What perplexes me is individuals who are such individuals because they do things that make them individuals that a million other individuals do but they want to profess their individuality at every turn and want to make sure everyone knows they're such an individual like everyone else because they did something that sets them apart from all the other individuals who are being individualistic in the same way the first individual is being an individual.

If you type and say the word individual enough times it starts to look and sound funny.

Just more of my random thoughts. When they pop my head off I might not have many more, want to get a few in first.

I'm curious. Do you have a trusted Optician who measures you?

I have an optometrist who tests my eyes and gives me a prescription.

An optician to measure my haid? no. I have old glasses that fit well, and a ruler to measure those to get the same sized ones offered on the internet. I can measure the distance between my pupils myself in the mirror.

Here's the issue in my profession. When you buy glasses, some of what you pay for is the Optician's expertise. A good Optician will determine your needs and recommend the best products to meet those needs. S/He will take appropriate, accurate measurements, and when the glasses are made, s/he will ensure their accuracy. Then the Optician will custom fit the eywear to you, and will adjust your glasses if they ever come out of adjustment.

Historically, we have adjusted anyone's glasses, whether they purchased the glasses from us, or not. An Optician somewhere sold those glasses and at some point may adjust glasses that were purchased from me.

Now, people are buying their glasses on line, and we Opticians are being asked to give away our skills, expertise, and our time. If it's just fitting glasses to someone, it's not a big thing, but when we're asked for measurement, for which we can be liable, or to troubleshoot a problem with the glasses, then it becomes costly to us. The worst is when our paying customers have to wait while we try to figure out why an on line purchaser can't see out of their glasses.

For young people like you and Pie, it's not so much of an issue, especially if you don't have a strong prescription. But when you get into multifocals (and you will), you may want to consult with a licensed Optician. :idea:

Sounds like a simple policy of "we charge to fit any glasses not sold by us" is in order.

That's a completely new paradigm, and it won't be a popular one with patients - taking something away that's always been free never is.

How about a sign or a card or "something" that says you do it for your customers for free. <shrug>

They used to do free adjustments at a few places here, but haven't for the last few years.

I got my first pair of glasses at 3 years old. For the next 6 years, I wore the wrong prescription, because every single time I went in for my eye exam, I squinted as hard as I could to figure out what the letters on the chart were--because I was told it was "a test" and you're supposed to do as well as you can on tests. I had two eye doctors during this time, and neither of them ever told me not to squint, to just see what I could really see. What's more, you can look at old photos of me and clearly see that the two sets of frames I wore during this time did not even come close to fitting my face.

Then I found a good eye doctor, and I have stayed with him. But still, he is not the one in charge of seeing people in the frames department, and in my adulthood that person sold me yet another pair of ill-fitting glasses after a 10-year stint of contacts followed by LASIK. It wasn't until I made my husband (who has always chosen well-fitting glasses) come in with me to get a new pair that he informed both of us the reason none of the frames fit me is because my face bones are small and I need to be shopping in the kids' frame section. The woman was a little shocked at the idea, but he was totally right.

All of which is to say, good opticians certainly do the things you list above. But good opticians may be rarer than you think.

Hey, I pay an optometrist $60 every year to give me a full eye exam. I get pics of my retinas and everything, since I'm typeIID and work with <Dr.>frikin' lazers</Evil> every day. I refuse to pay a kajillion dollars to some frame manufacturer when I know it should cost $19.95. And I work with precision optics for a living -- we don't pay hundreds of dollars for the stuff we use, and it's a lot more high-tech than my specs. I know my prescription, my IPD, all the various lengths associated with my last specs, and verify that info with my optometrist.

<shrugs> Seems fair to me.

Spexx, the party's over. I wonder why photographers didn't do the same thing that doctors did a long time ago: create a guild that prevented others from practicing without a special license. Do you know how many times I hear from people who ought to be using a professional photographer that their nephew or son or whoever is going to take the pictures for them for free? Just because you can buy a hammer, that doesn't make you a carpenter. Same goes for just about every profession and trade. Being in a consumer society we pay the price by having our expertise discounted in order for someone to be able to sell out from under us. Our national values respect consumerism more than expertise.

There was a local paper near here that was always going on an on about "shopping locally" and supporting local businesses. But what does that mean? From my point of view it means:
Don't buy a camera, if you need photos, go to your local photographer and let him make a living (not a killing)
Don't buy a computer for desktop publishing, go to a graphic designer and hire them to make your poster.
Don't run to home depot and buy and arsenal of tools, hire your local carpenter to fix your screen door.
don't buy pepperidge farm cookies or budweiser beer or produce from across the continent. Why don't you have a local bakery or brewery? because they were edged out by economy of scale.

So I say the party's over, because it is just a matter of time before your business is a self serve procedure. Pharmaceutical companies are already marketing directly to consumers.

I can just imagine how my teeth would have looked if I could have ordered my new caps online, after making my dentist take the molds. :eek:

Umm, I like the highlights... and your bangs are cute.

HA! That's an uglified photo of Elle McPherson I grabbed off google images.

And yet, many professionals have countered the problem by charging more and more for the few people who are still willing to pay for their expertise. A wedding photographer nowadays will cost you a couple thousand dollars for a mere 4 hours of time, and then the photos are still their property and you get one copy of each and anyone else in the family who wants one has to pay $5 per photo. Which only leads to more people deciding to let their cousin do it for free.

All the better really. I wouldn't want the agra of shooting a wedding for 15 thousand dollars.

The pros aren't countering the problem by over charging, they are passing along their real costs, believe it or not. And a good wedding photographer is a world of difference from a bad one or even a talented cousin.

Think about your industry. Is what you do really something that anyone can do? Are your standards higher than someone else's? Why should I pay a voice over actor anything when I can get my brother to do it for nothing?

On the other hand I just heard Maya Angelou narrating an explanation of the big bang and she may be all ms. poet, but she sucks as a narrator. Absolutely no sense of rhythm, every word was another brick in the wall.