When Soap Isn't Enough

The most disgusting of disgusting happened to me the other day. As I was helping my daughter in the Home Depot bathroom, my sunglasses fell off my head and right into the toilet. Now, there are many things I would not rescue from this particular situation, but my prescription polarized sunglasses were definitely worth saving. I stared for a moment completely mortified. Then, quickly fished the sunglasses out and hustled to the sink (luckily the toilet had a freshly-flushed bowl). I washed the glasses and my hands for about five minutes in soapy water, but felt like I wasn't quite ready to let them anywhere near my face.

After wrapping the sunglasses in a paper towel and heading home, I called my personal Optometrist and his office manager (a.k.a. my parents) to find out the best way to clean the sunglasses to my satisfaction. I learned a few things about cleaning glasses that I thought I would share here, since I know my first instinct of throwing them into boiling water then dowsing with Clorox probably was not the best course of action.

1) Use rubbing alcohol for disinfecting. NEVER use a household cleaner as it can ruin any coating on the lenses.

2) Use gentle liquid soap such as dish soap to clean. Put a dab on your thumb and index finger and rub lenses carefully under running water. At the risk of sounding like a shampoo commercial, rinse and repeat as necessary.

3) Kleenex is actually the best thing to use to dry. T-shirts, dish towels and paper towels can easily scratch lenses. And make sure your tissue is not the lotion variety or you will be rinsing and repeating a lot more than you would like.

4) If there is any leftover lint, use cloths that are glasses specific (they usually come with your glasses, if not; they are inexpensive and can be washed in the washing machine).

5) Wear and enjoy :)

Hopefully you won't have the issue of have to rescue your glasses from a public toilet, but if you do, now you know how to clean them properly.