that I probably flunked, the Qs came up on a screen; if that format is used tomorrow, I need to be able to see the screen. Also to play the mock game.) I also need them to drive. I did say I have pairs at home with 12-year-old prescription in them. This is a place that will do your eye exams if you want them to (though my exam was through my medical plan, not the glasses store), so they know how bad my eyes are. Any decent glasses store could see from those lenses how bad my eyes are.


The store voluntarily gave me a free new pair of frames with these lenses in them. I should be happy but am not because of course, for the lenses to be cut again to fit, the frames they will fit have to be smaller than my real frames.


Also smaller than my old real frames at home. Also smaller, & a different shape, than any frames I actually liked currently in their store.


So I get to go to J! audition tomorrow with too-small glasses. And very bummed out about other things. Not the right frame of mind. I have to snap out of it long enough to charm the J! people.


I will try.

[gsabc]

You should come up with a good story about them. Maybe joke about being afraid that you're not at your best because your glasses are too tight because they're too small. (I'm sure others could do better than that.)

Knock 'em out at the audition, with The Call coming in short order. +~+~+~+~+~+~ heading out to you.

[Bob Juch]

Don't worry about it. When I saw how large my glasses looked when I watch my BAM episode I immediately went out and got much smaller ones (which you can see in my FB profile).

[a1mamacat]

Vision issues SUCK!

I really need new glasses, as the trifocals are now bifocals because I can't use the reading area anymore.

600.00 probably, of which I get 250.00 back from my insurance plan.

Like gsabc said though, play it off. Perhap " I normally see the world through rose colored glasses, but these are make dos, so things are just slightly pink today..."

Good luck!

[MarleysGh0st]

Good luck, ghost!

And if you do use this story at your audition, try not to add so much depressing detail. Instead, how about emphasizing how great the people at the eyeglass place were and how they went the extra mile to ensure that you had glasses that you could see with at your J! audition. Say they're now a part of "team ghost".

Positivity.

Light, upbeat stories.

I know it's difficult, but it's necessary.

[ghostjmf]

Thanks for all the good wishes, people, & for sympathy on the glasses thing too. When I use this forum as the "blog I'm too lazy to set up" like this, I often get slapped silly, & I'm so grateful I haven't been (yet, anyway) about this(!).


Glasses are such a big part of our appearance, those of us who wear them. I am feeling guilty that the vision store did go the extra mile to give me substitute frames when I have a drawer full of reject frames at home, but I realize they would have thought those "just as corroded" as the ones they are trying to get lenses to fit into on Monday. The only frames I've never worn, so which should be pristine (& have side screws that actually open up the frames) are a pair that I bought once thinking I could get sunglasses made for them, so they would have been way too large for a cut-down-to-fit of my existing lenses.


And trying on some of those reject glasses was a real "eye-opener"; my eyes were worse back then than they are now. The "now" prescription is stronger than my 4-years-ago prescription, but still a lot milder than my 12-years-ago prescription. So I would have been overcorrecting, in a way that didn't do me too much good, if I'd tried to wear that old prescription to drive & to see the J! test this weekend.


I was thinking about putting a glasses story on my form, but put in a story about my Dad instead.


There's a lot about the form I'd like to redo, but I have other obligations before the test that preclude me spending the morning redoing it.


I am trying pysch myself into as positive mood as I can for this.


Its apparently a dark secret of the glasses store industry that if they can't or don't want to try to get the side-screws to work, they just jam the lenses into your frames, really easy with malleable metal frames like mine, & hope they hold. When they took the lens that didn't fall out of my glasses out yesterday, they just popped it out by massaging the frame, they didn't use the screws. And they massaged the other side, the side where the lens had fallen out from, to see if they could get the fallen lens to pop back in. They then made a face & didn't try popping it in. Then they took the frames in back again. That's when they came back to me, talking about "corrosion" & that they'd have to order new lenses. I pray they get the screws to work. Maybe they're soaking the frames in corrosion-dissolving stuff this weekend. But, frankly if they get the lenses to actually hold by the popping-in method, I will take the glasses & be none the wiser or madder, as long as the darn lenses stay in!

[Bob Juch]

Next time get titanium frames. That metal deserves its name.

[mellytu74]

Good luck with everything.

I had some glasses/frames issues not that long ago.

I've used the glasses since my laser surgery 10 years ago and I cannot drive at night without them. So, MUCH sympathy from here.

Good luck with everything. And, YES! turn it into an upbeat story for the audition.

[ghostjmf]

BJ: If they made titanium frames in the style I want (metal ovals large enough not to make my large but close-together eyes look small; I can get you the size oval if you want) I'd of course buy them. The frames I am having fixed are a core of some metal that obviously does corrode at the screws & screw-holes, plated over with some high-priced silver-colored metal, processed to a nice matte finish that still looks silver, rather than grey, but not a shiny silver; I believe its rhodium. It might as well have been platinum, for what they cost. The brand is Oliver Peoples. Please believe I did not start looking among this expensive a brand. But its obviously where I wound up. And they don't make these anymore.


And why glasses-companies insist on making those nose-pads out of metal that corrodes, probably nickel, encased in clear plastic that then fills with green corrosion, I dunno. I have begged the people fixing my glasses to leave the nose-pads alone, gross as they are, because I know they won't be able to unscrew them, or even bend them back to "where they should be" (when something whacks me in the face, it bends my nose-pads) without breaking them, & then I really would be up the proverbial creek, paddle-less.


I had envisioned being able to replace nose-pads every time they got gross, but this was not to be. Even if they're made to slip out rather than screw out (as mine may, I think; glasses aren't with me at the moment) they're not going to move the moment they get corroded.


melly: I did try to to turn "these are not my real glasses; that's why they keep coming off & on!" (actually, I of course took them off so I could be filmed without them any time I didn't actually have to read the screen with the questions on it) into a speaking point at the interview part, but the interviewer said, about my story of the lens falling out, "so you fixed it" & wanted to move on, so they did. You have to do what they want. I'm kind of sorry I didn't get to talk about something they were interested in. I guess they didn't find that on my form. Darn. When they are interested in an item on the form, they really go to town on it. Some people lucked out on that. More in the J! writeup when I get to it.

[ghostjmf]

They're Back!!!


No, not the zombie army, or the Wars of the Roses or whatever, but my beloved glasses!


And for right now, there's glass (well, plastic) in each lens-holder.


I look like myself again.


I did not press for details; I don't know if the screws ever moved or these lenses were popped in; the store-owner did say "your frames were a little bent but we took care of that". So maybe rebending to the "right" shape was all they needed to hold lenses cut to the right shape.


I wish this hadn't happened over the J! aud weekend; but the reason I got the lenses replaced in the 1st place was I was afraid I wouldn't be able to see the J! test stuff.


The J! test stuff was in very large print, but, frankly, with my tiny substitute glasses but with the right prescription in them, I could tell, when I took them off to test, that the very large print went just a little fuzzy around the edges (I have a lot of astigmatism). Not that I couldn't read it, but I really did need glasses for the best benefit, even from the front row, where I was during the mock game, after the test. I had planned to play the game, where you're filmed, without glasses even when I had my real glasses, but I could tell I'd do better with glasses on, so wore them.

The nose-pads are decidely less grotty, though, though not non-grotty (they'll never get there), so the frames were probably soaking in some corrosion-dissolving substance, whether that freed up the side-screws, that someone not a glasses-store expert would want to loosen to get the lenses in, or not.