A good sign for a billboard

Hello Fans, and welcome to another exciting edition of ‘Try It, You’ll Like It’ with Mr. Ohh!. Actually, a better title might be ‘Try IT! You’ll Get Very Excited About IT For A While. Then You’ll Start To Spend Lot’s Of Money On IT But Will Soon Lose Interest Because The Glamour Will Fade And Only The Work Will Remain. Soon After You’ll Get Excited About Something Else. Your Significant Other Will Invariably Get Angry With You As The First IT Collects A Ton Of Dust. Eventually That IT Will End Up In The Attic Or Garage Until You Pass On And Your Kids Hold An Estate Sale Wondering How You Collected All This Junk.’

Sadly, although the second title is the more accurate, you will never see it used because it’s too freaking long, and would never fit nicely on a billboard. Fitting on a billboard is a huge requirement for such things. Imagine driving along the highway and seeing the first title. You could look up, read it in a tenth of a second, and think, “Hey I might watch that show!”. Now imagine the second one. The printing would have to so small so you would squint to read it all. By the time you finished, you would undoubtedly smash into the pile of other cars whose drivers were also trying to read the sign and forget to watch the road. The only person who would be happy about this would be the local body shop. Let’s be frank, they just wouldn’t be that many viewers, and the show would be cut from the line-up.

I know all this because I have done this many times. I had hoped I was past it all and was now smarter and wouldn’t get into any more fads. I was slightly incorrect. I say slightly because I tried to do everything I could to avoid the rush of excitement when I saw the amazing technology.

Not a good sign for anything

About two years ago, I saw a special on how a 3-D printer worked. My brain immediately went into “I need that” mode. Happily, I resisted. In fact, I was so proud of myself for being mature, that I took myself out for ice-cream. That’s not such a great thing. I once took myself out for ice-cream because I was on time for an appointment. It’s kind of my go-to thing. Either way, I avoided stupidly spending a ton of cash, and was rewarded. End of story! Au Contraire, Mon Frair!

You see several months after that; my local library appropriated a 3-D printer for community use. Ohh the pain. I was hooked. I started designing things to be printed out on the printer almost every day. I sent them to the library so much, that the lady in charge actually called my up and yelled at me to give others a chance. I was placed on printer probation and only allowed to submit a design once a month. This was hardly good enough. My mania was such that I started to send designs under fictitious names. I wore disguises when I picked stuff up. I was eventually caught and placed in 3-D rehab, removed from the computer system, had my library card revoked and worst of all, the cute blonde librarian, with brown eyes refused to talk to me. I wasn’t even allowed to eat chocolate-chip cookies while I wrote my blogs, for fear I would design plastic ones. It was a dark time in my life.

A sign of the times

There was only one thing to be done. I had to buy my own 3-D printer. You probably thought I would go off the printing stuff completely. That didn’t happen because the computer store is right down the street. Anyway, if there’s anything that will cure someone from abusing a printer like this, it is having a printer like this. I am now totally cured and let me explain how it happened.

  Once I decided to make the purchase, I read reviews and stuff. That was so confusing about rates, and temperatures, and layers, and millimeters that I didn’t understand any of it. I asked around and the only thing I could think to ask was; How large can I print something? I received a recommendation and I went and bought it.

Bad signs

It came in a box full of parts. The manual had no words. There were just diagrams and Chinese symbols. This shouldn’t have been a problem. Guys don’t read manuals anyway. I did manage to assemble it, but there were twelve wired plugs that had to go someplace. A bit of instruction would have been helpful. I was able to find where half of them went, my sons found a few more and my daughter found the last one which could not be plugged in without plyers, patience, and prayer. I managed after an hour to get in together and it was time to feed the filament.

The filament is one point seven six millimeters in diameter and has to be fed through a connecter which is one point five. There was no way it was going through. I don’t know who the engineer was who designed that one, but if I had him there, I would have… Well let’s just say it was good he wasn’t there. I actually Googled how to do this, and even Google was baffled. There was a site that said a modification would help. I tried that and after three hours, and four bleeding cuts, the printer was all set up.

Proudly I ran the set-up program. This didn’t work. I tried to print something. It completely messed up. It was now two days since I opened the box, and all I achieved was to cut my hands in six places, modify the connecter, and get angry. All this was accomplished with the easy instructions. I’m scared to think of what might’ve happened if I didn’t do it the easy way.

Road signs

I took the printer back to ask what I was doing wrong. Here I met Paul. Paul took one look and told me that it was by far the worst printer anyone could buy. This was not the best time to learn that. He suggested I trade it in for a different model which actually had instructions in my native language. What a concept!

The only problem was I hadn’t returned it to the box. They couldn’t take it back assembled. I angrily walked out to my car. I wasn’t taking that stupid thing home so I took it apart, and repackaged it, in the parking lot, behind my car. If you think it took a long time to put that printer together, I can tell you it takes a longer time to convince four police officers that you’re not doing anything illegal taking one apart in the parking lot of a computer store. They actually handcuffed me and walked me in to see Paul, who vouched for me.

A sign of the times

Well, I made the exchange and in three days was able to print something, with only minor cuts and bruises. Final score: Printer six, Mr. Ohh! one!

I’ll do better next season.