Lighting

Hey everyone, its been another busy week, but I have news about the lighting situation! I told you about Penny who came out and did a assessment, but I don't remember if I told you about the electrician who came out via Penny, well, he did the rubbing his chin thing that blokes do when they are making out that they are making a super hard decision, then he said he was going to recommend that I have a lamp put at the front of the house which comes on at 10% at dusk, whenever someone walks up the garden path, it goes full power, therefore giving enough light for me to find the lock without getting in a panic and screaming and kicking  the front door. Honestly, my girls would tell you of the complete transformation of mood and character I have when trying to unlock the door in the dark, it pisses me off so much, I seem to transform into a two year old that has just had its mothers iPhone taken away. I have learnt to get the key ready before I get to the door and feel it, find the straight edge so that when I finally find the lock the bloody key is actually the right way up, AND get this, I know for a fact most of you will not admit to it, but you will be sitting there laughing saying, yep, I've done that....so, you get dropped off, usually for me its only in the car park in front of my house, but its dark, as you are waving off your mate and walking down your dark path, you are acting all cool, but really you are shitting yourself in case something jumps out of the bushes, you get to the front door and you cant get the key in the lock, the something you are imagining in the bushes has now turned into a fecking great Gruffalo and its about to eat you, you know any minute you are going to pee yourself, THEN the key slides into the lock and your home safe, stuff you Gruffalo, you'll have to get me next time! That's me, only the panic turns into anger and I end up swearing...a lot, and kicking the front door, my family have learnt when I get to that stage, NEVER  ask me if I need help for fear of loosing their own lives!! Well, that's not going to happen anymore, as the gentle light will get stronger as I walk down the path, so the Gruffalo will need to go live in someone elses shrubs (I did write bush, but felt I needed to change it to shrubs).Of course the other bonus is that when someone comes calling at the door in the dark, I don't blind them by flicking on the outside 100 watt bulb.
At the back of the house he thinks that a sort of flood lamp thing will be best, again coming on low at dusk and lighting up my whole garden (which is really quite small) when it detects movement. This will hopefully stop me from tripping over garden stuff and it will deter unwanted visitors jumping over our back fence, Ralph is crap when it comes to defending his territory, he barks twice then runs for his life!
Lastly he went into my kitchen, he looked up at the old down lights, frowned, then checked his paperwork....'it says here, you need strip lighting....why the hell do you want strip lighting?' I stood there, mouth open, gazing at him, errrr because I was told that was I needed!! He then erupted into a long rant about how the strip lighting is crap, ugly and a waste of time, oh and did he mention that it flickers so wouldn't be much good for me! why cant he just replace the down lights for modern ones, because did I realise that if they were putting up strip lighting, I would end up with eight holes in the ceiling where the old lights were as they wouldn't fill them, the whole ceiling would need painting, bla bla bla.......and was I aware how much down lights had evolved since I had the others put in....errrr nooo, sorry mate, the life and times of down lighting is not really my bag, but hey, I'll take your word for it, so yes please go for replacing the down lights!
He seemed proper pleased and then started going on about how there is three stages of light lightness! Yellow light, white light and blue light....which one would I like??? I am pretty sure my eyes had glazed over and I was dribbling, I snored myself awake, and said, white light please, apparently this was the correct choice.
Off he went to send a email to Penny and she would let me know how my case was progressing. The council have kindly  given my case a budget of £1000, and Alan the electrician recons it will come to well under that, so this week I am pleased to say that my lighting has been given the go ahead, so now I am waiting for Alan to get back to me with a date for work to start, I am actually very excited!
Also, the visual impairment team have been in touch to say they will be sending me a one off payment on the 11th Aug for me to buy all the gadgets I was telling you about, I think that has been about three months ago now, as soon as I get all the equipment I will do a 'haul' blog!
speak Soon x