Froggy's World - Alms for Oblivion (Weblog)

Balancing act no bright idea
19th August, 2007

How many people does it take to change a lightbulb? No idea. I'm still sitting in the dark after the bulb illuminating our balcony blew last week and wondering whether I can stand the embarrassment of paying someone to change it for me.
   "Haven't you got a stepladder?" asked my wife when I told her of this crisis. I replied that I did not for I have had an unfortunate history with ladders ranging from all but amputating a finger to breaking windows. "Don't try and change it by standing on the outdoor table or chairs," she warned.
   "I promise, I won't," I said, which was an easy assurance to give as I had climbed down from one of the chairs not a minute before.
I had contemplated standing on the table but the thought of the glass top shattering beneath my feet made me opt for the chair.
The problem inherent in changing lightbulbs is the necessity to look up. If you suffer from vertigo, the moment you look up you get the head spins, lose your balance and fall to the ground. I know from bruising, painful experience that this is so but it never stops me from trying.
So I climbed up onto the chair, holding on to its back with both hands and my knees bent. I don't know why people like me bend their knees when they begin to feel terror grip their hearts, but they do. Maybe we think we won't fall so far if we bend our knees. But the problem is that if your knees are bent you can't reach very far, so you stand there in a half-crouch with your hand above your head grasping at fresh air.
So there I was on the chair looking ever so elegant with my knees bent, legs shaking and arms extended like a tightrope walker. Gradually I raised one arm above my head and felt for the cover, at the same time attempting to rise out of the crouch. At this point I chanced a quick look up. Aaarrrggghhh! My head immediately started to spin.
Fixing my eyes on a mark on the wall where I had obliterated a wasp the week before, I stared straight ahead and reached up for the bulb cover. Maybe, I thought, I could replace the bulb using the Braille method, if only I could get the cover off. So I pushed it and wiggled it but it wouldn't budge. Temporarily defeated, I climbed down, grabbed the few screwdrivers I own, climbed back on the chair and, again staring straight ahead, tried to slide one of them into what felt like one of the screws holding the cover.
Ten minutes later, mood and temper by now deteriorating, the bulb remained unchanged. I rang the manager of our apartment block and asked, ever so casually, if there was a particular knack to changing one of the building's lightbulbs.
   "An Allen key," he said. "You need an Allen key to get the cover off."
   "Ah," I replied. "Of course. An Allen key."
   "Yes," he said. "As you know, there are about 20 different types."
   "Of course," I said, wondering just what it was that Allen had done in order to get a key named after him.
Every evening I come home and stare out onto the darkened balcony, look up at the lightbulb cover and wonder at what sort of cretin would design a light fitting in such a way that you need a degree in engineering to change the bulb? Surely life was complex enough.
Whom do you ring to change a lightbulb? I can hardly call an electrician and say: "Mate, would you mind slipping around when you've got a moment? A lightbulb just went out. Don't forget to bring your ladder and your Allen key."
I'll have to wait until I suffer some significant electrical problem and ask him, while he's fixing it, if he'd mind changing a lightbulb.
The kitchen tap's been leaking for a while and I've been meaning to have it repaired. Real men, I know, fix their own leaking taps, and good luck to them. What I need is a plumber who changes lightbulbs - surely not too much to ask?

» geocities.com/psychofrog