Tripping the light, not so, fantastic

Last Easter weekend I reported the glue incident in relation to my DIYing. There was a further incident that weekend that involved me nearly electrocuting myself!

I have one of those handy gadgets to detect if there in any electrical wires behind a wall. I spent six hours last Saturday putting up this nifty metal sheeting on the kitchen wall. It was a real fiddle but I managed it (although during the last half an hour the fiddle factor went through the roof – as did my blood pressure). Before commencing this I ran this gadget (not sure what the proper name for it is) over the wall where I was working to check for metal and wires. There was a wire so I avoided drilling there. Simple hey!

Anyway I was packing up my tool boxes feeling very pleased with myself and then we decided to put up this magnetic knife strip on the wall. I totally forgot to do the gadget check. Chad was holding the hoover as I drilled through the tiles. Hole one no issue, hole two was a whole other story. As the drill went in there was a MASSIVE flash of light from the hole and all the lights at the back of the house went out. Chad and I just stared at each other for a few seconds in total shock. I had drilled straight through a wire. I was SO depressed for hours after this incident – I hate it when I am a muppet.

Anyway we spent most of this week walking around in the dark, but our electrician, Nico, came yesterday and fixed it all. He told us that the new consumer electrical unit that we had put in a month or so ago (as part of doing up the bathroom and kitchen) had saved my life!!! The old 1960’s one that we had in before wouldn’t have tripped so quickly and your truly might have been a gonna. How scary is that.

I live to tell the tale – result. Anyone need some DIY doing!!!