Kinsler: A 6" stainless steel ball from TEMU must have a use
And now our dining room looks like Space Command headquarters.TEMU struck again yesterday. Along with a selection of more useful treasures, this week’s shipment included a 6” diameter hollow stainless-steel ball, highly polished. And useless. Five bucks.
Though known worldwide as a skinflint of the first water, I occasionally lose sight of the ultimate goal, which seems to be to die with the most junk. TEMU is great for this, for their merchandise is inexpensive and looks temptingly useful until it comes, e.g., the collection of miniature plastic funnels for 90 cents.
“So,” asked my beloved after admiring the astounding reflective qualities of the 6” stainless steel ball. “What are you planning to do with it?”
And I had to admit that I hadn’t the slightest idea, even though I had debated its utility prior to ordering it.
As I think about it now, certain items of no particular use somehow become astoundingly attractive when first examined in a catalog or in a gift shop. One example is tumbled stones like agate and tiger eye and metallic, magnetized magnetite. I love them all, even to the point of considering the purchase of a tumbling machine (Harbor Freight sells one.)
Like the barnacles that gradually cover a boat’s hull, a certain amount of sales resistance has gathered over the years, rendered additionally effective when we ran out of room in our smallish house.
But occasionally a bright, shiny object, the sort that would appeal to an ape, will break through that crusty layer, and that’s why we have several substantial specimens of petrified wood from the Petrified Forest National Monument.
On the same theme is the collection of ottoman-sized granite boulders that surround our house, each harvested from Delaware and northern Franklin Counties by a somewhat younger M Kinsler, primitive landscape artiste.
The first thing that happened to the 6” stainless steel ball is that it was placed in our front yard like a gazing ball. But unlike stainless steel, some varieties of which vary in nickel and chromium content, real gazing balls are blown glass, metallized inside and thus completely weather-resistant.
So I brought it in, and it now proudly resides in the center of our dining room table like a sample of moon rock. I don’t think it’ll survive Natalie’s Easter dinner, but I shall likely find a comfortable niche for it.
Mark Kinsler, kinsler33@gmail.com, lives in our little old house in Lancaster with Natalie, the two alley cats, and far too much junk.
This article originally appeared on Lancaster Eagle-Gazette: A 6" stainless steel ball from TEMU must have a use
