No Ang, You Blew More Than 'a Fuse'

So, I'm laying on the floor in my living room, alone, doing Russian homework while I watch Law and Order: SVU. (Amazing show. It's one of my addictions.) The overhead light has two bulbs, but one went out just the other day. The dimness wasn't that apparent until the daylight from the window stopped helping. I hate working or reading in dim lighting. I don't mind doing anything else in the dark, but I want to be able to see my pages very clearly. So, I decided I would take one of the bulbs from my bathroom light fixture. As long as it was on my side, Ang wouldn't care. I would just get a new bulb the next time I went to the store.

I climb up on my counter, lights off, and begin to unscrew the bulb. I worked on it for a long time, but it wouldn't come out. It felt loose, like it was almost there, but I just wouldn't finish. I thought for a second that perhaps I was going the wrong way, but after having the rhyme, "Left to loose, right to tight" run singsong through my head, I realized, no, I've got it right. Then why wouldn't it come out!? I looked in and realized that the glass part of the bulb was coming out of it's metal conductor. Great. Just great. I decided that I should leave it until I could get someone else in there - someone else being a professional, or at least a guy.

Later that night, Angela came home from a test at the center, and upon going into the bathroom, realized my light was out. She's taking a personal health and wellness class (a requirement) and the teacher asks that everybody in the class perform three acts of unsolicited service throughout each day. I'll just replace that bulb for Mallory with one of mine! That's a great idea! She managed to unscrew the bulb from the fixture without event, but when she went to screw the new bulb into the ACTIVE CIRCUIT - yes, this does mean that the light switch was in the ON position - a shock ran through her fingers.

"AAAAHHH!" came a small screech from the bathroom. Katie, who was in her bedroom studying - a new trend in that part of the apartment - turned to find a frazzled Angela in her doorway. A moment of shocked silence passed, and Angela showed Katie her blackened fingertips and a burnt out light bulb.

"Think this'll still work?" Katie shook her head in the negative, laughed at Angela's daze, and went back to work.

Still later that night, I went into the bathroom, flipped the switch, and when the lights didn't come on, I checked the toilet room (the bathroom has two parts, the vanity area, and the shower/toilet room, the latter has a door) same deal. I flipped the light switch in the hallway. Nothing. The other girls' bathroom? Nope. All the bedrooms and the main parts of the apartment worked, but it seems that the wiring in our bathroom runs through the hallway and into the other. Great. I didn't know what Ang had done, so it seemed really surreal at first, like the power was out only in those parts of the house.

Ang comes around the corner and saw me playing with the switches, desperately trying to get them to work.

"Oh yeah, I blew the fuse in here." She obviously didn't realize the extent of her damage.

"No, Ang, you blew a much bigger fuse than 'in here.'" She tried the other switches and started cracking up when she saw what she did. I joined in with her. We neglected to tell the other girls that their lights were out as well, but they figured it out eventually.

The next morning, as Ang and I turned the corner of the building to start heading out to class, there was the maintenance man, crouched down in front of the fusebox. We sniggered quietly amongst ourselves, and headed off to English.