I like scented candles, so it always annoyed me when some of the ones I bought would burn in a funny way and leave a lot of wax after the wicks were done. I knew you could melt the candles and buy new wicks, so I didn’t throw them away, but also hadn’t bothered to take any further action.
Until last month, when it occurred to me while looking at the melting candle on at my desk, that the wood stick of the Costco ice cream bar I just finished could make a perfect wick replacement. Even better, burning this wick produced the oddly pleasant crackling sound of burning wood, enhancing typically cheaper candles that didn’t come with that type of wick.git
Today, I melted those leftover candles, and it turned out I had enough wax for a small, medium and large size. I repurposed an ice-cream stick-wick, cutting it into equal pieces, and have started reaping the rewards of my labor from this evening.
Talking about it with a friend, I vaguely remembered similar things in the past, enough that one time someone described it as “just like MacGyver”, even though I can’t recollect the exact event or person. I still haven’t seen even a minute of the series till this day, but I was curious then and looked it up, so that was how MacGyver came into my consciousness.
These ‘solutions’ I come up with from time to time are hardly rocket science, but it’s always refreshing to put unlikely things together and make them work well for the task at hand. I hope I never lose this creative instinct.