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copyright
©1999-2000 |
There
it sat, amidst a legion of other abandoned housewares, collecting dust
next to a record player relic. Our soon-to-be latest lamp acquisition.
It was little, it was brown, it had a sketchy-looking old black cord,
and it had probably been sitting on that grimy shelf at the back of
Value Village for weeks before my boyfriend and I stumbled upon it.
Neither of us could quite figure out exactly how it was meant to
be used – it wasn’t obviously a floor lamp, or a table lamp, or a
hanging lamp, just a small spherical lamp shade with a long cord
attached. But scrawled across its murky-brown curves, in red grease
pencil, was the irresistible price of "1.00." We happily
snatched it up, carried it off to the cash register, plunked down a
dollar (!), and brought it back home. Sure it was in need of a little
first-aid, but so what? It was a bargain, and so funky … or rather it
would be, once we made a few minor modifications. There’s something a little scary about buying an electrical appliance secondhand. There’s just no way of knowing, until you’ve taken the risk and carried it back to your apartment, whether the damn thing actually functions or not. And, since thrift shops, flea markets, yard sales and the like offer no warranty whatsoever, you’re out-of-luck if the answer should be the latter, right? Well when you’re dealing with lamps, the answer is an emphatic "No sirree." Cloth shades can be replaced, metal shades spraypainted; and if, when you plug in the cord, your lamp yields no light, the solution is generally as simple as either replacing the entire socket, or just replacing the cord. Every lamp is assembled a little bit differently, but once you’ve seen one lamp innard – and learned the super-easy steps for disassembling/reassembling the parts – you’ll pretty much be equipped to handle any standard incandescent lamp.
---------------------------> lounge . nourish . host . laze . home. |
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