Making makes me happy.
Whether it's a map, a blinking hoodie or a Twitter bot, I get a thrill from making things. Yet I don't partake this euphoric drug often enough. Which is ridiculous.
So every week this year, I'm going to make something.
Could be small, could be simple, could be silly. Some should be tricky and/or blinky. And best if I learn something new in the process.
But at least one thing. And I'll blog about each one here.
So without further ado ...
Week 1: The bendy magnifying glass
For a while I've owned a little tool called a “third hand” to carefully hold tiny things while I solder other tiny things onto them. Looks like this:
The magnifying glass is key, because tiny electrical parts are no match for my glasses prescription.
I just bought a nifty new version, along with an extra set of arms and parts, giving me third, fourth and fifth hands!
But no magnifying glass!
Spinning off a comment on the product page, I decided to make a bendy-arm magnifying glass by mashing together new and old parts.
First I took the magnifying glass off the old tool. The pole attached to the glass didn't quite fit into the hole on the arm, so I used a bread knife(!) to shave about a millimeter off the end of the last arm piece.
Next, I powered up the hot glue gun …
And voila!
Tho tempted, I let the hot glue cool (and harden) completely before playing with it. Now it's very firmly attached!
So the first thing I made this year will help me make more things. That works.
By the way, if you buy one is these nifty tools and can't figure out how to assemble the arms, watch this video, not the one they tell you to watch on the product page. It's a big help.