Temerity Jane

Eyeball risks

So, Internet, I have done something that I have been wavering back and forth on doing for awhile. I bought glasses online.

Actually, I haven’t really been wavering back and forth about the actual buying of the glasses. I just never got around to going to get a new prescription, as I am lazy and I’m always afraid they’ll overpower me during the eye exam and make me submit to the puff of air test.

I KNOW I should have the puff of air test, but I can’t even stand the idea of it. It makes me want to fly violently backwards off my chair and onto the floor, where I would lay twitching and rolling and clutching my eyeballs.

I did finally go and get the prescription update, though, for the first time since 2001 or 2002 and surprisingly, it hadn’t changed too much. The doctor did add in a bifocal prescription for all the look-down-at-a-notepad, look-up-at-computer I do constantly. And I didn’t have to have the puff.

Me: No puff, please.
Her: No puff?
Me: No, no puff.
Her: Doctor… she doesn’t want the puff.
Me: No puff.
Doctor: No puff?
Me: *hands over eyes* No puff, please.
Doctor: Don’t do the puff.
Her: No puff?
Doctor: No puff.
Her: You can move your hands now.
Me: No puff?
Her: No puff.

So anyway, he handed me my prescription and Phil and I went back out into the area where they have all the glasses and I tried a few on. I was seriously into some Harry Potter style stuff, but Phil wasn’t having it, and he thinks I’m ALLLLWAYS beautiful, even right now, at 5 in the morning with my hair sticking up all over the place wearing shorts that are way too big for me and a blanket like a cape and an old t-shirt with a plastic decal of a cowgirl on it that is seriously suffering from way too many washings and no make up and total coffee breath, and I don’t know if he ACTUALLY thinks I’m beautiful right now because I’m not going to turn around and ask him because I’d hate it if I surprised him and he dared hesistate for a second and I had to kill him to death and make him late for work, so let’s just agree that he does think so and that if he didn’t like the Harry Potter glasses they must have been seriously bad.

Right, so I looked at a couple of frames there, but I already knew the basic idea of what I was going to get – I’ve been wearing the thick, plastic rimmed glasses since long before the were the norm and I was just a huge nerd. I lost and broke so many pairs of glasses growing up that I finally just went with the cheapest I could find, which, at the time, made me look like the lamest of nerdy lames, but now I’m finally in style, which basically has convinced me to never change anything about the way I dress because eventually I will be cool and who will be laughing then, Internet? WHO WILL BE LAUGHING THEN? I was uncool before uncool was cool.

I got the lady at the counter to hand over my prescription and I also got her to take my pupilary distance measurement which is very important to have if you’re going to order glasses online, and you should NOT guess at it. I’ve heard stories about how some places won’t give you your prescription to take with you, or they will refuse to take that measurement if you’re not buying glasses in their store. They don’t really HAVE to take that measurement for you, but they DO have to give you your prescription if you ask for it. I didn’t have any trouble, but if you decide to try this, you might, so be firm. They have to give you the prescription. If you can’t get them to take the measurement of your pupils and give it to you, there are ways to do it yourself, but they’re not as accurate and it’s what dictates where the focal point of your lenses is, so do what you can there.

We came home and I looked at the various sites for buying glasses online – there’s 39dollarglasses.com, goggles4u.com and a whole whole lot more. I personally went with ZenniOptical because 1, they had the cheapest glasses and if ordering online turned out to suck, I wouldn’t be out much money and 2, the shipping is $5 no matter how many pairs you order. One or two other sites actually let you upload a picture to check how the glasses would look on you, but there are very few pictures of me in existence and I rarely look directly at a camera, so that didn’t entertain me very long.

I settled on two frames and putting my prescription in was easy, and then Phil convinced me that I also needed to get sunglasses as well. On most of the sites, you can add sunglass tint to any frames, or order a little clip on thingie with some frames, or get transition lenses. I’m not a fan of transitions and most of the frames I liked didn’t come with a clip on thingie (I don’t really like those anyway) so I found a pair that seemed somewhat suitable for sunglasses and had them done up with my prescription and tinted as well. I admit that finding a pair that I thought would work for sunglasses was a little tough, but that all depends on your taste.

I do not have the glasses yet, but the ordering went easily enough, so I am hoping that there will be no hitches once they arrive, either. Here’s what I picked out:

These first, in black. There were a few different color options, I wasn’t into this stripey one, but the black looked ok. Sticking to my usual plastic, assuming I will break/lose/maim/eat them at some point.

Next I picked out these, thinking that maybe at my responsible old age of 27, I wouldn’t completely destroy them within the first 15 minutes of owning them. Plus, while the plastic rimmed frames may have made me look super nerdy 12 years ago, they at least made me look intelligent. Now that plastic frames are the norm (not that I don’t still love them, because I do, I really do), they don’t have the same “Wow, you look smart!” air to them. And I depend on that initial impression to lure people into speaking to me before it’s too late. So I figured maybe if I went the other way, back to some classy wire frames, I could re-fool people as to my smartyness.

And, lastly, the pair I decided on for sunglasses:

I was kind of looking at this pair for normal glasses, but I’ve not really worn square glasses before and didn’t want to risk it with an online order. My current glasses, like most, had some measurements on the inside of one of the earpieces, so I stuck as closely to those measurements as possible when choosing frames, so as to minimize the possibility of facial ugliness. I also wasn’t initially going to get sunglasses at all, but after watching me futilely switch back and forth between seeing through my real glasses and protecting my eyes with my sunglasses at the airshow a couple of weeks ago, Phil insisted. I’ve never had prescription sunglasses (and I don’t wear contacts) so I have to admit that now I’m really looking forward to not have to choose between being blinded by the sun and not actually being able to see other cars when I’m driving.

I don’t really know why I’ve made this whole post when I haven’t acutally received the glasses yet – if I waited a week or so, the post could have been much shorter: “I ordered glasses online and they suck!” or “I ordered glasses online and they’re awesome!” and that could have been that. Obviously I was in need of new glasses badly as the intelligence has worn off of my current pair.