Fellow gpg students!
Well, those in britain that is, Gui use to live in a palace!
Went to open my bedroom door last week, as you do. Nothing particularly special about the day, just like all the others really.
Except that day, I was quite surprised to receive a little tingle when I put the key into the bedroom lock. The sort of tingle you get when you run around on carpet in the house and touch the TV; or when your're in the supermarket and get that static electric shock. Was quite funny, I didn't expect it, and assumed it was my new housemates playing a trick on me.
Not that I got a thrill out of it, but I touched it with my finger too, as I thought it might have discharged itself. [family fortunes style incorrect sound effect]ERGGH ERRRGGGH[/family fortunes style incorrect sound effect]. How wrong could I have been.
I've played those smelly little electric buzzer games with friends all the time, my little brother also use to zap me with the igniter on those barbeque flamers. I've also licked the 9v batteries to zap my tongue.
But my god those seemed like small bait. The second time I touched it I felt as if someone was sandpapering both my entire arms whilst blowing heavily on them, followed by a nasty achey sensation as though my arms were being pulled out their shoulder sockets.
Being stupid, I did touch it again to see if it would suddenly stop, but it didn't. The electric shock was a bazillion times weaker, but still there. I did this about three more times touching various parts of the door and radiator around me until I asked the housemate across the landing.
He came out still in his boxers and a tshirt, clearly not anticipating a reaction. He truly had nothing to do with it, and upon telling him what I felt, he looked as if I was both laughing and being pathetic over nothing.
'Have you got anything metal' he asked. Me, being numbnuts, grabbed an aluminium baseball bat from my floor and handed it to him. 'No mate, no chance. Put the end on the radiator and lean it to the door handle'.
It looked like we were doing some sort of GCSE Physics experiment. It kinda was. But without even GCSE knowledge, lol.
The bat wouldn't balance, and thinking 'its got a rubber handle mate, touch that bit', I slowly balanced the end on the radiator, and made it gently kiss the doorlock.
I have included the photo I took of the door and radiator right after it happened.
In short, there was a very quick BANG noise, followed by a large bluey white flash about twice the size of said housemates' fat head. It happened right next to his head, which made it far funnier, and only got funner when the bat fell onto his foot :P All the lights went out, and all we could smell was burning and copper coins. The end of the baseball bat was also unusually warm when he moved it away from him.
We must have stood there saying nothing for half a minute thinking what the fudge had happened, before we went to turn the trip switch back on and see exactly what did flash and bang.
I called my dad, and his initial reaction was, 'oh shoite, the radiator is probably not earth bound, so theres a leaky live current touching it somewhere in the house giving you a bit of a buzz'. We called the letting agency, reported it and demanded it be sorted immediately.
This was on Monday gone. 7 days later nearly, and nothing.
Earlier today my dad was working close by, he popped in to check it out. Pulled out the 'Megger' electric votltage checkery thing majig and gave it a loving little prove.
The radiator read something like 4.5 volts. Apparantly, that's nothing, my dads finger gave off 9.5 as he proudly showed.
He poked and prodded a few things, each giving around 3 to 7 volts. Weird. Maybe just a random charge, one of those freak things?
Last in line was the socket part of the door lock. In goes the probe.
DING!
The digital display reads '239 volts'. TWO HUNDRED AND THIRTY NINE!
My dad jumped back and quite literally had a little truffle in his derriere.
Basically, my landlord, the stingy barstool that he is, has made a hash job of all the little DIY tasks in the house, and simply used a random two inch woodscrew to put in a brass door bit that needed a half inch screw, to match all the others.
That screw penetrated the doorframe, into the partition right into a LIVE WIRE. My door lock, and handle, the thing I touch every single day about 50 times a day was running 239 volts of live electricity straight from the mains.
Had I not been such a smelly and worn my shoes inside the house all the time, and have a good rug mat beneath me and that thin scraping of a carpet, I could very well have chargrilled myself before finding out the results of the grand prix!
Disaster!
Anyone else got dodgy landlords to coexist with the magic dodgy housemates thread? :P
Jenson drives it like he owns it; Lewis drives it like he stole it