Monday, October 04, 2010

A light in the darkness

I have this problem with laziness.

Imagine, for example a lamp in my living room had a bulb burn out. Say, just to pick a lamp at random, it’s the lamp by DH’s chair. It is one of 4 lamps in a sort of lamp triangle lighting arrangement so it’s light is useful but not technically necessary to normal living room activities, like reading a book, watching tv, playing with legos, surfing the web, etc. You can still do all this, it’s just less bright.

It could be days before that bulb gets changed. Even weeks.

Partly it never happens sooner because I only notice it when I am in the middle of something else & I never remember it later. Partly I put it off because I am sure we have no bulbs and I’ll have to remember to buy them. Partly I am thinking “It’s by DH’s chair, surely he’ll notice & change it” But that never happens. (nor does he say “Honey we need light bulbs”, so I know he hasn’t attempted to replace it & been stymied by an absence of them).

I have a phobia of some sort about stocking up on light bulbs. Everything else I have multiples of. I have 5 jars of Skippy Natural peanut butter. I have 14 Scotch bright sponges and 3 jugs of dishwasher liquid.

I have 2 spare bulbs, both 40 watts with those tiny little bases that don’t screw into any fixture in my house & probably I absentmindedly bought them by accident. But I have to keep them in case I am mistaken and there is a fixture that uses them, or maybe the fridge does, or the stove.

I think this phobia is left over from when we moved every year and every apartment had different sized fixtures in the bathroom & I never could remember if this place was small bases or wide bases, or if i need the short fluorescents or the big ones and I always bought the wrong bulbs.

For me, buying light bulbs is like buying hardware. I pretty much have to take the thing I am replacing with me to buy a new one.

Even then I end up having random drawer pulls & bolts & light bulbs in my car or purse for months before I think about them.

Overhead lighting fixtures with 3 bulbs? They never get 1 bulb changed. I always wait until a second bulb goes. If I have to get the step ladder out & then risk having heavy glass fixtures fall on my face while I remove or replace them, it had better be worth my time. Plus by the time I get around to buying the replacement bulb for the first one, a second one has usually blow as well.

In my defense… I am not the only person in this house who uses the lighting. At least one, possibly two, other people could notice the burned out bulb and replace it, depending on location. One of those people doesn’t need a step ladder to replace most of the overhead light bulbs.

But I have always replaced the bulbs eventually. I have inadvertently taught them this behavior. The others have come to expect only I change bulbs and simply live in the dimness until I get around to it. “Better to sit in the dimness than curse about how long it takes to get a light bulb changed around here” being their philosophy

If something were to happen to me and I would not be around long enough for all the bulbs in a room to blow, I think probably they would start moving working lamps around rather than change the dead bulbs.

They would of course, have to do it while struggling through knee high drifts of dirty socks.

This post inspired by the fact that two weeks later I had to cannibalize a working but little used lamp in the junk room in order for there to be one working bulb in the boys room.

I’m going to buy bulbs tomorrow. I swear.

15 comments:

Scrapdreams said...

I think everyone is entitled to their one little quirk (or two or three). The next time an overhead bulb goes, why not try "honey, could you please replace that bulb for me?" Remember to bat your eyelashes and look helpless. Then you'll have effectively passed the job to him. Hey, it's worth a shot...

mapsgirl said...

Don't think of it has being lazy, think of it as energy conservation. My mom actually unscrews a couple of the bulbs in the 4-bulb light fixture she has in her bathroom. The only time all 4 lights are on is when she has company over. And this happens in multiple places in her home.

SciFi Dad said...

My brother in law has issues with light bulbs too... of course, he lost an eye when he was 12 and playing "light sabers" with discarded fluorescent tube lights he found in a dumpster so...

Comfy Mom said...

yeah, I had a heavy glass fixture cover come loose on an overhead light when I was trying to put it back in place and it almost shattered my nose when it landed on my face. I had two black eyes and a swollen nose for a week.

Cindy Carlson said...

You know they would use the dirty socks to protect their hands as they moved the one working bulb from lamp to lamp as needed. Why move the whole lamp?

Carole said...

My DH would probably be quite happy to ignore blown lightbulbs but I'm quite obsessive about them as I like bright light for reading and stitching by. So, I make sure we always have a stock of all the different bulbs in and when needed, he gets the bulb put in his hand and is gently steered towards where it needs replacing.
I don't 'do' ladders. I buy 'em, he pops 'em in. Fair division of labour ;)

Beverly said...

Love your ending speculation :) I too suffer from the why "it doesn't happen sooner" explanation. There are so many things that I only think of if I am standing right in front of it then forget as soon as I walk away @@

Mary Burt-Godwin said...

The same type of thing would definitely happen in my house. Though I don't have extra jars of peanut butter or dishwasher liquid. Keep us posted on how long it takes to get those bulbs. : ) Glad you're in my SITS tribe!

Rinda1961 said...

Light bulbs land squarely in the husband chore category at our house (along with unplugging toilets and killing spiders). He grouses about it, but I'm not budging.
Rinda

Helena said...

Oh hey. Your lazy habits and my lazy habits should be friends. They have so much in common.

Stopping by from the Pug group!

Carrie said...

lol, Fun post! And I think my DH has that phobia too - the light above shower burned out weeks ago. ;)

Alexandra said...

Umm... this post reads suspiciously of someone who looked through my windows and documented my life last night.

Replacing all the bulbs in the bathrooms...

shoppingjean said...

Today's the day! Get yourself a bulb... or two.

Untypically Jia said...

I'm totally with you on the bulb laziness. I HATE buying light bulbs. I always think I'm going to get the wrong kind. Also, the light bulb on our living room lamp went out a week ago, I finally replaced it yesterday ... by taking out the light bulb in the pantry.

humel said...

lol! I always have to take an old bulb with me when buying a new one - and as the kitchen and bathroom each have 4 bulbs (yes, 4) in their light fittings, it never seems worth replacing just one. Often we get down to just one working bulb before we (that is, before I) get round to buying new ones....