If anyone has noticed that I haven’t posted anything to do with woodworking here, that’s because I haven’t.done anything much with wood lately. Health problems have sidelined me for the time being. But as a result I have lots of pill containers.

I’ve got a Kohinoor drafting pencil that I used in high school. It uses the 2 mm lead. When we in class we would sharpen them with sandpaper pads. It was messy with the lead dust getting everywhere I didn’t want it. The idea of BUYING something (cough, choke), um, what?

Solution: I taped a strip of sandpaper to the inside of a pill container. Now I take the top off, twirl the pencil lead around against the sandpaper to point it and put the lid back on. The pencil is pointed and the lead dust is safely contained. I found both 150 and 220 sandpaper work fine.

Anybody else come up with new and unique uses for pill containers?

-Tom Stenzel