I’m assuming most folks have used superglue before, but for the uninitiated here’s a step-by-step guide:

  1. Rummage through the junk drawer for the half-tube of superglue you have left over from the last time you used it 6-12 months ago. If you have more than one junk drawer, no sweat - just pick one, then try another. By law, the superglue will always be in the second drawer (local statutes may vary).

  2. Spend no fewer than 15 minutes fiddling with the dried-up superglue trying to get not-dried-up superglue to come out. When the 15 minutes has elapsed, throw it away.

  3. Buy new superglue.

  4. Open new superglue. Immediately discard packaging and/or anything that might claim to provide instructions or safety information.

  5. Poke a hole in the place on the new superglue where it seems like the superglue should come out.

  6. Carefully squeeze and/or roll the tube until it “spritzes” (you’ll know it when you see it - if you’ve got superglue on at least one finger you’ve done it right).

  7. Apply superglue to the thing you’re trying to superglue (the gluee). The crucial element for success in this step: make sure you either superglue one finger to the gluee and/or superglue one finger to another finger.

  8. Replace cap (after locating cap) and toss half-tube of superglue in junk drawer for future use 6-12 months from now. Don’t worry about which drawer (see: Step 1).

  9. (Optional) Google “how to get superglue off fingers”, click the first link, and do whatever it says.

  10. (Optional) Buy your wife a new pair of sunglasses that don’t have your fingerprint melted into the center of one lens.

For me, superglue falls into the category of things that uniquely provide a necessary function, but that I earnestly hope to never-ever have to use. Post hole diggers, EpiPens, fire extinguishers…this fuckin’ thing.

Anyhow, whilst bathing my fingers in acetone over the weekend I was thinking of things in the World of Computering that fit this category. Tools like kill stra, ce and jmap. Now, each of these have legit (non-emergency) use cases…but I don’t think I’ve ever taken a heap dump because I just love-love-LOVE me , some heap, eh?

Related: I’m nominating fsck as the best-named command line utility of all time. (If you know, you know).

What tools in your toolkit are you simultaneously thankful for and hope to never have to use?