I always figured grease was just gonna trap sand and make things worse, so I never messed with it. Then a guy at the shop watched me fighting with a stiff seal one day and told me to warm it up in my hands first and rub in a light coat. Total game changer, the seal actually sits flat now and I quit getting that red ring around my neck. Guess the old timers know what they're talking about more than I wanted to admit. Now I keep a little tube in my bag and do it every single time.

Checked my own stuff after reading this and yeah, it happens more than people want to admit. I've seen it with baby formula scoops, with medicine doses on those little cups, with wiring diagrams for home outlets where the book shows a 15 amp breaker on a 20 amp line. Somebody prints it once, it gets copied forever, and the fix lives in some bulletin nobody reads. Takes five minutes to double check and saves you a whole weekend of redoing work. Slow is smooth and smooth is fast.