Let me step back for one moment before I get too far into my narrative to explain how we happened upon this a particular light fixture. My wife, and I to a lesser extent, seek out and find interesting things at thrift stores, garage sales, yard sales, craigslist ads, and all other manner of places where thing can be bought cheaply or sometimes bartered. This particular light fixture came from the swap meet. And like many of the light fixtures I've hung around our house, it came with no hardware. It's usually not an issue since you have the hardware remaining from the one you are taking out that you can re-use. Also, somewhere along the way I have collected quite an array of doodads to help me with just about any installation.
Ok, back to the story. Simple, just replace the light on the bathroom ceiling. Ok, no need for a ladder, just grab a chair. Check. Get a screwdriver. Check. Turn off the power at the breaker? Naw, no need its just a light fixture, and turning off the power at the switch will do it. Good, time to get started. It should be easy, I think I'm ready to go.
I take off the old light fixture. Hmmm, that's not right, there is no hardware. The fixture screwed into the junction box through the fixture itself. Ok, no problem, off to my box of doodads. (A short while later) Got it. Just what I need, at strip of metal 3/4 inch wide with two slots, one on each end. But wait a minute, its not quite right. The bracket I need has a whole in the middle. AWESOME. Time for power tools.
I quickly determine the bit I need, and attaching it to my trusty DeWalt 19 amp drill, I set off to screw a hole in the center of this sucker. But wait, I need a piece of wood to drill into. There must be one in the shed. Got it! hmmm I can just do this on the half wall by the garage. Its nice and bright.
Drill set to high speed. Start slow then increase to full speed. Hole is forming. Looking good. Just a bit more..... OOOOOOOWWWWWWWWWW!!!!!! Shit, I think I just managed to slice the end of my thumb off. And to top it off the metal is still on the drill bit. Just sitting there waiting for me to back it off.
A trip to the bathroom to clean this thing out. Yuck, it looks horrible. Where do we keep the butterfly bandages. Can't find them. Thumb bleeding again. Hmmmm. What to do. Washcloth. Do we have red ones? Perfect we do. Wrap the cut. Now I have a little extra time to find the bandages.
Got it. Do I need two or three? I'll go with two. Now, how to unwrap the cut, dry it off get the butterfly's unpackaged and on before the blood starts again? Well, I'll figure it out.
10 minutes and 5 tries later, I called my son to get the friggin bandages out of the wrappers. I never thought it would be so hard to do with on thumb. There. Finally, I got them on, and my thumb is throbbing.
If only I could put a glove on to finish with the drill. Luckily all I had to do is reverse the thing off. I can use my palm to hold it and with any luck I wont get cut again. Like I said lucky. After 3 or 4 attempts it actually worked.
Now the easy part. Putting everything back together.....RIIIIIGHT. It seems that while I went back outside, my son decided to take a look at my handiwork and turned the light switch on. Ok, here I am working on the hot lead, when what should happen. My finger touches the ground. Hey, check it out, I'm dancing. Pulling away I flex my right hand and find what? yes, its numb from the electricity. Awesome. I guess I should turn off the switch.
After that things got easier. I guess there wasn't much more that could go wrong. Oh, except that we didn't have the right sized lightbulbs and the lighting bezel was cracked. I'm waiting until I can get to the hardware store to find the right bulbs to go in there, so that I can turn them on and burn the house down.
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