I discovered a new source for tools tonight - the emergency room at your local hospital!
I had to take my son in for some stitches on his hand (football practice accident. . . ), and when the doc was done, he was telling us to come back in 8 - 10 days to have the stitches removed. I asked him if it was ok if we did it at home as 1) we’ve done it before, and 2) my oldest son is a registered medical assistant. He said he wasn’t allowed to tell us not to come in, but off the record it would be ok. He then stated that the tools he had used for the sutures were “disposable”, and handed me a nice pair of fine pointed tweezers, and a small, pointed, slightly curved set of scissors to remove the stitches. I figured what the heck, and asked him if the hemostats were also “disposable”, and after ascertaining that I wasn’t planning on using them for smoking pot, tossed them in the bag also.
So, if you have to go have stitches or other minor surgery, see if you can bring the instruments home with you - get more for your insurance money! The bad part is I had just bought a set of tweezers and a hemostat recently - but hey, you always need replacements, right? 