Lighting the lamp

[rolanni]

I dragged the lamp out from its place by the sofa last night and by means savory and un- have caused it to work again. It now has four twisty bulbs in place -- two daylight, two bright white, 'cause that's what was under the counter in the kitchen (Note to Self: Add light bulbs to grocery list), and lo! the living room is readable once more.

Now, the DVD player doesn't work.

No lie; I'm putting out the amps this week, seems like.

Answering the multiple queries of, "But! What do the lamps stop doing?": They stop making light, a function I consider of utmost, if not primary, importance in a lamp.

Now, the Cat Farm and Confusion Factory is located in the House That The Contractor Built -- by which I mean, the former owner was a contractor, and whatever material happened to be "left over" from a paying gig came home and was incorporated into the house he was building for his family. Which is why, until we had them replaced, none of the windows in the house matched any of the other windows in the house. The wiring is likewise, um, idiosyncratic. Not that it isn't to code, but the switches work in Mysterious Ways and things that you would think were no way on the same circuit? Are.

We are also located. . .in the country, where the power has the charming tendency to flicker on and off in, oh, a high wind, or during a rainstorm, or, yanno, because it's too sunny.

What I'm saying here is that power surges are not unlikely and are possibly the doing-in of the other lamps that have died the Real Death in this location. Before we moved here, I had lamps that lasted for years, needing nothing more than a bulb replaced now and again.

Someone had suggested putting the lamps on a power-bar, which seems overkill, but, in light of the lamp body-count -- maybe not.

Many thanks for the links to the Ott lamps, which look lovely -- and which I hope I won't be needing for. . .a while.

Comments

[difrancis.livejournal.com]

Here's something I suggest to help. Staples (and no doubt other places) sells these surge protectors with battery backups. They have helped here tremendously (with the same flickery power problems). When the power goes out, they give up to an hour of power to keep things going. That has helped not only with my desktop, but also for the other things I use it for. It means that if the power stays out for longer than a flicker, I'm covered. That's particularly important in my front room, because I depend on lamps, because this is a very old house and there really aren't wall/ceiling fixtures.

I so sympathize on the wiring. We remodeled the kitchen a couple of years ago and in the process had to replace the breakerbox. That's when we found out how remarkably the house had been wired and how interestingly the circuits were set up.