Copyright (c) 2006-2008 Wendy Reid.

The day Dad lit up the house - and nearly blew us into space!

Posted under Family Life by Wendy on July 10th, 2008 7:42 am

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My late Dad was one of those people who held the attitude of ‘ Why pay someone else to do a job when you can do it yourself for free? ‘

Which is fine - so long as you know exactly what you are doing and especially when it comes to do-it-yourself electrical work. And my father had absolutely no idea about this area; he worked on the premise of if you plug it in and it works then it’s all fine…

Dad decided one time to rig up some outdoor speakers on the patio as he did a lot of entertaining, we always had people over for bbq’s and parties. He thought it would be great to have music playing outside and so he took two speakers, tied them to the branch of our willow tree and ran several metres of electrical cable directly into the house and plugged it into the power board where the television was also connected to.

Well, the idea worked fine despite Mum’s apprehension whenever it rained. But something had to happen sometime and that something happened during a particularly violent storm. We were watching the TV, which was plugged into the same adapter as the speakers outside when a lightning bolt hit the willow tree.

The charge ran through the speakers, blowing them to pieces, along the cabling into the house and straight into the television. Ever seen a TV explode…? well, we did, and from very close range. How none of us were not injured remains a mystery to this day.

So that put an end to Dad’s outdoor music. Some time I’ll tell you about the time he decided to build a fireplace in the loungeroom - using a portable barbeque…

Copyright © 2007-2008 Cultured Views. All rights reserved.

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2 Responses to “The day Dad lit up the house - and nearly blew us into space!”

  1. May Ledesma, on July 10th, 2008 at 10:56 pm Said:

    Wow! That’s really scary! But your Dad’s an adventure-buff eh? I haven’t seen my Dad do such stunts though. I mean, he always calls an expert if he’s got doubts on his abilities, especially on electrical matters. But your Dad! Whoa! Well, I’m sure he wanted to learn a lot…. :)

  2. Wendy, on July 11th, 2008 at 8:43 am Said:

    Dad was not so much an ‘adventure buff’ rather more the ‘I know what I am doing’ type. He actually had some great ideas at times but did not possess the know-how to carry them through and make them practical. Every time he got an idea it was an adventure for all of us!
    He was the worst DIY’er of all time I reckon.

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