Let there be light (From Bradford Telegraph and Argus)

Let there be light

11:06am Monday 13th October 2008

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Modern life is all very well until it goes catastrophically wrong, isn’t it?

I’m not talking about the credit crunch or the international financial meltdown here.

No, I’m talking about when all the electricity in the house blows, and not a thing in the place works.

Throwing the switches on the trip fuse box thingy usually does the trick and everything comes back on.

But not this time.

It blew again straight away, and with some force.

It’s then that you realise just how much you rely on the miracle of electricity in this modern world.

You can’t re-charge your mobiles, you can’t fire up the computer for all the essentials that provides, you can’t charge up your biking lights, you can’t watch telly, you can’t make a pot of tea, the fridge starts to melt, the freezer is likewise in meltdown, the wireless phones don’t work… oh my god!

Fortunately there are wizards in this world by the name of electricians.

While I find it tricky enough changing bulbs, their skills in unravelling the problem leave me in wonder and awe.

All done, of course, in that self-assured methodical manner that says this is not the end of the world. The problem will be solved.

And so it was, after a couple of hours of taking out every light bulb in the house, answering what seemed a puzzling array of questions about a system that was put in 30-odd years ago, that the system kicked back into life.

The rogue in the circuitry, it appeared, was a dodgy dimmer switch in the bedroom that had blown itself apart, which may have accounted for the blinding flash of light in the early morning when the system first blew.

What a relief to get everything back up and running, the clocks ticking, the fridge and freezer humming, the kettle boiling, the phones working etc.

It took a couple of days, though, for me to be able to switch a light on without an inner feel-ing that everything was about to blow again…!