Overheard a welder say his forge was ruining his eyesight

Last Tuesday at the steel supplier in Wichita, I heard a guy complaining about how his forge was giving him headaches and blurry vision. He'd been using dark sunglasses instead of real shade lenses for five years. Made me double check my own setup and sure enough my #5 lens was scratched and letting in too much UV. Anyone else ever catch a bad habit like that from just being too cheap to replace gear?

2 comments

2 Comments

richardfox1mo ago

Are you telling me this guy was out here looking like a welder from a 80s music video with his cheap sunglasses? Five years is impressive dedication to being stubborn, I gotta give him credit for that. Dude probably saved like forty bucks total but now he's gotta squint at his grandkids faces forever. I mean come on, a new shade lens costs less than a case of beer and doesn't leave you with permanent eye damage. Guess that's one way to find out if your insurance covers cataract surgery.

river_hart181mo ago

Forty bucks total" is generous, I'm pretty sure my last pair of gas station shades cost like six bucks and left green smudges on my nose. But hey, I get it. I once spent three weeks eating nothing but canned soup to save money on groceries until I realized my "savings" went straight to the dentist for a cracked tooth from a rock in the lentil broth. Some lessons just have to be learned the hard way, I guess, especially when you're too stubborn to admit a ten dollar fix would've saved you a thousand dollar problem. At least cataracts are fixable, that tooth is never coming back.