Sunday, May 19, 2013

Cutting the Thread

Well, here I am at Job #2...which looks like it may be going away at the end of this semester.  :(  It is time, really -- there is no denying the fact that college students don't use the library the way they did even 10 years ago.  For better or for worse, reference librarians just aren't a student's first stop when they are seeking information.  And to pay someone to sit at the reference desk for 9 hours every Saturday and Sunday just to refill the paper on the printer and point a few confused parents toward the restroom is not a smart use of the college's already tight budget.  Although I will miss my extra little pot of "fun money"...at least I still have my full-time job (Job #1), and can still pay my bills.

I don't have any pictures to share today, but I have been thinking about something that I heard at Celebrations a few weeks ago.  At the Saturday dinner, Susan Greening-Davis mentioned scissors, and how there are "many pretty scissors out there that are cheaply made."  She went on to say that she has some, but does not USE them.  Uh....why not?  I mean, I know that Ginghers are lovely, high-quality scissors.  They feel "solid" in my hand and make nice clean snips.  However, my "cheap" embroidery scissors work just fine for 99% of the stuff I cut!  Cutting cotton thread isn't exactly heart surgery.  So more often than not, I use whatever pair of scissors is closest when I need to snip a thread.  Any thoughts?  (I do understand that for Hardanger and other kinds of cutwork, you might need a very clean/precise cut.  I'm talking more about the idea of owning but "not using" the cheap scissors, even for just snipping threads on the back of a piece.)

2 comments:

Heather said...

I'm going to be mean and say that I think she said it to sound kind of hoity-toity. I mean, if she is a fancy designer, she needs to have standards, right? I don't know.

I'm with you, though. My cheap snips from FabricLand work just fine (and they are purple!). Sure, I love my one pair of Ginghers, but I'll keep buying $5 scissors. Speaking of which, the scissors Knit Picks carries are cheap, sharp and great!

Margaret said...

I only use "cheap" scissors and have never owned a fancy pair. Nor do I collect them. One pair are for "everything" and one pair are for hardanger only and that does me fine.

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