A long time ago, when I was a fourth year in college - it actually was a five year program. Really. - I worked for a construction company. I ran the office and marked the quantities of concrete poured for Interstate 99 round-about Bellefonte, PA. This was probably one of the most boring jobs ever, but I did learn a few things.
Anyhoo.
They sent everyone a Christmas present and card, even lowly interns like me. My gift was actually pretty nice - a utility knife with 15 razors stored inside a cartridge. To change the blade, all you do is rotate the inner cartridge and slide the new blade up. The knife came complete with the company logo on the side, a little sheath, and instructions.
For most of the last ten years (yikes!) since I owned this knife, it sat in a drawer and got very little use. However, I took it with me when I went to help my parents with their New Room construction. It proved very handy. And then it disappeared.
I searched my parents house, but never found it.
Flash forward about two years to last month, when I was asked to go to our Lakeland, Florida office to look at some building cracks. I packed as much as I could fit in my bag, including some three ring binders, a clip board, my camera, and my "Engineers Bag". (Sort of like a doctor's bag, only mine contains a tape measure and various other tools useful for looking at structural issues.)
And that is where a nice man at Airport Security found my utility knife with its fifteen razor blades. He really was nice about it. He didn't confiscate the whole thing, but used my little "all-in-one" tool with a little screwdriver (also not allowed on plane) to loosen the screw, and then he pulled out each razor.
It was a tad ridiculous.
It turns out, the knife takes special blades, and I wasn't able to figure out what kind. The company logo on the side presumably replaced the actual manufacturer logo, and those instructions were loooong gone. Google search actually took a while and I was about to give up, when I found the answer on a Blog.
Woohoo!
Thank you, fellow Blogger! It turns out not all of us choose to ramble pointlessly!
A more poignant search revealed that I can buy replacement cartridges from a store in Minnesota, and apparently, no where else. Also, shipping costs more than the actual item. So I stocked up and bought the 7-pack. If I use these are the same rate, I now have enough blades for the next 70 years. (Or 7 plane trips.)
3 comments:
You are sooo gangster bringing blades on a plane! ;)
IJust checking in to see what you were up to.
I had a knee replacement and set the darned alarms off every time I fly. I haven't flown since the X-Ray scanners were set up. I wonder what that will show?
As for me, Things are settling down around here but still trying to get used to the noise and clutter two little kids provide.
kt
You were lucky! You could have ended up cavity searched if you had a gung ho or angry TSA agent. Haha.
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