Sure, Now You Tell Me

A couple years ago I got a great office chair for Christmas. It was one of those large, leather captain's chairs with the high back and overstuffed seat. I loved this chair right off the bat. The only problem came a month later when I was reclining in it and suddenly one of the arms snapped. The arms of this chair were the type that basically formed an oval with two screws going into the chair and another two going into the back. Of course, because this is how life works, the chair broke almost immediately after the warranty had expired. I didn't think much of it, just figuring I would go to an office supply store and buy a new arm. I was even willing to buy a set if that was required, I mean, how much could it be?

Turns out that, even if stores carried the arms, they would cost me $30 (each) when the chair only cost $100. Who knew that most of the cost a chair was the arms? I would have guessed the fancy thing under the chair that lets you adjust the height. Anyway, it never even got near that point, because you can't find them in stores. Have you ever walked into your average office supply store and asked to buy only chair arms? You may as well walk in and just start talking to the staff about a time Jesus talked to you in your dreams. You get the same confused/lethargic/disinterested look in both instances. Then they will tell you about the chairs that they have on sale, clearly not listening when you say you only want the arms. The only place I found the chair arms I needed was online and that site will only sell them in bulk.

I decided instead to fix the arm, using glue; only I couldn't seem to find glue that would work. I tried Super Glue at first, but it didn't hold. Then I tried industrial glue and some braces to let it set, but it still broke in the same spot as soon as I reclined. So, for the last couple of years I have been using a backup chair that is not nearly as comfortable, while the chair I like sat in my old room, going unused. Finally my mom got fed up with wasting space and wanted to either toss it out or at least give it the Salvation Army. I was saying that I still wanted to try and fix it when my father decided to check back into the conversation:

"What are we talking about?"
"My old chair, I can't find a good way to fix the arm."
"Oh, just drill a hole in the bottom of arm and then use a smaller screw to hold it in place. You'd never even see it."
"..."

I did it yesterday afternoon and it took 10 minutes. We'll see if it ends up holding long-term but so far, so good.