So now, after seven years in Jersey, I have a top-of-the-line contractor or two, an electrician, a plumber, the furnace guy, and an appliance repairman - all reasonable people who come when you need them, or at least call and tell you when they can be there.
Everything else I can handle myself.
My paternal grandfather was an electrician. One summer day, after he and my grandmother moved to San Diego to live with my aunt and uncle, I found in a box of cast-off books a set of manuals he had used in trade school.
Even in 1961, electricity sure had changed since those books were published in 1915. Still, I read them, inhaling the years of mustiness embedded in their pages.
I picked up a few things, though - other than mold spores and silverfish - and I decided to try some experiments.
The light fixture in our second-floor bathroom had a pull chain. I noticed after one Sunday-night bath that if I got out of the tub and pulled the chain, I would get a slight shock.
I should have kept this discovery to myself, but I told one of my sisters, who, after repeating my experiment, fainted. She was not grounded (if she only had stayed on the rug). I, however, was grounded for two weeks.
I had bought an "on the air" sign for our neighborhood "radio station" (six 11-year-olds basically talking to themselves, since we could broadcast only a few hundred yards in any direction from my attic). It required a bit of soldering, so I carefully read the directions that came with the sign and the corresponding chapter in Grandpa's manual.
At least, I thought it was the corresponding chapter. I plugged the sign into the living-room outlet, and the shock sent me flying across the floor and into the couch.
The verdict: improper grounding. My father did not forget to ground me properly. For at least three weeks.
Then, there was Harry.
