Wednesday, September 21, 2005

An exercise in futility

After braving the unheated waters of the campground's swimming pool for water aerobics this morning, I figured I might as well continue to be adventurous and try to pry a few diamond chips out of some scrap jewelry I had grabbed from Dad's jewelry bench when we were home at Christmas. And no, I'm not stealing from Dad, I inherited the jewelry bench after he passed away several years ago. I had an idea for a necklace I wanted to make for Mom and I needed some diamond chips to finish it.

So I got the Dremmel out of the truck, picked through the various bits trying to decide what to use to remove the tiny pave-set stones and decided on the emery wheel. Okay. Read the instructions on how to put the bit in, read that the emery wheel can "grab" and tear your hand off, sit back and reconsider for a while. You have to understand, I am one of the world's greatest klutzes, so I take warnings like that seriously.

Okay, gird the loins and go for it. Carefully drill away bits of antique sterling (a broken watch band) and finally pop out a decent sized stone only to see the tell-tale gilt backing of a rhinestone. Sigh. There goes an entire morning. I'm a little surprised that Dad was taken by someone, but perhaps he bought that after he was diagnosed with ALS and was no longer as interested in his antiques and scrap gold/jewelry purchases.

So I'll have to hit eBay for some diamond chips to complete my project, but at least I know I can handle the Dremmel for other projects. I guess the morning wasn't such a waste after all.

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