The Random Musings of an Optical Curmudgeon

“The reasonable man adapts himself to the world. The unreasonable man persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore, all progress depends on the unreasonable man.” George Bernard Shaw

Please Note: A few of the OpticianWorks blog entries are written for experienced opticians. If you are brand new to the field you will want to stay clear of the political side of it until you have some experience.

• Summit: (sum’it) n highest point, apex, utmost point March 30, 2012

  An Open Letter to the Opticianry Community
  Your understanding or belief of opticianry or optician or whatever you wish to call it is just like your understanding of religion. I suspect that you hold some belief about what it means and how it relates t…

• In A Manner Of Speaking March 5, 2012

  My minor in graduate school was human resources development. That basically means adult education in the workplace.
  For one of my “big” research papers I had an interview with the head of customer service for a very large company. This is a well-k…

• The White Paper – Good For Bottom of Parrot Cage January 1, 2012

  I love it when a paper states: “Please feel free to share your comments and opinions with the editor of the paper.”
  So, you take the time to actually read the paper, you take the time to actually think about what the paper said and you take the t…

• It’s Tooltime! Make A Comment And Win FREE Dispensing Tools! November 29, 2011

  Sometimes we just forget about how quality tools make dispensing easier!
  The Optical Vision Site and OpticianWorks.com are generously giving away 3 sets of tools just for adding your comments below.
  Tell us your favorite dispensing tool story or tell…

• Why Am I An Optician? November 12, 2011

  When I was in my early thirties I was a courier for Federal Express. At the time I was living in the state of Maine. Being a FedEx courier in Maine meant working under extreme conditions much of the year. Winter included driving on ice and snow covered…

• Why Can’t We Get It Right After 724 Years? April 23, 2011

  “Around 1284 in Italy, Salvino D’Armate is credited with inventing the first wearable eye glasses.”
  OK, here is a challenge for you: Name one other practice that has been with us for seven hundred and twenty four years and we still do not know how…

• What Are You So Scared Of? April 6, 2011

  A few months back I posted this on The Optiboard.
  Thursday March 17th before Vision Expo East, First Vision Media Group will be leading a panel on Opticianry in the US.

  In this 2 hour discussion leading opticians and optical industry professionals…

• Opticians: It Is All About Business November 24, 2010

  Capitalism: an economic system characterized by private or corporate ownership of capital goods and by prices, production, and distribution of goods that are determined mainly by competition in a free market.

  The primary responsibility of the dispen…

• Opticians – Striking A Happy Medium November 24, 2010

  If you want to feel warm and fuzzy about being in a quasi-medical profession and that you are somehow helping humankind then be a social worker.

  If you want to work directly with a doctor assisting in surgery, performing refraction, and preliminary …

• Opticians – A Finite Body Of Knowledge November 24, 2010

  If you nose the web a little you will find a The OptiBoard, a well designed and popular message board or forum dedicated to the field of opticianry. I look at it every once in awhile and happened to stumble upon an interesting posting. In the post was …

• History Repeated and Repeated, and Repeated, and Repeated November 24, 2010

  I often say that opticians and ECPs are their own worst enemy. I must toss the entire optical industry in with that classification.

  As an example I will use the pattern edger. Why is it after, what, seventy five years, not one company has switched t…

• If I Were The Benign Dictator of Opticians (BDO) November 24, 2010

  If I were the Benign Dictator of Optics every frame would come with a case that the frame would actually fit in. If a company fails to provide this I get one of the CEO’s summer villas, one of his Ferraris, and one of his mistresses.

  If I were the…