CONVERSATIONS OF DIY
Cindy Maddera
6 Likes, 0 Comments - Cindy Maddera (@elephant_soap) on Instagram: "Playing with fire"
We have an outlet near the front door; it’s the one Michael usually has a power strip plugged into for charging all of his devices. The outlet is busted. Plugs are loosely held in place and the top outlet is busted. Part of a prong hole has completely crumbled away. Despite this, we’ve still been plugging things into this outlet. Saturday morning, I stepped into the living room and noticed that Michael’s power strip was not plugged into that outlet and I got a little nervous.
Just to reassure you: This is not a story about how we burned down the house with an electrical fire.
I voiced my concerns about the outlet to Michael when I got home from grocery shopping and he told me that everything was fine. He needed that power strip in the basement. Then I said “Maybe we should replace that outlet. Can you do that today?” Michael agreed and while he was out running errands with the Cabbage, he purchased a new outlet and outlet cover. Then, after eating dinner and watching some TV, Michael turned to me and asked me if I was ready to help him replace the outlet. I nodded my head, but then said “I’m really scared about this. What if you take off the broken outlet and find that there are no wires at all back there?” Michael looked at me like I was a crazy person. To be fair, that was a crazy person kind of question. I always go straight to worse case scenario when it comes to broken house stuff. When we replaced the toilet, I was convinced that when Michael pulled the old toilet up, there would be no floor under it and we’d have to replace the entire bathroom floor. Michael assured me that there were wires behind the outlet and sent me down to the basement to turn off the breaker to that outlet.
Sounds easy enough, right? First of all, I have to start off by telling you that our circuit breaker box is a homemade contraption. Somebody took some sheet metal, beat into the shape of a box with a hammer, cut a whole in it and then mounted it to the wall. This is not an exaggeration. The circuit breakers are nestled inside of this metal box and none of them are labeled. I stood in front of the box and started turning off one breaker at a time. “This it?” “No.” “How about this one?” “No.” “This one?” “No.” “This one?” “That’s your bedroom.” "Oh! How about this one? Wait…that turned out the basement light.” I flipped it back on, then Michael said “No! That’s the one!” Now we know that the living room, the basement light and the kitchen ceiling light are all on the same breaker. Micheal replaced the outlet and I flipped the breaker back on. Sparks did not start flying out of the new outlet and our lamp, Hector, that is plugged in to that outlet came one without a flicker.
There were wires behind the old one. They are the cloth wrapped kind of wires, but they are there. We know that this house will have to be completely re-wired in the future. It has to happen before we get an air-conditioner. It really has to happen if we ever remodel the kitchen. The most important thing though, is that no one was electrocuted and we didn’t set the house on fire.