The Official Pleasing Purchase Thread

[Mr. Dazzle]

I bet someone, somewhere, runs marathons in flip flops. Because that's exactly the kind of stupid shit runners do. It'll be on Instagram for sure.

[weeksy]

New flip flops (again)

After literally years of research I've realised that the best flip flops I can get are Birkenstocks. Yet even these will only last me about 2 months ! I guess they are not built for averages over 10,000 steps a day !

MAybe you have a weird walk ?

[gremlin]

New flip flops (again)

After literally years of research I've realised that the best flip flops I can get are Birkenstocks. Yet even these will only last me about 2 months ! I guess they are not built for averages over 10,000 steps a day !

I hate flip-flops, with a vengeance. A couple of years ago I chanced upon some Quiksilver (sp?) one which were really comfy, didn't fall off, never tried to kill me on stairs. I loved them.

Then a few weeks ago I looked at my mutt on the lawn, chewing in what I thought was a stick. No, it was my beloved flip-flops which the kid had taken to wearing int he garden and left them outside.

Supposedly going away next Saturday. I'll look a fool striding around the pool in brogues.

[Jody]

New flip flops (again)

After literally years of research I've realised that the best flip flops I can get are Birkenstocks. Yet even these will only last me about 2 months ! I guess they are not built for averages over 10,000 steps a day !

MAybe you have a weird walk ?

I do a bit, due to smashing my leg up about 25 years ago. But that said, my footwear wears out fairly evenly so I'm not sure how much my gait effects things?

[Taipan]

New flip flops (again)

After literally years of research I've realised that the best flip flops I can get are Birkenstocks. Yet even these will only last me about 2 months ! I guess they are not built for averages over 10,000 steps a day !

Try Doc Martens Myles or Chilterns.

https://www.drmartens.com/uk/en_gb/mens ... lsrc=aw.ds

[Yorick]

New flip flops (again)

After literally years of research I've realised that the best flip flops I can get are Birkenstocks. Yet even these will only last me about 2 months ! I guess they are not built for averages over 10,000 steps a day !

I hate flip-flops, with a vengeance. A couple of years ago I chanced upon some Quiksilver (sp?) one which were really comfy, didn't fall off, never tried to kill me on stairs. I loved them.

Then a few weeks ago I looked at my mutt on the lawn, chewing in what I thought was a stick. No, it was my beloved flip-flops which the kid had taken to wearing int he garden and left them outside.

Supposedly going away next Saturday. I'll look a fool striding around the pool in brogues.

Suits you sir

[Yambo]

New flip flops (again)

After literally years of research I've realised that the best flip flops I can get are Birkenstocks. Yet even these will only last me about 2 months ! I guess they are not built for averages over 10,000 steps a day !

My first pair of Ceyo flip flops lasted 3 years. OK, I only wear them for about 6 - 7 months a year but it was still impressive. My second pair lasted 2.5 years and I currently have 2 pairs which are over a year old.

Birkenstocks are probably 3 times the price. PM me some details and I'll send you a couple of pairs of Ceyo. If they only last a couple of months you can eat them (I would of course eat them but I wouldn't have them).

[wheelnut]

I had to go to a fancy optician for these, SpecSavers et al are no use. My underlying eye problem is Kerataconus - non spherical corneas. Therefore I need non spherical lenses too, which is why I'm bothering with CLs. I.e. it's not cause I don't want to wear glasses, it's cause only CLs can truly fix my vision.

You should be under the hospital for KC, not your opticians. Opticians don't see it enough to have the experience. Getting the fit right for them can be an art.

I baulked at the cost initially - £300 for the lenses plus £19pcm for ongoing cover at the optician - but so far its worth every penny. So sooooo much better than the treatment you get at the high-street brands. I've been back 4 times already to get the right fit, going back on Saturday to check again after I've had these a bit. SpecSavers told me I couldn't get lenses at all!

Wait till you lose them! They are proper ping fuckits! My right one is 7 years old - a record apparently. I've gone through about 4 lefts in that period though. I get CL checks every 6 months at the hospital and a consultant appointment every 18 months now.

They're not ideal tbh, they donlt like wind, or dust. From time to time you'll get something underneath them and it will hurt like a bastard and you just need to get it out wherever you are. Sometimes, if your eye is a bit dry you'll blink and the fucker wil ping out.

Don't get right and left mixed up, as the fit is different - especially hard to notice if the correction is similar in both eyes. I have them tinted different colours to stop this.

And yes, the difference in vision is night and day.

I'm not sure how old you are now, but the good news is that it should stabilise once you're over 40. It sounds like it was a late onset KC. It's something you really don't want as a teenager as it tends to get very bad very quickly.

One of the reasons you need a referral to an eye hospital is that you should be investigating C3R.

Edit - just read your other post - you've already had it. Good!

[wheelnut]

How exactly can a set of lenses fix something a pair of glasses can't ? I don't think it'll help me as such, but could be interesting.

