InsaneJournal

in which I demonstrate my mad computering skillz some more
I love my scanner. I use it several times a week and I love it dearly. It's a big old letter-sized SCSI thing that I've had for ten years and works just as well as the day I got it (in Linux, no less). I haven't seen a modern scanner that can top it.

Well. Except that, over the past year, the glass in it has been progressively bowing downwards as the double-sided sticky tape (I shit you not) with which they stuck it to the box gives way. This has been bugging me for a while and interfering with my scanning joy, especially of late when I've had to stop at intervals to turn the case over so that the glass can weight itself back down.

This evening I sat down and started randomly unscrewing things to see if I could persuade the box apart. At first I tried the two screws underneath, the ones holding the sockets and electronics into the case. Big mistake; those don't need to come out. Hmmn. No screws in evidence.

Then I turned it over and lifted out the cover (the flap that goes up and down lifts away for easy scanning of bulky objects). Aha! Two big, easily removable screws underneath it. I undo them, then decide that, like a noob, I'm going to remove the base from the lid. Oh dear. That was a mistake. Gubbins everywhere. Oh shit oh shit oh shit.

I panic a little, then notice that, behold, with a bit of a push forward the lid (containing the misbehaving glass) comes away in my hand. Woot. I rearrange the gubbins, put the lid back on and do a panicky impromptu scan to see how badly I buggered it up. Apparently not at all; it still works. Good good. Good. Ahem.

I've had superglue on my shopping list for a while to fix said glass panel. In the hardware store a couple of days ago, we went to buy some. Except that super glue bonds everything up to and not including ... glass. Arsebiscuits. Bugger. I'm forcibly reminded of my glass crystal earrings, which had a crystal prism attached to a post, and continually popped off the post despite being repaired with superglue a lot. My mother never read the labels on things, which is why she did things like decorating the kitchen with flying curry and shards from an exploding pyrex pan, went to sleep in a burning bed which she had personally set on fire, and thought that taping an electrical cable to another one, plugging it in, draping it across the floor, then mopping the floor was a really clever thing to do.

In at least three ways, I am nothing like her.

An alternative was available which would bond both plastic and glass, but that came in two tubes and needed to be mixed and applied with a spatula and I just completely lost my nerve. I fear glue. I can't help thinking that it's a really bad idea.

So I was looking at the lid and the glass, and thinking "It's a shame I don't have a metal or plastic strip that would fit in there and attach with screws. Why, look, there are even convenient attachment points for screws to bore through on the underside of the lid, a convenient and well-balanced point from the glass". And I looked, and looked some more, and thought about it. And noticed that there was a 12-inch plastic ruler in one of my jars of pens[1]. Which I never use, or certainly not as often as I use my scanner.

I pick it up. I slot it into the far end of the scanner lid. It fits perfectly. Snug against the three sides of the lid, and overlapping the glass by a centimetre or more. And even conveniently bevelled where there's a risk that it's going to foul up the scanner head. Perfect!

Well, perfect except for the ruler not having holes where I need there to be holes. I try to screw the nails through the ruler; they laugh at me. I don't think my drill will work on this. And I don't have an awl. But I am not to be defeated; I pick up my nail scissors (always handy), mark the spots I need holes, and just keep on going. It's third-year geography all over again as I mutilate the poor, innocent ruler with whatever is closest to hand.

Ten minutes later, two nice small boreholes have appeared (coff) through the ruler, right over the guideholes for whatever Umax wanted to screw in there, but didn't. I make sure that I'm not going to come into contact with the glass and then have a go at screwing the ruler to the plastic lid. CRACK. Nothing doing: the holes aren't wide enough and the plastic of the ruler won't force through; it cracks. I make the holes wider and try again. Perfect.

The screws just keep on going through the plastic scanner lid and fasten the ruler firmly, very firmly, to the lid. They sit against each other with the glass in between them, and the two screws holding it all together. Admittedly, there are two one-inch steel points poking upwards from the surface of the thing, but other than that, what's the harm?

I probably ought to get a hacksaw and take them off. Soon. Very soon. Although it isn't like the lid doesn't cover them.

[1] I have one jar of writing pens, scissors, rulers and the like, and another jar of coloured felt-tip pens on my desk. Because real women write documents in at least fifteen colours.