3 Days Left
I am down to my last three days at the Very Negative Job. I am so excited by this, but also full of anxiety about the switch. The start date for new job has become a bit more nebulous, so I may get an extra week off, but I am also a little scared it could suddenly just disappear altogether. I think, realistically this is EXTREMELY unlikely, but the anxiety it there nonetheless.
In any case, I I DID JEWELRY THIS WEEKEND! This lovely little old man who does the courier service for my current place of employment had his wedding ring of 50+ years break, and the local jeweler told him the band was also weak on the opposing side, and therefore the entire ring shank needed to be replaced. (This was likely true. Metal hardens with continued pressure, and becomes brittle. The little old man is an avid golfer, and the way he holds his clubs apparently is constantly rubbing against his ring.) Anyway, jeweler was going to charge him $350 for this. I found this fee to be outrageously exorbitant, so I offered to fix it for him for much less. (Still making a little money, mind, but for about three hours of work, I still made a very good chunk of change and saved him a bundle in the process.)
And I got to work with gold, which I almost never do because, you know, uber expensive. I gave the ring a good cleaning and polishing, and the shank I formed to replace the old one is about .5 mm thicker than his old, extremely thin one, with a very healthy amount of hard 14k solder at each join. It should easily last him the rest of his life. Here are some pics, all polished up, probably shinier than its been in a number of decades:
You can see just a bit how much thinner the original shank was. The new only covers the whole area where the breaks were occurring, so it should be good to go. I really hope he will be thrilled. :)
Cross-posted from Dreamwidth - there are
comments there. Comments welcome on either post.
In any case, I I DID JEWELRY THIS WEEKEND! This lovely little old man who does the courier service for my current place of employment had his wedding ring of 50+ years break, and the local jeweler told him the band was also weak on the opposing side, and therefore the entire ring shank needed to be replaced. (This was likely true. Metal hardens with continued pressure, and becomes brittle. The little old man is an avid golfer, and the way he holds his clubs apparently is constantly rubbing against his ring.) Anyway, jeweler was going to charge him $350 for this. I found this fee to be outrageously exorbitant, so I offered to fix it for him for much less. (Still making a little money, mind, but for about three hours of work, I still made a very good chunk of change and saved him a bundle in the process.)
And I got to work with gold, which I almost never do because, you know, uber expensive. I gave the ring a good cleaning and polishing, and the shank I formed to replace the old one is about .5 mm thicker than his old, extremely thin one, with a very healthy amount of hard 14k solder at each join. It should easily last him the rest of his life. Here are some pics, all polished up, probably shinier than its been in a number of decades:
You can see just a bit how much thinner the original shank was. The new only covers the whole area where the breaks were occurring, so it should be good to go. I really hope he will be thrilled. :)
Cross-posted from Dreamwidth - there are
comments there. Comments welcome on either post.