And old term for KC used to be 'light blindness'. As per Daz's pic above, the cornea becomes irregularly shaped, sometimes like a rugby ball, but not generally as uniform., That has the effect of scattering the light on the back of the eye causing ghosting and generally strange vision. Having a hard contact lens on the fromt of the eye creates a false cornea witha regular shape, allowing the light to be refracted more regularly.

That's why soft contacts don't work for KC as the soft contact will just follow the irregular countours of the cornea.

[Mr. Dazzle]

Mine onset in my early 20s although it wasn't' formally diagnosed as KC until late 20s - until then they thought it was just astigmatism. I went to Moorfields for check ups once every 6 months or so, until I had the CXL done there when I was early 30s - think I was 31. Since then it hasn't changed.

The optician I go to are brilliant I have to say. I've only just started going there, but so far they're tip top. They've got all the kit to measure KC properly, which is why I started going there. They're one of the only places vaguely near me that can deal with it properly, it was just a huge stroke of luck that they're in MK. At £120 per eye test and £70 per contact lens session they fucking should be! That's why I pay the £19pcm subscription

Quite right on getting the correct fit, I had to try 3 'zero prescription' sets to get the fit correct (with a 2 week wait between each set ) before finally getting my "real" ones on set 4. Sets 5, 6 etc are included in the price. They've got little orientation markers a the 6 o'clock position (can't see 'em when you're wearing the lenses) so when I first put them in my vision is wrong, I have to blink a load of times to make the lenses rotate around and 'fit' with my cornea.

[wheelnut]

Glasses can't possibly fix that. They can mitigate, but basic optics means you can't 'adjust out' the effects caused by having non-spherical lenses. The only way to fix it properly is to make the cornea spherical again. The extreme solution is laser eye surgery, but my vision is nowhere near bad enough to warrant that and it'd probably change again anyway. The less drastic fix is to get CLs which are also non-spherical "the other way" so that the combination of CL + cornea forms a sphere again.

Not really sure what you mean about laser surgery, I may be a bit behind the times with mine as it's stable and managed but the only treatment (apart from a graft) is C3R and that just stops it progressing - it can't reverse it. When you have KC your cornea gets stretched as it deforms. Where it stretches it gets thinner. The last thing we want to be doing is shaving bits off with a laser.

Also it's really tempting to have a good eye rub when you take the damn things out - try to keep it to a minimum as hydrops isn't something you want.

[Mr. Dazzle]

I had a good old ask about it when I was at Moorfields. I've also been to both Moorfields - i.e. the NHS one and the private one next door - and spoken to 'em. Apparently the latest laser eye surgery is possible to do with KC sufferers, especially the stuff which uses the laser to the do the "flap cut" right at the start (exactly what it sounds like ). Using a laser to make that cut means you can scarf the joint when your eye is closed up again, which reduces the stress built into the cornea when it heals.

[wheelnut]

Mine onset in my early 20s although it wasn't' formally diagnosed as KC until late 20s - until then they thought it was just astigmatism. I had went to Moorfields for check ups once every 6 months or so, until I had the CXL done there when I was early 30s - think I was 31. Since then it hasn't changed.

Same as me. I was prescribed glasses which did SFA, then I was lucky enough to see a new optician for an eye test. She was moonlighting from her day job at the eye hospital and she noticed it straight away. That afternoon I was on the eye mapping machine. It was still managed with glasses for a few years but then I went onto RGP and have had them for about 22 years or so.

It's all been done on the NHS though and they have been superb. I get CL checks every 6 months. I have to pay for a lens if I lose it (£60) but any changes of fit are free. Not that there has been any for the last ten years or so - mine seems totally stable now. I didn't get C3R as it wasn't available when I was diagnosed, pointless now as it's stable.

I still go to the optician for a normal refraction test for my glasses and that's always fun and games.

[Mr. Dazzle]

NHS won't do anything for me. They did my initial cross linking, but beyond that my vision isn't bad enough to warrant their attention. In fact I had to go private to even get the initial checks, only when I had test results from a private doctor in hand would they consider looking at me.

I'm not gonna complain that I'm not blind enough to get free stuff though

[Mr. Dazzle]

No idea!

This was a private hospital too, so maybe they just wanted to sell me it

[Horse]

Curved specs.

Since my neck isn't so mobile after the op, looking at junctions is more awkward.

So curved lens specs are helping :

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Varifocals and photochromic, thinner lenses, coatings.
£300
About three weeks from order.
Very helpful response to questions too.

https://www.optilabs.com/

@weeksy
https://www.optilabs.com/product-catego ... an-frames/
Is that the ones you have?

[weeksy]

No sir, my Sunglasses are Oakley Fuel Cell. Fitted with custom Oakley lenses.

My glasses that are not sunnies are Oakley Litebeam with prescription lenese.

[wheelnut]

50p from a charity shop.

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[Taipan]

Alloy wheel cleaner, for £4.00 from amazon. Bargain!

[David]

Do they do one for slower wheels?