Some Things Are Designed To Frustrate You

[Sean Regan]

Around the side and the front of our house we have 5 PIR security lights, (and three in the garden). One high up on the wall over the front door. A porch light below it and three on the side of the house along our drive.
The one high on the front wall had a mind of its own lately, coming on frequently when there was nothing activating it.
So yesterday, I bought a replacement. I wasn't going to pay for something fancy, I thought £18 was enough.
But it was a nightmare to change over.
It's pretty hard doing stuff like this when you're up a ladder. It's not the height, (or the fact that I'm 84), it's that you haven't enough hands.

I removed the faulty one and tried to connect the cable to the block inside the new one.
But it was of such poor quality and one screw was missing, I couldn't find another in my "screw box" and the other screws in the block weren't holding the supply wires tightly enough. I gave up in the end.

So I went down to the village DIY shop and bought a new strip of connectors and cut a block of four off.

Then swopped all the wires over, (one at a time!)

A full block was only 99p, so why couldn't the manufacturer use a decent one?
Also, the light didn't come with a bulb, but fortunately I had a couple of spares for the other lamps.


Job done!

Well not quite, the controls, need balancing out at dusk..... So the ladder will have to come out again...but not last night!

 

[Oliver Buckle]

It's pretty hard doing stuff like this when you're up a ladder. It's not the height, (or the fact that I'm 84), it's that you haven't enough hands.

I'm only eighty and a couple of days, but I know just what you mean. I cleaned the gutters out the other day, there was a torrential rain and hail storm knocked all the moss off the roof. I had a trowel that fitted the gutter, and a bucket to put the stuff in, can I have a couple of spare hands to scoop it into the trowel and hold on with please? Must at least get/make an S hook for next time. Ladder for tops of hedges is the other thing, and the missus hovering nervously and wanting to 'Get a man in', I used to be that man people got in before I retired.

 

[Anniekay]

Ladders !! I hate them!! @5'1" and a 70 yo girl, I'll happily mount and jump an 18h horse but don't ask me to climb an 8' ladder to change the curtains in my house !!

"shudders"
A horse has 4 legs and he's sturdy; takes a lot to knock him over. Ladders, on the other hand, have 4 legs as well but they're too close together to be sturdy. It's also the fact that you don't have to "open" the horse before you climb aboard !! Even if I were a man I'd hire some other f±±± to climb the ladder !!

 

[Sean Regan]

Fortunately, I have these, my wife bought me 20 years ago.

I can use them as a stepladder for pruning the big acer in the front garden..

A platform, a three-quarter length, or full length ladder.
Yesterday, three-quarters was long enough. You just fold the last section down behind the third bit.

They are very sturdy.