my new test-light
 

was swamping the rainwater out of the car & pulling rear seat out when I found something unusual in the first-aid tray.

I have a spare light bulb & some wire, so its time to warm up the soldering iron. The silver should make an excellent conductor. The abalone inlay is just for bling.

The original owner, an 88 y.o. retired MD is in the clear, as are the dogs, who lack thumbs;)

glad I found it before any LEO

turns out its a (multi-purpose) tie clip...

as one might guess, I'm not much of a tie wearer.

next time I'm passing through the Swampscot MA, I might see about returning it to Dr. S

Yeh don't melt that down.....post some photos of the markings and I can tell you its worth.....if its from tiffany/cartier or another high end jewelry.....you may be holding a couple hundred dollars...

roach clip

rolling in style
 

<ahem> yes officer, I must have dropped it after my last formal function.

in the old days out in the pioneer valley, there was a special long 12pt 8mm socket serving dual purpose, laying incognito on the floor of the jeep.

i've come a long way, baby;)

Back in 1999, I was stationed on an aircraft carrier based at NAS North Island, San Diego, CA. I bought a 1965 Ford Thunderbird from an impound lot in extraordinarily good condition for only $720. The car was left on I-5 when my friend kicked over his alternator belt and then the car died. He left it there for just a couple minutes to call for a tow but by the time he got back it was rolling away. He couldn't afford to get it out of impound so I offered to buy the car from impound to save him the legal fees that California would levy against him and I'd pay him a bit on top.

Anyway, I got the car running and was happy driving it. It was a fantastic beast.

One day, after driving on base and doing a day's work on the ship, my friend Matt was looking at the beauty and noticed that right behind the driver seat was a little plant, about the width of an Eisenhower dollar, growing right out of the carpet. The driver window switch had a problem and I guess a little bit of rain, plus a lush bed of Ford carpet plus a seed, humidity in the cabin and some nice California sunlight caused this thing to germinate.

Now that one would have been hard to explain to base security if we had left it.

Phil Forrest