I was walking down a city sidewalk last week when a young woman, dressed in business attire, stared at my face as she was passing me by. I knew exactly what had grabbed her attention. It was my new eye glass accessory, a miniature binder clip on the upper left corner of one lens. Ignoring her ogling, I continued to stroll toward the parking garage where my car was parked.

Sometime during my morning at the office, the frame on my glasses pulled away from the lens on one side. My glasses were not just a little loose, they were nonstop threatening to take a nosedive off my nose and onto the floor.

Desperate times call for desperate measures. What would MacGyver do, I wondered? It would probably involve gum, a map of Ireland, and a blow torch – none of which were readily available to me. I used the next best thing and clipped my glasses together with the binder clip. It’s barely noticeable… if you’re standing across the street.

A very small part of me would like to claim that I was completely mortified by the bit of attention this slightly unusual adornment was attracting, but it takes a lot more to throw me off my game. After all, lack of style is my modus operandi (see past column on why there should be an Garanimals clothing line). When I arrived home and Second Born asked why I was donning a Staples component on my face, I semi-seriously tried to claim it was all the rage and available on displays everywhere. She didn’t buy it, surprisingly.

Here’s the thing. This quick fix should in no way be considered unusual for me. I break stuff all the time. I am tough on my clothes, my shoes, my phone, and apparently, my eye glasses. A few weeks ago, it was a sandal that came undone – oh, and I do mean undone. The sole separated from the rest of the shoe, emitting a slap-smack-flap sound when I tried to walk. My only recourse was to wrap an elastic band tightly around the sandal, temporarily holding the two pieces together. On the office carpets, this wasn’t an issue because I sit (a lot) and I could check it periodically, persuading the band to stay put for the most part. Walking outside was another story.

Carefully trudging the two blocks toward the parking garage at the end of that day, I thought I was home free – until the elastic band sprang loose, slipping off the sandal and leaving me with what resembled a swim fin flapping around. This fashion statement had me loudly floundering until I managed to slip (more like slide) into the garage and find my car.

A couple of days (and hours of complaining) later, Spouse saved the day with Gorilla glue, the contents of which I would prefer not to know. All that matters, is that my shoe is back together, which got me to thinking – couldn’t we use this same stuff on my eye glasses? But my better half vetoed the idea, since that type of glue tends to spread out and may dry on the glasses before it could be cleaned off. He knows I have enough issues walking a straight line without having it blurred by a permanent glue.

We turned instead to a kinder, gentler, less-likely-to-grip-like-a-gorilla alternative – Super Glue. Spouse carefully applied the sticky stuff to the separated pieces, holding them together with — what else — the mini binder clip I had been using.

The next morning, I approached my eye glasses cautiously and gently placed them on my face… unlike the usual way I grab, twist, or drop them on a daily basis. Lo and behold, the lens and frame are stuck like… well, you get the idea.

I am no longer attempting – I mean pretending – to make a new fashion statement with a clip on my glasses, which is good because seeing the dang thing up in the corner was very distracting.

However, let’s acknowledge that, for a moment, I was almost stylin.’