I changed a lightbulb today. Yippee!
A little context here: my kitchen has recessed lights in the ceiling, about ten of them. On most days, the daylight is too dim to do much in the kitchen without those lights on, so the lights may be on anywhere from 10 to 18 hours a day when I'm home (which is most days). Naturally, the bulbs eventually burn out, even the new, super-efficient LED bulbs, and I'm frequently replacing them. I usually keep a box of a dozen in the pantry to replace as needed and when the box runs out, I buy a new one at the supermarket.
I must have bought a batch of deficient light bulbs, as when I went to unscrew one burned-out bulb recently, the glass part twisted off leaving the metal part still in the socket. Days later, another bulb did the exact same thing.
I've been living in this house, this pile of bricks up on a hill, for some 18 years now (this Saturday will be my 18th-year anniversary). I've been replacing at least one bulb a month since then, sometimes more, and this has never happened before. And then twice in the course of a week.
Now, how to get the metal part of the bulb out of the socket? Obviously, I turned off the power first, and tried using a pair of pliers to grab a lip of the metal so that I could screw it out. But the broken part of the bulb was deeper into the socket then it was long, which is to say there was no exposed lip to grab onto. I tried using a pair of needle-nose pliers to get a grip, but all I managed to do was deform the metal base and make it harder to remove. To make matters worse, with the lights out, it was hard to see what I was doing up in that recessed socket, even with a flashlight, and the confined space of the light canister meant that my own hands would obscure the view of my activities.
Well, shit. What to do? Feeling frustrated, I took a break for a day and then tried again with a fresh attitude, but my luck was no better. I looked online for advice, but most sites said to do exactly what I was doing - use needle-nose pliers and be patient. Some sites suggested using a potato - slice a raw potato in two and jam the exposed surface into the socket. The potato will fill the socket, they asserted, and then you can twist the potato to unscrew the remaining bulb. I intuitively knew this wouldn't work, and would just fill the socket with a lot of mashed potato, making matters only worse.
Was I going to have to call an electrician or a handyman over to change my lightbulbs? Was that what it really was going to come down to? Had I become so incompetent that I have to pay someone to come over and change my lights? How many Retired Old Men does it take to change a lightbulb? Two - one to slice a potato in half and another to call an electrician.
On my like 11th Google search for advice, I got a pop-up ad (not a search result) for a bulb extractor tool. It was a simple enough device, a sort of reverse pliers - squeeze the handle and the jaws open up. You put the plier head into the socket, open the jaws to grip the bulb head from the inside, and then unscrew the bulb while keeping the handles squeezed tight.
I ordered the tool from Amazon Monday morning - at least two weeks after the first bulb broke - and it arrived last night. I used the tool on the second bulb this morning - the one I hadn't mangled with the needle-nose - and it came right out. Dang, the thing actually worked!
The second bulb was a little more difficult due to the aforementioned mangling, but I eventually managed to get it out, too. I replaced both bulbs with lights from a new batch of bulbs made by a different manufacturer. So after several weeks, I've got all 10 (or so) lights in my kitchen working again.
A small enough victory, but one that's helped my self-esteem more than it should have to. No, I'm not so incompetent after all that I have to call (and pay) for help to come over on what should be the simplest of household tasks.
Little crises, little confidences. Life as a ROM.
Top picture: the bulb extractor tool (foreground), the metal bulb pieces that had been stuck in the socket (midground), a complete light bulb surrounded by the two bulbs that broke (background).
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