My old set have had a good run. They're light, rimless, and sit close increase visibility through the smaller than average lense size. They are also 7 years old and browning off as the transition lenses lose their transitionness. Transition lenses have been great, my 3rd set of glasses with that technology. it keeps getting better each generation, but they all seem to die the same way; they eventually end up brown. Some of the coating on the legs had peeled too, as well as a thin coating over the lense itself. The coating wasn't the transition part as they still retain the same level of brownness across the whole lense, but the ridgeline of the coating failure is starting to get into my general field of view.
K.Rudd also stepped up to the plate and offered another incentive to get new glasses. $900 would do nicely. I headed in to OPSM through the school holidays and got the checkup done. Almost the same prescription as last time. My eyes haven't changed? I'm stunned. I don't treat them very well and even the day of the eye test was off the back of an all-nighter. They must have appeared bloodshot looking into them.
Rummaging through the options for a new set, there seemed to be less options on offer than usual. I liked my old set a lot, but sadly that model had long passed its manufactured lifetime and in its place were chunkier versions. Must be a retro fad. A set of Oakleys were looking the best of the bunch, and the legs had a weird steampunk look. The brand name was 'Transistor'. Could it be that geek cred had made it into the company famous for surfing coolness?
2 weeks later an SMS alerted me to the arrival of my new glasses. I was a little disappointed that they sit a bit further out than my other set, but a couple of adjustments and they feel Ok, albeit a little disorienting for the first couple of hours. Arriving home I showed Sandy the Coupe de grace; a cylindrical metal container with pop rivets. Steampunk it is. 
