Outside light

Mum,

Dad was right. Except that it was actually pretty easy. The hardest part is that it's impossible to reach without standing on a chair on a shallow slope, but if you offset the chair, pull the door shut (it doesn't latch) and lean against it you have stability.

There's a tiny corroded notch at the side of the case, and if you insert a 2p (from my cache of 2ps) and twist hard, the transparent casing pops off, and there's a light sideways inside. You can plug another bulb in easily, and then the cover just presses on.

When I flicked the switch and the warm glow came on I felt quite smug at having sorted it out. It's not a big deal or I would have done it earlier, but it's nice to not mess around outside in the dark.

Half a second later, the bulb overloaded.

That was an energy saver. I swapped it for a normal one, and then it was ok. But what could have caused that?

Love Jack

Soft and Teal

The top ten most useful things to say to someone asking if you have a camping stool he can buy. (Note, as normal in things said, this refers to saying truly. If it's not true, the order of utility is approximately reversed.)

10. The shop you're thinking of isn't here any more. It was levelled to make way for a new building site.
9. You want a WHAT?
8. What's that?
7. Que?
6. No.
5. No, but have you tried [otherplausibleshop]?
4. No, but here's my phone number. I have a thing for guys who don't have camping stools.
3. OK. How high?
2. That reminds me of an interesting philosophical logic puzzle I was thinking about the other day...
1. No, you don't want that, you want [this other thing] which [does the same thing] but [lots better] and [is lots cheaper]. Here's one.

Note, I didn't actually hear all of these. And I was glad to get some fresh air, or I wouldn't have gone looking.

For those who don't know, a camping stool, or folding stool, or fishing stool is a small canvas and rod attachment which collapses to small, and expands into a mini-stool. Useful for resting while walking if you don't want the ground, or an emergency extra seat.

The building site was on-top of the key cutting shop, and fortunately (a) there is a key cutting shop on the way from every shop to every other shop and (b) I didn't actually wander into the middle of the churned up earth, stepping blissfully from swinging girder to swinging girder, before speaking to thin air and finally noticing the change.

No-one was actually shocked, or didn't understand the concept *at all*.

No-one spoke no English, though one assistant's response didn't give me confidence that she knew what I wanted and would know if they had it but I hadn't correctly divided what label they sold it under.

Several people suggested plausible shops, often ones I'd just come from. In fact, Robert Sayle suggested a hiking shop which said "No, but a lot of people ask us that", who suggest Millets, who did have a selection of different sorts, and were obviously the right shop, but only in the spring.

No-one asked me out, though several people smiled at me in the street.

"How high" is the traditional supra-yes response, but actually made sense in this context.

No-one offered logic, nor a better alternative :)