[Elecraft] More Stupidity

[Gregg mulder]

Seeing all of these "Stupid" posts reminded me of one of mine. Another story of experimenting with our good friend " AC wall outlets". 1965, I was in the 6th grade. In science class we learned abt the making of Mr. Edison's electric light. upon returning home I decieded to make my own !  I borrowed an old mason jar from my mom and removed an old lamp cord from a dead lamp got a hammer es some nails and started to build !  You were "supposed to" put the nails into a rubber stopper, wrap some nichrome wire between the nails, put the stopper in the top of the jar, attach the power leads to the nails, and make light !  Well as luck would have it I didn't have a rubber stopper, so i just used the metal top of the mason jar. I pounded the nails halfway into the lid "shorting them" and carefully wrapped some wire around the nails. I lit a peice of paper on fire and put it in the jar es secured the the lid to burn off the oxygen in the jar. then attached the 2 ends of the lamp cord to the
 nails protruding from the top of the jar. I set the "LAMP" on the bed and went to plug it in to the nearest wall outlet fully expecting to see light. when I plugeged it in I saw light alright. Arcs en sparks from everywhere ! I blew all the fuses in the house, but not before watching my lightbulb blow up, es the lamp cord melt onto my bed spread catching it on fire !  I must have jumped 10 feet in the air !  I beat the fire out just in time to hear my mom yelling " what's going on in there ? " I was still shaking when my mom entered the smoke filled room. And although i was lucky to have not been electricuted, that episode did end my Edison experiments. I was also pleasantly supprised that I didn't get a wippin when my dad got home from work. Guess they figured i'd learned my lesson. And then there was radio............
  Hope u enjoyed one of my stupid moments.  73  Gregg  WB8LZG