I Suck At Installing A Ceiling Light

Wednesday was home improvement day. On the agenda for the day: fix the ceiling light in the room with the fireplace. It's probably been over a year since the ceiling light stopped working in that room. Our temporary solution at the time was to use table lamps at night... which we did... for over a year.

But since I was on vacation, I figured that now was a good time as any to finally fix the ceiling light. Funny thing is, my initial diagnosis of the cause was that the ceiling light needed new CFL specialty bulbs. The light had worked... then didn't... then flickered on sometimes... then didn't... then turned on... then didn't.

When I had removed the dome to the light, I had noticed that the CFL bulb was essentially black. So naturally, I went to the nearest home improvement store (Home Depot) to get new CFL specialty bulbs. And for anyone curious, Home Depot recycles old CFL bulbs. Sweet!

Anyway, upon returning home, I installed the new bulbs in ceiling light and flicked on the switch. Initially, I was thinking that this was probably the easiest project I had to do. Why did I wait so long to change bulbs?

Lo and behold, the lights did not go on. Then I thought... hm... maybe that's why I waited so long. Needless to say, I started uninstalling the existing ceiling light to get at the wiring. Based on my high tech testing... of attaching a working light to the wires... I concluded that the wiring was good and that the light fixture itself was bad. This was similar to the issue my BFF (Kerry) had at her house.

So off to Home Depot again to get a new ceiling light. After careful deliberation, I decided to go with a ceiling light similar in size, but different in the bulbs it uses. Instead of using specialty CFL bulbs that are pricier, the light would use the standard type of CFL bulbs.

And after getting the light home, all I had to do was install it. Now, I suck at installing a ceiling light. Okay, so maybe I don't. It didn't take too long to install the light. Karen's grandmother came over for a quick visit. Before she even left our house, I had the light installed and working. If only I had looked further into the light a year ago...